I was just reading an article on Pivot Bio, a newer company using natural means to replace synthetic fertilizers. While they're the great discovery of the last century, those fertilizers are now clearly known to be an environmental disaster. https://www.technologyreview.com/20...e-tech-companies-pivot-bio-nitrogen-microbes/ My innocuous question is: knowing the great damages caused by synthetic fertilizers, is it the government's responsibility to require the crop growing industry to switch to a far less damaging natural product that is almost as efficient? Subsidiary question: If not, whose responsibility is it, if anyone's?
Well it's government's responsibility to promote good practice and possibly make incentives. Another solution developed is to use vision equipped AI machines to very selectively pest spray and fertilise in the same pass to reduce nitrate run-off. A niece of mine is an ecologist with a particular focus on soil bacteria. Speaking of governments, an important paper she wrote was removed a few days ago by a US government database because it contained the words "Climate Change". I suggested she change it to 'Atmospheric carbon based molecule photon wavelength transformation heating'. I have started to investigate salt resistant biomass crops. This is taking off in Spain and they are highly resistant to pests as few terrestrial bugs want to be around seawater.