Importing sand is just the beginning

If immediate actions are not taken, the State of Israel will have to deal not only with the problem of the lack of sand on the beaches, but also with the lack of agricultural land - and the price it will pay will be much higher

By Dr. Neta Lipman, Zivata, Science and Environment News Agency

The ground we tread on is often taken for granted. She is there, no matter what we do. We remember it only when it begins to fall under our feet: for example, when we open sinkholes and bury infrastructure under them in the Dead Sea region; Or when the warm yellow sand on the beaches, the one that helps support the coastal cliff, among other things, is washed into the sea.

Recently we were informed that the State of Israel will start importing sand from Turkey in order to reduce the enormous damages of the disappearance of the sand on the beaches. One million cubic meters of gray and black sand will be spread on the beaches of Ashkelon and Netanya as a protective measure against the collapse of the cliff. Such a move is a last resort, an emergency solution taken after all attempts to solve the problem locally by feeding Israeli sand, which is simply washed back into the sea, have failed. But the foreign sand has different properties from the local sand, and apart from the difference in color and shape, experts fear that foreign animals and plants will hide among the grains of the imported sand, which will invade the country and thrive in it while suppressing local species.

The Israeli sand, which recently made headlines, is not the only soil resource in danger in the State of Israel. According to the estimates of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, about half of the agricultural land in Israel is at risk of drifting due to intensive cultivation and due to the effects of the weather. One powerful rain event can wash away in minutes a layer of fertile soil, which took about 2,000 years to form. According to the ministry's estimates, in the last 30 years 15 percent of the agricultural areas in Israel have been damaged, and the situation will only get worse due to the extreme weather events, which are increasing and increasing due to climate change.

Healthy soil is the substrate that enables agriculture and food production. The soil provides the agricultural crops with the nutrients they need, and we - who eat these crops - draw from them the vitamins and minerals necessary for our health. Without the resources of its agricultural land, the State of Israel will lose the ability to maintain the nutritional security of its citizens, not to mention the final death blow that will fall on the agricultural sector, which is already full of difficulties.

Here, too, there are solutions that can be implemented long before we have to give up Israeli agriculture and import all our vegetables and fruits from abroad, or even start importing agricultural land from neighboring countries. There are preventive actions through the proper planning of drainage in the catchment basins of streams, and the use of processing methods that preserve the stability of the soil: one method, for example, is finding replacements for the heavy engineering tools, which cut through the top layer of soil and make it prone to drift. Another method is by planting cover plants between the rows of crops (for example in vineyards or orchards), which reduce the impact of the rain on the soil and stabilize it through their roots.

Stabilizing the soil has another advantage: it reduces the drift of fertilizer and pesticide materials from the fields into the streams, which pollute and contaminate the sea and even the groundwater.

The State of Israel will be required to pay a heavy price if it reaches a situation where it has to give up local agriculture or import agricultural land in order to continue sustaining it. Now is the time to take the necessary actions to stop the loss of agricultural land, before the erosion cannot be stopped.

Dr. Neta Lipman is the CEO of the Israeli Association for Ecology and Environmental Sciences