Dirt ties in the essential elements of life such as food, water and natural elements. The organic compounds, which make up the soil, support all living organism and any life form could not sustain without it. Three services it provides are food, water and natures elements; simply, without these we would not be able to survive. Dirt is the very base of life on Earth because it has most of the important nutrients in which plants need to grow; those plants in turn feed animals and humans. Dirt is also where much of our fresh water is stored. Fresh water travels through the soil being filtered as it goes. It often ends up in underwater rivers called aquifers where we can get it when we need it. Thanks to dirt, we have clean, fresh water to drink and food to eat.
Many industries and activities are having an adverse impact on dirt for example agriculture and runoff. The current type of agriculture uses monocultures. A monoculture is when a large amount of one crop planted in a field. This has detrimental effects on the soil because this crop takes in the nutrient out of the soil, leaving it deficient and unable to sustain other crops. The monocultures also attract many pests. Since there are no other plants that would attract other pests, which in turn would make these pests compete and therefore regulate the amount of insects, farmers uses a large amount of pesticides and insecticides. Farmers overuse these toxic substances and because the soil is deprived, it is not able to take in the extra pesticides. Therefore, the pesticides run off into nearby streams, which cause eutrophication, creating a anoxic environment. Due to these problems, small farmers are unable to support their crops, which cause them to lose their jobs to industrial farms. Recently the U.S. agricultural industry consistently experienced record profits, but this agricultural boom did not create more