A Well-Being Approach to Soil Health—Insights from Aotearoa New Zealand

Abstract

This paper explores the concept of soil health from a human well-being perspective in Aotearoa New Zealand. Globally, soils play an integral role in wider society and the environment by maintaining a large range of ecosystem services and benefits. As populations and resource constraints increase and food production and food security become growing issues globally, there is a recognition of the importance of defining soil condition or soil health for sustaining all ecosystems, including services and benefits to humans, plants, animals, and micro-organisms. While the ecosystem services approach has helped to illuminate the varied services soils provide, an understanding of the complex human–soil relationships and values has been missing. Those seeking to understand and form concepts about soil health have concentrated on the more inherent biochemical, physical and economic (e.g., productivity) aspects of soils, but not on the human, social or cultural dimensions. It is argued in this paper that soils form an integral part of our social and cultural fabric and are fundamentally important to human and societal well-being. The way humans interact with, value and use soil is a critical part of determining the health and sustainability of soil ecosystems. We discuss how a well-being approach can improve understanding of soil health with respect to societal goals and needs. We believe this type of approach, which includes social and cultural dimensions, provides a more diverse and inclusive knowledge base and perspective to better inform the development of integrative policy. This would lead to improved management and decision-making of land resources and soils in Aotearoa New Zealand and globally.

Geoethical futures: A call for more-than-human physical geography

“…Further, collaborative research by and with Māori scholars in Aotearoa New Zealand has prompted research on natural systems’ plural knowledges for: rivers (e.g. Hikuroa et al, 2021); soils (Stronge et al, 2020); and, geomorphic perspectives of the rights of nature (for Rights of the River see Brierley et al, 2019). Research by Brierley (2020) and Salmond et al (2019) prompt us to ask: ‘How do assertions of digital rivers and Māori narratives in telling each river’s story, relate together or otherwise push up against each other in ways that prompt us to think and act differently?’ For soil, Soilsafe’s participants’ situated, relational recognition of soil as oneone, whenua, and whakapapa therefore notice not just the human values of soil, but soil’s genealogical ties to human and more-than-human others, its cosmological connections, the invertebrates and microbes that co-produce it biologically and independent of humans, its cosmogenic nuclides that situate it temporally in its parent rock.…”

Giving stakeholders a voice in governance: Biodiversity priorities for New Zealand's agriculture

“…Lessons emerging from our process evaluation include: Institutes addressing conservation challenges within local contexts will need to be ‘boundary spanning’ to manage cross‐scale influences and create circumstances that encourage conservation behaviours by relevant actors (Abson et al., 2017; Darnhofer et al., 2011; Norström et al., 2020; Ostrom, 2009). To help address the ‘persistent gap’ between information generated by science and that desired by land managers (Sutherland et al., 2011), there is a need to recognise the effort required to overcome existing power hierarchies (Irwin, 2001; Norström et al., 2020), be sympathetic to the time pressures of collaborative process participants, facilitate transparent and structured decision‐making processes that deliver social justice and explicitly plan for such. Processes should better capture the relational values of nature (including Te Ao Māori perspectives; Harmsworth & Awatere, 2013; Reid & Rout, 2018, 2020; Stronge et al., 2020) to more successfully leverage peoples’ connection to nature in conservation policies and practices to deliver desired biodiversity and social outcomes (Chan et al., 2016; Mattijssen et al., 2020). Wider environmental (e.g.…”

“…However, a potential weakness emerging from this power dynamic was the failure to meet all participants' expectations (Fung, 2015;Rowe & Frewer, 2000). For example, while & Rout, 2018& Rout, , 2020Stronge et al, 2020). Furthermore, as our 'solution scanning' focussed on management actions implemented at the farm level, wider environmental, social, economic and political mechanisms were not considered (Sutherland et al, 2014).…”

“…• Processes should better capture the relational values of nature (including Te Ao Māori perspectives; Harmsworth & Awatere, 2013;Reid & Rout, 2018Stronge et al, 2020) to more successfully leverage peoples' connection to nature in conservation policies and practices to deliver desired biodiversity and social outcomes (Chan et al, 2016;Mattijssen et al, 2020).…”

“…This philosophy underlies the development of New Zealand's recently launched environmental strategies (Department of Conservation, 2020; Howard et al., 2020; Minister for the Environment, 2020), informed by Māori worldviews and knowledge systems (e.g. Reid & Rout, 2018, 2020; Stronge et al., 2020). Furthermore, as our ‘solution scanning’ focussed on management actions implemented at the farm level, wider environmental, social, economic and political mechanisms were not considered (Sutherland et al., 2014).…”