Launching Our New Research Database

V. Miranda Chase

Remineralize the Earth is proud to announce the launch of our new research database, click here, the only online research database dedicated to soil remineralization. An important means of promoting this mission is to make research relating to soil remineralization as easily accessible as possible to gardeners, farmers, scientists, and policymakers. With the launch of our database, there is now a single, convenient resource that gives the public access to a wealth of academic studies and other articles which demonstrate the benefits of soil remineralization.

Our mission is to see the planet Earth rejuvenated with strong, healthy, remineralized soils that produce nutritious and delicious food for all people and sequester carbon. Soil remineralization is the process of adding finely crushed rock dust to unhealthy soils in order to bring back macro and micro nutrients lost through weathering and unsustainable farming practices. The articles in our database include scientific research that has tested different types of rock dust, on different soils, with different crops. These studies show how adding rock dust systematically increases yields and regenerates soil fertility. Other papers describe how adding rock dust to soils is an effective and inexpensive way to trap carbon from the atmosphere by increasing microbial life and boosting plant growth. The reports in the database cover projects and practical case studies that have utilized remineralization to alleviate poverty and protect the environment.

We encourage people from all over the world to use our database in order to grow healthier gardens, to increase yields for agriculture, and to advocate for policies that protect environmental resources. The purpose of our database is to serve all of those who want to learn more about how soil remineralization can help alleviate poverty, improve human health, mitigate climate change, and protect the environment. Soil remineralization is important to everyone from farmers and gardeners to scientists and policymakers.

Our database is available in English, and every document in it is hosted with permission. Achieving this result posed challenges: the research related to remineralization was originally published in several different languages, and the copyrights were held by many different authors and groups. A team of volunteers from many different countries and backgrounds—but united by a desire to serve the environment—worked together to make the database a reality. Omid Afzalalghom and Michelle Ottmann each translated a large number of documents. Jayme Severance took responsibility for proofreading the translated documents. Giovana Dubocq was able to contact the authors and get permission for Remineralize the Earth to provide all of these documents to you, free of charge. Thanks to their service, we are now able to launch our database.

This database is an ongoing project. New research is being published. 2013 was the last major conference on remineralization in Brazil, and the next conference is in 2016. The majority of conference researchers comprise the field of agrogeology, defined as geology in service to agriculture. Agrogeologists collaborate with and are part of the agroecology movement around the world. Each conference produces about 70 – 80 research papers, most of which need to be translated into English. The number of articles on remineralization is growing. We will keep working to increase the number of research studies available, and our aim is to have 200 studies in the research database by the end of 2017. We are dedicated to maintaining a single platform that offers the most comprehensive, up-to-date online research database dedicated to soil remineralization.

We welcome any constructive feedback, so please do not hesitate to contact us with your comments. If you believe that this effort is valuable to you and to our planet, we would tremendously appreciate your support. We are a volunteer-based organization with limited resources. We appreciate contributions small and great!

Miranda Chase is an Environmental Policy Researcher, with a BA in International Relations and MSc in Integrated Water Management. She is a PhD candidate for the UMass program on Global Governance and Human Security, and is a research fellow from the IGERT program of the National Science Foundation. Her research mainly concerns sustainable development in rural communities of the Amazon basin. As a coordinator for RTE, her goal is to provide a state-of-art database with reliable information about remineralization as a sustainable, effective and affordable solution to agriculture worldwide. This knowledge can assist scientists and policy makers, farmers and gardeners, and the general public in making better environmental decisions.