Tseke puts soil health under spotlight
The decline in agricultural soil health has motivated Tseke Nkadimeng and a team from the Conscious Planet Save Soil movement to walk 10 000km to collect signatures to save the soil.
According to Nkadimeng, the walk started in Dullstroom on July 27 last year and then proceeded to Nelspruit, Durban, Bloemfontein, Cape Town, Namibia, Randfontein, and the Northern Cape including Kimberley. “We have been to the Northwest province, Mafikeng, the border with Botswana, Alldays, Thabazimbi, Beit Bridge in Musina, Pafuri and now we are here in Giyani on our way to Phalaborwa, and then from there we will head to Polokwane,” explained Nkadibeng.
They aim to end their trip on April 4 at the Union Building. “We walk 30 to 40km every day from town to town and villages creating awareness about the need to save soil by pressurising the government to create policies that are soil friendly,” he said. According to him, their goal was to collect as many signatures as possible and present them to the president.
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“We want to present the signatures along with our storybook on saving soil as proof that there is enough support for the creation of soil-friendly policies,” he said. Nkadimeng said the use of pesticides is not necessarily bad as it prevents food shortages. “What is important is the manner in which soil is being deprived of its original content. “You need to allow leaves, grass, and branches to return to the soil in order to form organic matter. “If you do that, there might be no need to use chemical fertilisers,” he said.
