Thinking ahead

Michael Horsch talked to terraHORSCH about hybrid farming with regard to the Green Deal announced by the EU and about how many possibilities really still are in the topic CO₂ storage in humus.

It is quite interesting that we have already been dealing with these topics for quite some time, long before these stipulations now were issued officially. We and a lot of our customers, too, who we are in close contact with all over the world for a long time have been well aware of the fact that we have to work on the topics reduction of plant protection measures or residue-free production of staple foods. So what does hybrid farming mean in this context? The ultimate objective “yield maximisation is the only kind of profit maximisation“ worked perfectly in the past 60, 70 years. But we will only be able to advance if we abandon this way of thinking. The details, of course, have to be discussed. This actually is the core approach of hybrid farming. Hybrid farming will only work if we do not put the ultimate maximum yield first. This does not mean that we cannot achieve it.

Reduced meat consumption?

Another central question in this context is: What will we eat in the future? This topic gains enormous momentum among people in Europa, USA/Canada, but also for example in Brazil or Russia. Meat consumption is reduced a little bit and people eat more vegetable products. By the way, in the US, this topic might get rather exciting after the election victory of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. For in their election program they, especially Vice President Harris, take a firm stand that meat consumption is to be reduced – mainly in the fast and junk food sector. I do not want to judge whether this is right or wrong. It would also happen if the outcome of the election had been different. Flexitarism, i.e. less meat consumption, is a trend in a lot of countries all over the world – even if these countries, of course, only cover part of the whole world population. But people change their diet for health and/or for climate reasons. The same is true for meat substitutes. We will no longer need the current quantity of maize and soya for animal feed. More land will be available for vegetable food.  
I also observe that often people do no longer discuss why and when exactly we have to implement the new processes. Many people already discuss what is the best way to do it. And when I talk about my thoughts with regard to hybrid farming, they often say: “Yes, we have to deal with this to manage our farms sustainably and profitably.” Perhaps in some countries we can even earn money with regard to the topic of residues in food. For the consumers want food without residues. And this is something you can control exactly. Even if only Europe wants it, it will affect the whole world. And if maize from the Ukraine or soya from Brazil arrives and residues are found, the train full of wheat or the ship full of soya has to go back home. This, too, are topics in the EU’s Green Deal. Of course, there are countries that for example for wheat might consider this as a competitive advantage. Let’s take the Ukraine as an example. Their wheat would go to Egypt or China. But if Europe drops out as an import market for maize or soya, this will have massive consequences on resource flows and also on the price. For when the soya and maize producers start looking for new markets, all the other producers will do that, too.

Humus formation

With regard to the topic of humus formation it becomes more and more clear what is possible and what is not. It is a fact: in my opinion, especially the Germans, among others, rank first when it comes to intensive and modern farming. But most of them have not yet achieved the maximum organic carbon (C-org) in our fields. The average humus content of our arable land in Germany is just below 2 %, for grassland it is 5 %. How can it happen that the C-org content of cultivated grassland is twice and a half as high as the content in arable land? This is closely related to the fact that photosynthesis is carried out the whole year round. As soon as it is sunny and wet, sugar is produced. And part of this sugar, between 10 and 30 % depending on the plant species, is emitted as liquid carbon into the rhizosphere and the soil organisms. They increase considerably. The spreading of soil organisms, however, is limited by the salt concentration (fertiliser) in the soil. Little research has been done on this topic so far, but it is clear that with a wider rotation, a high share of catch crops and an adapted, non-turning cultivation you will get closer to the C-org rate of a cultivated permanent grassland. Thus, it should be possible to build up to 0.1 % of humus per year. But the humus that is built up in this case normally is nutritive humus and not permanent humus which mainly appeals to the clay content in the soil. At the moment, you can see this in Kazakhstan. During the past 60 years, they loosened the complete fallow at a depth of 10 cm – the nutritive humus is almost used up. Now they started to cultivate with the Tiger at a depth of 30 cm. This is how they want to reach the deeper layers of permanent humus. A lot of nutrients plants can benefit from when growing are still mineralised in the soil.