The leading authors are a pedologist and an agronomist. For a long time, they have been concerned about the state of agriculture and the degradation of our common wealth: the chernozem – the rich black earth that has supported the people of eastern Europe for generations and which, globally, still represents the biggest reserve of future arable land. They have joined together to seek solutions to the issues of land degradation and agriculture’s dependence of on energy and other non-renewable resources that are increasingly scarce all over the world.
Their vantage points are the Rothamsted of the steppe: Selectia Experimental Station established 65 years ago at Balti and the Nicolai Dimo Institute in Chisinau (Kishinev) – in the heart of the province where modern soil science began with the work of V.V. Dokuchaev in the 1880s, which inspired the classical Russian school of agronomy under Viliams and was the homeland of the hardy red wheat, and the hardy farmers that grew it, that transformed the Prairies of North America. Heirs to these great traditions, the authors address very present global issues: the sustainability of
agriculture and the neglected but critical role of soils as a carbon source and sink; as much as one-third of the excess greenhouse gases in the atmosphere has come from the soils, through land use change over the last century. The tract of chernozem with its extraordinary thickness and natural humus content has contributed more than most
but, as the best soil in the world, it offers the best opportunity to put that carbon back in the soil – where it is needed!
Soil degradation is a global issue on a par with climatic change and loss of biodiversity. In eastern Europe, it has become more acute in the transition to a market economy. Existing farming systems match neither the processes of soil formation nor the functional principles of agro-ecosystems. This can only lead to economic and natural disaster but we optimistically consider that the situation can be turned around – if urgent and active measures are taken to restore soil fertility. The grounds for optimism are that the chernozem, though much degraded, has kept its innate capacity to build up fertility – the inherent capacity for self-aggregation and rich mineralogical inheritance from their parent material, the thick soil profile and unique quality of humus. We present the experimental data that underpin this conviction, which include a wealth of data from long-term field experiments at the Selectia Experimental Station.
Future intensification of agriculture will depend on what we are calling ecological agriculture: not a nostalgic return to organic farming but a new paradigm built upon the scientific principles of modern ecology. It draws upon all the experience of what, before recent addiction to agrochemicals and raw mechanical power, was considered good husbandry but it does not eschew the advances of modern research and development, which are surely needed. It supposes a more intensive turnover of nutrients and renewable sources of energy on every farm, built upon crop rotation with optimal tillage, fertilization, systems of weed and pest control, and mechanization; and with the full integration of perennial legumes and livestock.
The central place in this sustainable farming system belongs to soils, in which processes of synthesis and decomposition of soil organic matter drive soil fertility. In a very real sense, soils behave like living organisms and they fulfil many crucial roles in the biosphere: in the water cycle, nutrient cycle and the carbon cycle that regulates global climate, and which have been dangerously perturbed. It is impossible to maintain soils as the Earth’s living skin without an holistic approach and the book describes the various characteristics of soils that arise from the continual interaction between their living and non-living facets. It also requires radically different policies.  We know that the required reforms need the support of governments – and politics is the art of the possible – but solutions to the problems of the land must respect ecological laws that are no respecters of the economic and political imperatives of the day; there can be no compromise with ecology.
There is technical knowledge enough to recoup the health of our soils and agriculture and, essentially, this book is technical. But it is written for everyone involved with agriculture: agronomists, agricultural engineers, farmers and farm managers, executives in central and local government and earth scientists in allied fields. After all, this is everybody’s business. The authors combine pedology and agronomy, drawing upon both new and old, but not obsolete, literature and resources – including their own personal knowledge. David Dent has joined them as contributing editor of this English edition with the aim of making this knowledge, and the literature of the Russian school, accessible to specialists and laymen worldwide. Its focus is Moldova but the issues are the same in the neighbouring countries that share the same soils and environment and much of the same history – Hungary, Romania, the Ukraine, south Russia and the North Caucasus, extending eastwards into central Asia. The principles
apply equally to the black earths of the prairies and the pampas. We thank everyone who has helped to publish this book. Special thanks are due to Mr Constantin Mihailescu, formerly Minister of Ecology of the Republic of Moldova;
the Ecological Agency North of the Ministry of Ecology, Director I. Gavdiuc and the series editors Edward Derbyshire and Ed de Mulder. We are indebted to Academician Ursu for the illustrations of soils and vegetation in Moldova, Dr Freddy Nachtergaele for the global map of black earths, Mrs Y. Karpes-Liem for transcribing the English manuscript and to Larisa Mrug, Lilian and Cristina Puscas for technical assistance with the pictures.