Will human be able to make those barren land arable and fertile soon?
Let necessity and /pol/shit behind first.
We may make the green ones infertile ;^)
http://www.learner.org/interactives/collapse/mesopotamia.html
>Along with factors such as war and changes in the environment, scientists now believe irrigation techniques played an important role in Mashkan-shapir's collapse. The same process that allowed farming in this region also eventually made it impossible to farm. Irrigation has a Catch-22: if irrigation water is allowed to sit on the fields and evaporate, it leaves behind mineral salts; if attempts are made to drain off irrigation water and it flows through the soil too quickly, erosion becomes a problem. Scientists believe that Mashkan-shapir's collapse was caused in part by destruction of the fields by mineral salts. When mineral salts concentrate in the upper levels of the soil, it becomes poisonous for plants.
>In Mesopotamia, irrigation was essential for crop production. The rivers were higher than the surrounding plain because of built-up silt in the river beds, so water for irrigation flowed into the fields by gravity. Once the water was on the fields, it could not readily drain away because the fields were lower than the river. As the water evaporated, it not only left its dissolved mineral salts behind, but also drew salts upward from lower levels of the soil. Over time, the soil became toxic and would no longer support crops. By about 2300 B.C., agricultural production in Mesopotamia was reduced to a tiny fraction of what it had been. Many fields were abandoned as essentially useless. Mesopotamian cuneiform tablets tell of crop damage due to salts.
:DDDDDDDDDD
*fixed
>>864294
>tfw even with advanced technology people are still doomed to have dynastic cycles of drastic rises and falls of population
>>864346
Isn't it fun how we got the ability to destroy great areals of farmland without even putting any effort into it?
>>864282
The natural beauty and diversity of our earth makes me feel like crying sometimes
>>864294
>Ecological failure and infrastructural breakdown is a new alternative theory regarding the end of the Khmer Empire. Scientists working on the Greater Angkor Project believe that the Khmers had an elaborate system of reservoirs and canals used for trade, transportation, and irrigation. The canals were used for harvesting rice. As the population grew there was more strain on the water system. During the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, there were also severe climatic changes impacting the water management system. Periods of drought led to decreases in agricultural productivity, and violent floods due to monsoons damaged the infrastructure during this vulnerable time.[30] To adapt to the growing population, trees were cut down from the Kulen hills and cleared out for more rice fields. That created rain runoff carrying sediment to the canal network. Any damage to the water system would have enormous consequences.
>>865578
Wasn't the North African and Spanish desertification at least sped up during the Roman times?
>>865647
Yea i've heard about that, also in Australia currently there are large areas being effected by soil salinity rising due to excess irrigation which is destroying the productivity, and leading to desertification.
>>865661
Sounds bad, I guess it's extra bad for places like Australia since they are so fragile for desertification even without overfarming?
Anyone who got an idea how much truth there is in this claim?
>Scientists are warning that the UK is facing an “agricultural crisis” unless dramatic action is taken to reverse the depletion in soil nutrients.
http://www.fwi.co.uk/news/only-100-harvests-left-in-uk-farm-soils-scientists-warn.htm
>>865693
>Anyone who got an idea how much truth there is in this claim?
I can't be sure about there exact estimates, but of course it's a massive issue, people seem to forget the importance of soil quality in agriculture, I'd guess that Europe having been farmed continuously for such a long period will certainly be afflicted by these problems. For Australia even though it hasn't been farmed as extensively the soils are much less fertile and resilient for most of the continent.
>>864282
Global warming will do most of the work for us, those frozen northern regions will be the new population centres. Sahara, probably not fixable, we could "farm" electricity there tho.
>>865718
Dumping this because it is relevant.
Always gets me that California is one of the US main agricultural production centers.
>>865743
Actually, that may not be the case, as we can't for sure know how it will change.
While southern altitudes gets warmer northern ones may get colder or to rainy for humans to live at as water and air currents may change due to the changing climate.
We also got the problem that there is a lot of lakes in Russia that are leaking metanhe, which may alter climate change even futher without Humans being able to do much about it.
Not to forget the problem of rising water levels, both due to melting ice and that water expands when it gets warmer (As long as it is above 4 celsius that is)
>>865743
Link for the methane thing.
http://inhabitat.com/toxic-methane-is-leaking-from-siberias-permafrost/
It's also a rather popular theory that the reason humans became farmers to begin with was because climate change, getting even more climate change that makes farming impossible ((Seasons became to unstable, as an example)) would pretty much kick the legs of our civilization away.
>It’s not surprising that climate change has doomed so many populations, Blom says. After all, it was when weather patterns finally became predictable about 11,500 years ago that complex civilizations finally formed in the first place. A stable climate ensured that crops would grow year after year, and a reliable source of food freed people to settle down and develop culture.
http://climate.nasa.gov/news/1010/
Maybe I am just being an alarmist though?
>>864282
>North American Grain Belt
>not arable and fertile
Who made this map?
>>865743
Yeah what will happen to all those people where all their land is fucked beyond repair and reducing their agriculture and living spaces?
You know this whole forgetting a large area of the world thing has fucked pthe world up once lest not do that again.
>>865803
And yet Antarctica, the largest desert, isn't marked
>>865803
It's not actually that bad (Also of course it's simplified as fuck).
>>865953
This one isn't much better. It strikes me as Americans just guessing what the rest of the worlds soil might be like based on some rough measurements of things like weather or something.
>>865977
I doubt that.
It's showing soil quality in terms of performance and resilience.
>>865985
Yeah, but they have the soil around the st lawrence as being the same as that of northern ontario. That's just retarded.
>>865987
It's still not going to be perfect, especially when looked at from this scale, but I doubt that it isn't showing the general pattern. Perhaps the climate in those latitudes is inhibiting the fertility of the soil, but for Australia I can see the lake Eyre basin and the great dividing range quite clearly.
It does seem a little strange that it's an American map, yet there is greater detail in other areas. Maybe soil quality is lacking research in America?
>>865782
>Grain Belt
It wasn't marked grey. Look closer.
>>864308
Is there any known way to fix the Aral Sea or is it permanently fucked?
>>868088
The damage is irreversible. The water and the sand surrounding the lake is also highly toxic.
>>868102
Feels bad man. At least the northern part was saved.
>>868102
I did use to think it was a pretty good proof on the Soviets being retarded, but we are doing the same in the West, aren't we?
>>865743
Perhaps, eventually. But it takes time for new land to be colonised by other life, soil to build up etc.
>>868142
Unsustainable growth has the same consequences regardless of the ideology behind it.
>>868167
The northern latitudes have different distribution of sunlight though, which affects which crops can be farmed and how many yields you can get in a year. And you'd be chopping down the few remaining forests which considering the current state of things is a terrible, suicidal move.
>>868210
Not to forget that the whole season-based years that our agriculture is based on may become destroyed if the weather gets to unstable.
>>868142
Texas here
All this water is nice, but its too much senpai
California take that shit back before we drown please
![battle-of-verdun-10[6].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/SDCO2wO.jpg "battle-of-verdun-10[6].jpg")
One rather recent envioremental change that is pretty uknown to people is the one at Verdun.
When the war was over the place had been so filled with coper and lead poision all the weapons used at the place that it became impossible to farm.
http://www.amusingplanet.com/2015/08/scars-of-world-war-i-battlefield-of.html
>The massive amount of artillery tore up the ground turning it into a wasteland of mud pools when the rain came. Forests were reduced to tangled piles of wood. Even today the soil is contaminated with heavy metals such as copper, lead and zinc, and poisonous chemicals such as arsenic and ammonium perchlorate, which were used in detonator shells. Only the most toughest plants managed to survive. Millions of unexploded shells still litter the region. Everywhere you look the brutal scars of war are visible in the many over lapping craters.
>>868275
So many things that can potentially fuck up everything, I can't even keep track of them all.
>>868142
Los Angeles never should have been made into a major city in the first place. It's retarded how many people live in a desert
>>868305
X) i like how everything just isnt so simple
>>868305
Not to forget things that can't be foreseen.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKyRHDFKEXQ
>>868379
Ah the fabled unknown unknowns.
>>868142
>tfw michigan
The only thing we don't have is as much money as new york
>>864282
/pol/ is always right, chap.
>>868423
>Pride about having Detroit
