Healthy Soil, Healthy People

The condition of the soil beneath our feet can shape not just the health of our food, but also our risk of disease, resilience to climate impacts, and the safety of the water supply. According to a growing body of research, soil health is a critical foundation of environmental sustainability and human well-being.

Soil health is not simply about whether crops can grow; it’s about whether the soil functions as a living ecosystem. A healthy soil maintains biological diversity, stores and filters water, cycles essential nutrients, and sequesters carbon. It supports microbial communities that interact with plant roots and affect everything from crop nutrition to ecosystem stability.

For decades, however, soil assessments focused narrowly on chemical indicators like nitrogen, potassium, or how acidic or alkaline it is. These were measured mainly for optimizing short-term yields. This reductionist approach, while useful for agricultural productivity, failed to capture the broader ecological and human health implications of soil degradation.

Why Soil Health Matters For Human Health

The health of soil has direct and indirect effects on human health. First, it affects the nutrient density of the food people eat, with healthy soil producing more nutritious crops. Second, soil acts as a filter and buffer, influencing the purity of groundwater and the resilience of ecosystems to climate extremes.

Perhaps most urgently, degraded soils can be breeding grounds for antimicrobial resistant bacteria (mutated microbes that have become immune to human medicines) and zoonotic pathogens (viruses and bacteria that jump from animals to humans), both of which pose significant public health threats. Furthermore, degraded soils contribute to climate change by releasing stored carbon, while healthy soils can serve as carbon sinks, absorbing atmospheric carbon and storing it to reduce the concentration of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere. Thus, protecting soil isn’t just an agricultural concern—it’s a planetary and public health imperative.

A New, Holistic Framework

Recognizing these complex interconnections, researchers are calling for a paradigm shift in how we define and manage soil health. Some researchers argue for expanding the definition of soil health beyond chemistry, to include its biological and ecological functions. Others propose embedding soil health into global frameworks like One Health and Planetary Health.

One Health traditionally focuses on the interconnection between people, animals, and the environment—primarily to address zoonoses and antimicrobial resistance. Planetary Health takes these ideas a step further, emphasizing the links between human health and the Earth’s natural systems. However, soil health has been largely absent from both. By placing it at the center, we can more effectively tackle root causes of environmental degradation and health inequities.

Toward Integration and Action

The condition of our soils is more than a farming issue. It is a public health, climate, and sustainability issue. A living, functional soil supports not just plants, but people. As the scientific community moves toward a holistic framework for soil health, it becomes increasingly clear: to care for our health and the health of the planet, we must start from the ground up.

If you want to support your local soil health, learn more about Understanding Community Supported Agriculture