A group of 79 company bosses and investors managing $41 trillion issued separate calls on Thursday for world leaders to accelerate action on climate change by enacting more ambitious policies in areas including carbon pricing.

“One of our most important solutions to the global challenge posed by climate change lies right under our feet.” That’s according to Asmeret Asefaw Berhe, a soil biochemist at the University of Merced, and she’s talking about soil, which isn’t acknowledged as a key factor in the fight against climate change.

A growing global population and changing diets are driving up the demand for food. Production is struggling to keep up as crop yields level off in many parts of the world, ocean health declines, and natural resources—including soils, water, and biodiversity—are stretched dangerously thin.

In her book Silent Spring, Rachel Carson writes: “The sense of smell, almost more than any other, has the power to recall memories….”

Agriculture is a weather-driven industry: For Africa, more than 95 per cent of the production is rainfed.

The mammoth task of developing a pathway for South Africa to end all carbon emissions by the middle of the century is now in the hands of President Cyril Ramaphosa’s presidential climate change coordinating commission.