Nothing short of a climactic miracle will save us now, and people are fighting over the corpses of once mighty rivers. There is literally a window of only 6 months left.

>> Water economist discusses Australia's Murray-Darling River system crisis

"Land erosion leads to reduced productivity, migration, food insecurity, damage to basic resources and ecosystems, loss of biodiversity and also contributes to increasing emission of heat-trapping gases, the Rome-based agency said.

"The loss of biomass and soil organic matter releases carbon into the atmosphere and affects the quality of soil and its ability to hold water and nutrients," said Parviz Koohafkan, director of FAO's Land and Water Division."

Desperate times call for desperate measures. While I'm a bit concerned about the safety of RoundUp (TM), I wonder whether it might be time for most of those concerned about our environment to withdraw their opposition to RoundUp Ready (TM) and similar technology. It could be rapidly deployed to the areas suffering the most from degradation of soil and permit broad adoption of no-till agriculture.

I think the benefits would far outweigh the risks. This plan would have to include means of providing some financial assistance to the farmers for they can afford the herbicide and dramatically reduce restrictions on their ability to save seed for use the following season. Perhaps they could save seed for personal use, give it to others, but not sell it to other farmers. The institutions owning the technology would also have to fund an independent investigation of its safety and contribute to research that addresses public concerns, real or imaginary. We might also require transfer of the technology to the public domain after, say, ten years. No more patents that last decades.

There is my report, please send the check for a million dollars to my bank account...

Why can't no-till ag be done organically?  This sounds like lies and propaganda from the petrochemical industry.