KEY FINDINGS

soil measuring BIO-AGRICULTURE SOIL CARBON SEQUESTRATION PROJECT.               Our company is carrying out important research work, taking detailed soil carbon measurments from a large cross-section of bio-agricultural farms around Australia. We will be remeasuring the farms after a period of 3 years - to demonstrate the ability of bio-agricultural farming to store carbon in the soil.          For more information or to donate to the project - click here

LONG TERM RESEARCH 1IRRIGATIONLong term field trials have shown significant and continual increases of soil carbon sequestration, each year, over a 40 year period. These results have been verified in more than thirty world-wide and Australian comparative field trials between bio-agriculture and conventional farming methods.

  • LONG TERM RESEARCH 2 RICE FIELDEven though climate change research is such a recent phenomena, researchers in the field of bio-agriculture have been studying the build-up of carbon in agricultural soils long before global warming became a major issue. This means we have evidence showing that carbon sequestration in agricultural soils continues over the long term.
 

Background to Long Term Research

   

feild trialsMany scientists in the climate change field talk about the great potential of carbon sequestration of agriculture. A problem that is often raised is that as climate change research is such a recent phenomena, there is not enough evidence showing whether carbon sequestration in agricultural soils continues over the long term.
It is fortunate that researchers in the field of bio-agriculture have been studying the build-up of carbon in agricultural soils long before climate change became a major issue.

 

There are over 30 studies by different research organisations that all point to this potential of bio-agricultural farming to be a major part of the solution to global climate change. Many of these studies are very long term, in some cases studying the effects of different farming methods on the same land for more than forty years, Some of the worlds oldest experimental plots have shown soil carbon can increase for over a hundred years.

 

The research has also taken place in many different countries, including, Europe, the US, Australia, Africa. and India showing that these findings are consistent under many different soil and climate conditions.

It is fortunate that researchers in the field of bio-agriculture have been studying the build-up of carbon in agricultural soils long before climate change became a major issue.

                    What the Studies Show

 

It has been shown that;

  • The figures being found in current research can be verified over the long term.
  • As long as the right farming techniques are used, carbon will be continuously built up and stored in the soil for many decades.soil
  • While bio-agricultural methods increase soil carbon, conventional farming methods based on chemical fertilisers reduce soil carbon.in the long term.
  • When taking into account the land degradation from conventional farming methods and the land regeneration that bio-agriculture generates, bio-agricultural farming can match and even surpass the yields of conventional farming.

 

The following pages show some of the important findings of this research.

For more detailed information see the references pages.

 

Long term field trials have shown that organic and biodynamic farming methods (bio-agriculture) sequester large amounts of carbon into the soil. This process has been shown to occur continuously, sequestering up to 11 tonnes of CO2-e per hectare per year.

      Research Organisations

 

The research has been done by many different organisations, including.;

  • University researchers
  • Government and UN sponsored research.
  • Agricultural research organisations.

 

More information can be found in the references and the research pages of this site.