Addressing some hurdles to implementing soil health management systems

Excerpt

Over the past 30 years, there have been many obstacles to changing the way people think about soil and implementing cropping systems that have led to the improvement of soil health in western North Dakota. Once people understand that the soil is a biological system and manage the soil as good biological habitat, they are able to significantly reduce input costs, maintain or improve crop yields, and restore and build soil health. Two significant groups of people that we identified as critical to the perpetuation of the soil health movement were lenders and landowners. What follows are some ideas that produced some success at getting everyone on the same page and continuing to build soil health while dealing with the economic realities of agriculture.