Save Soil, the brainchild of Indian mystic Sadhguru, is a global movement to enrich the Earth’s depleted, degraded soils with organic matter before it is too late for them to grow enough food to feed increasing populations.
A long time in development, the Save Soil movement is partnering with or is endorsed by major institutions, including the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), and celebrities and politicians worldwide. It is organized by volunteers and even has its own theme song. The 64-year-old Sadhguru is serious about the problem. According to his Isha organization website, the mystic is journeying over “30,000 km across 24 nations on a lone motorcycle” to encourage participation.
According to Isha’s website, “The journey will begin in London and end in the Cauvery basin in southern India where the Cauvery Calling project, initiated by Sadhguru, has so far enabled 125,000 farmers to plant 62 million trees to revive soil and help replenish the depleting waters of river Cauvery.” The trees, which may include donated crore saplings, are planted solely on the farmers’ property. “The ambition is to enable 5.2 million farmers to plant 2.42 billion trees in the Cauvery River Basin in a span of 12 years.”
Over the Father’s Day (US) weekend (June 18-19), Save Soil Walkathons were initiated in cities across North and Latin America in support of the project. Houston and Sao Paulo were two of about sixty cities that scheduled Save Soil Walkathons in the region.
To explain the basic concept behind the walkathons, each city’s walkathon signup page quoted the founder, “By 2045, it is expected we will be producing 40% less food than what we are producing right now, and our population will be 9.3 billion people. This is not a world you want to live in, and that is not a world you want to leave our children.”