 You see vikings? My daughter insisted that I must see. There might be a risk that governments will see this as a potential cop-out to deal with the carbon emissions. Sadhguru, this initiative that I've been looking at, what you're doing is really incredible. What has blown my mind about what you're doing, it's something I had never even heard of before. This safe soil movement can not only be an ecological movement, but also it's a way of creating a more inclusive humanity. It's time from lab we once again come back to the land because it's on the land that life happens. Wow, wow. You've blown my mind yet again. The highest number of suicides in America of all the professions, it is the farmers. That is devastating. Namaskaram. Ah ha ha ha ha ha. Ah, Flokey and Yon, look at them. Both of them together. Let's get to see you again. Wonderful talking to both of you, please. It is likewise an honor, a privilege, a delight. Both of you are stationed where like in which part of America are you? Right now I'm in Los Angeles. Oh. Yeah. But normally I'm in Sweden, in Stockholm Sweden most of the time that's where I'm based. Oh, okay. Yeah, I'm in Atlanta, Georgia. I moved here because we're doing a new show at the moment. So I'm not far away from Tennessee. So next time you're there, I would love to. I'm there in July. Let's catch up. Oh, absolutely. Actually that's a perfect time because I'm done in July. So that'd be great. I'd love that. You golf, you guys, anybody golf? I'm terrible at golfing. But I like riding about in the golf part. This, Sadguru, this initiative that I've been looking at what you're doing is really incredible. I'm so happy you finally get to meet one of my best friends Gustav because he is, I would say, even more passionate about this than I am simply. And I'm very passionate about the environment. It's just that he's just taken the initiative to really educate himself on everything he's doing. And we're both so fascinated about what you're doing. And we'd love to learn more about everything. That's wonderful, Gustav. And, you know, it's great that young people like you are concerned about this because as a generation, if we don't do the right things now, we will live a life of regret. That's the way I look at it as well. We can't be ignorant to the information that we're getting. What has blown my mind about what you're doing just to, because I want to share this with as many people as we can, something I had never even heard of before, which was a soil being an issue. That's something I think that's not talked about at all. And I would love to know in what ways we can help spread the word and how people can take the initiative to support this. See, what I see in the last eight months, I've been talking to various world leaders, people who are in the environmental work, many, many, many scientists across the world, top scientists in the world. And as I speak to them, what I see is every one of them knows what is the problem. And every one of them knows this needs to happen now, which is very important that this time it needs to happen. But I think everybody was waiting for one idiot who is willing to bell the cat, and here I am. You appreciate me being an idiot, come on. But I join you in the idiocy. So somewhere in Europe, maybe on the right, you can catch up with me. Yeah, I hope so. Yeah, definitely. So tell us a little bit about the ride. Well, it's starting on 21st of March, so it's just another 24 days away from today. And we are riding through Europe, going to Holland, then to Berlin, and down south to Praha, Warsaw, and down south further to Slovakia, Rome, Geneva, Paris, and again, looping through Bonn because that's the UNCCD capital. We are partnering with UNCCD or the UN Agency to Combat Desertification. We are partners with them. So we spend a day or two with them and then go further. See, this is one thing when it comes to soil, this is one thing that all of us are connected to. In nationalities we may be different, in race we may be different, in religion we may be different, ethnicities may be different, so many differences. But soil is one thing that all of us are connected to. I want to use this soil not only as an ecological movement but also as a way to connect people, something there is a common ground for all of us. Well, there are so many differences, there is so much emotion, there is so much anger, there is so much everything everywhere. But at least at least the things that we are that we hold as common factors, I think we need to highlight that in a big way. I feel this safe soil movement can not only be an ecological movement but also it's a way of creating a more inclusive humanity because everybody can connect to the soil. Nationalities are made up by us, race and religions are made up by us, okay? As if we are something very different but all of us come from the same soil. So I would like to use the soil message as a way of creating a more inclusive humanity which has always been our work fundamentally, you know? That's lovely. And is it possible to then also draw the connection between soil and earth which are synonymous and that the extension of this is also that we are all one species on one planet which is the same. It's also a… So whether you use the word soil or earth it's not different in most languages it's a common word soil and earth. So earth is also the planet, it's also our home. So it extends even to that global consciousness, doesn't it? Yes, yes, they cannot be separated. It is very obvious, yeah. Sarguru, for those who aren't as aware of soil's connection to climate change or what they can be doing to further educate themselves on this or to help in any way, could you speak a bit to that? Yes. See everybody's talking about climate change. That narrative I've picked up is a very good thing that that's happened in the last ten, fifteen years time. But one needs to understand healthy soil is one of the best carbon sinks in the world. It is the best actually. It is even better than the ocean if you take in terms of square feet or square meters. Because the ocean has two-thirds of the surface, ocean is a bigger sink but in terms of square footage if you take a piece of ocean and a piece of land, the land or the soil is a much better carbon sink than even ocean surface. But at the same time unhealthy soil, plowed and exposed soil is a source of emission of both carbon dioxide and methane above all, which heats up the atmosphere almost eighty times more than carbon dioxide. So the same thing can work as a carbon sink as a way of capturing the carbon or the same thing can exude, you know gases which will enhance the climate change or global warming. And the crop land and the desert lands have the lowest level of carbon in education per hectare, you know? Crop lands and desert lands have the lowest carbon in their vegetation. Any other place if you take if to watershed areas or forests, the level of carbon in that vegetation and in the soil is very, very high. But these lands have the lowest. Deserts are another, it's another reality. We can't really go and fix the desert tomorrow morning. But the significance of agriculture land or crop lands is, this is the only piece of land on the planet which amounts to seventy percent of the land on the planet is that land which is every day tended to by human beings. The land that we are tending to if you cannot transform, how are you going to go and transform the desert or the ocean or even the rainforest, how are you going to do anything about it? This is a land where every day there's a human hand on it. This is the land we should first turn it around and it's possible to do it if we take the necessary steps, if you institute this in the policy of every nation in eight to twelve years, a massive reversal of what is happening right now can be done. What are some of those steps that would be implemented, would have to be implemented? See, we've produced a soil document, a common document for the world and also for every nation based on its latitudinal positions, regions where they are and the soil types that exist. We have identified fourteen types of basic types of soil and also the economic conditions of the region and of course the agricultural traditions because you cannot change agricultural agricultural traditions overnight, you will have to work with that. So considering all this we have made a policy document for every nation or in some cases for every region, right now all the Caribbean nations are signing up with us, we are signing MOUs with them with the soil policy document how to implement. We will do similar things with most nations, maybe the large nations may not want to sign because they have their own systems to do it but it's okay as long as they do it. But smaller nations we are trying to sign up and hand hold them in that direction. When you ask specifically what, see there is one fundamental thing that we need to understand. When Alexander asked about what about climate change, essentially one important aspect of climate change is the number, amount of PPM per, you know, in the in the air around us. On an average if it's 358 it is considered normal but today we've reached 410. This 410 means 60 PPM extra. PPM is a unit for the you know carbon dioxide or carbon molecules in the carbon particles in the air. To bring this down one important thing is to enhance photosynthesis on the planet. Whether it's a cover crop or whether it's a bush or it's a tree or grasses whatever it is, always land should have photosynthesis going on. Photosynthesis is the magic, perpetual magic that is going on using the perpetual energy of the sun. The very life that we are is manufactured from this because before photosynthesis started on this planet people say, scientists say approximately a billion years ago or whatever, whenever it started before that the oxygen levels in our atmosphere was less than two percent. Obviously human beings and most mammals could not exist in that but today it is 21% where all of us are comfortable. So this 21% of oxygen has happened mainly because of photosynthesis. So right now if you look at you know human habitations, the lands that human beings have occupied, if you fly across the world you will see the level of photosynthesis happening in every land that human beings have put their hands into is minimal or nothing, you know. Large parts of the time in the large you know for months on end in the in a year there is nothing happening it just plowed and left open killing all the microbial activity. The first 15 inches, 12 to 15 inches of soil is responsible for 87% of the life on the planet including you and me. Today we are using machines where they're plowing almost like 12 to 14 inches deep and leaving it open to the sun. This is like we peel off our skin and stand in the sun, you know, you will be screaming. That's exactly what the land is doing. Land is screaming but nobody's hearing. So the most important thing is always there must be a crop. If you have no yield crops coming there must be a cover crop all the time. So one of the things that we have been pushing for is for the governments to give some financial assistance to put cover crops. Just now about ten days ago United States announced one billion dollar fund to enhance the cover crop in various states in the country. Similarly United Kingdom has announced subsidy for cover crops. Now we're pushing the Indian government and every other government at least in the seasons when you're not growing food on it there must be a cover crop enormous foliage when time comes you just put this back that creates humus in the soil and that humus is the basis of who we are because the word human itself comes from the word humus. So essentially we have to reteach people everything that they they know is essentially about. No no we we just have to remind them because 40-50 years ago we knew what to do. Suddenly we forgot because from land we moved to lab. It's time from lab we once again come back to the land because it's on the land that life happens. In the lab you can experiment. It is life happens only in the land. And there's I was I was watching the YouTube video about this already and is it there's something like we have 80 more harvest or less? Different people are saying from 60 to 80 harvest some people are more optimistic are saying 80 to 100 harvest. 80 to 100 harvest means approximately 45 to 60 years is max. But every responsible scientist is clearly pointing out by 2045 we'll be producing 40% less food but our population will be over nine billion. That's not a world we want to live in. That's not a world where we want to live our children and go. But this can be turned around we are in a cusp of time right now. If we act now in the 10 in the next 10 to 15 years or maximum 20 years we can make a significant turnaround in the soil quality and in turn the all the other aspects related to it. But if we'll say let us say we let it go for another 30 to 40 years because the loss of biodiversity per year on an average is around 27,000 species I'll repeat that 27,000 species not organisms that many species of microorganisms are going extinct. So if you let this roll for another 30 to 40 years we will come to a place where if we do everything possible to turn it around it will take 150 to 200 years that's a disaster. For Sadguru first of all thank you for taking this on you know this can't be easy for you to do video after video trip after trip educating all these people on this and it's incredible what you're doing. For everyday people like Gustav and I what can we be doing as individuals to help? See right now everybody wants to get their hands in the earth right now because they're inspired by a video or something that is not what we need. First thing we need to understand is we should stop doing things for our satisfaction and do something that is a solution. We are interested in a solution not doing something for my personal satisfaction this is an important step everybody must take. So if we want a solution it has to be enshrined in the policy of every nation why should it be enshrined in every policy of every nation see right now if you have hundred acres of land you're doing a great job with the soil you're taking very good care about it but what is the guarantee that the next generation will do that they may turn it into a desert that's what we have done in one or two generations we've done that right. So it has to get instituted in the policy if you want to understand what I'm saying see for example if you see the cities right now in every city there is a building law if you have ten thousand square feet of land you can't build ten thousand square feet of building you can build six seven thousand you have to allow space for yourself and your neighbor but just go to the old cities and see wherever there are really old cities you will see there is no concept of a window they've all just built side by side attached to each other there's one door to enter one door to get out so that is simply because there was no law today you can have hundred acres of land you can plow every inch of it turn it into a desert in the next ten years nobody to ask you why are you doing this we must understand soil is not our property soil is not our property it has come to us from previous generations it's very important we hand it over to future generations in its living condition as a living soil not as dead material yes wow wow you've blown you've blown my mind yet again when do you start when do you start your trip to to begin this process of so I understand your meaning with with politicians people all over trying to institute this one step at a time it's your your ride is something like 30,000 kilometers so right now I'm coming to United States on 5th of 5th of March I'm sorry and I have some media interactions and stuff I finished that then I'm in Caribbean region for about four days and then by 15th I'm in London there are many events till 20th 21st I start to ride from London so then we go to Holland and from there Germany and that whole trip as I said earlier but on the way I'm taking a two-day break and going to Ivory Coast because it is the UNCCD's COP 15 170 countries representatives will be there so I will be addressing them and also handing over these soil policy document to each nation and we have written separate sections for every nation for every nation we have made a separate book so we will be giving it to those nations or whoever the representatives of those nations and from then again I fly back to Riyadh and from there I ride down to UAE muscat and from muscat I'm taking a boat with my motorcycle and two day or two and a half day trip to Indian coast from there I'm again I'm riding for another 25 days this sounds incredibly relaxing I'm 65 I hope I survive I thought before I'm too old and no good for anything I must do this because as a generation if we don't do this this is not going to be good I'm not a doomsayer but I'm saying we are in a situation where if we act now we can turn this around this is our challenge this is our responsibility and this is also our privilege that we have the opportunity to turn around such a massive irregularity that we have created in the carbon chain see when you utter the word carbon today a whole lot of people who are just reading textbooks if you say carbon they think it's some kind of poison because they think carbon monoxide carbon dioxide whatever but we are all carbon life we are all carbon life every life that you see whether it's a worm insect bird animal tree you and me we are all carbon life carbon is life so this is a carbon chain that is going on if you break one link of the chain the chain will fall apart right now the soil is one link that we are breaking very badly if you break this the life chain that is going on right now could be broken or at least seriously damaged so what about our dependence on fossil fuels because that is also that is also a way of breaking the chain isn't it that we're taking carbon that has been stored in concentrated form in the ground for millennia and we take that and we combust that and bring it out into the atmosphere and that enhances tremendously and disrupts this whole cycle doesn't it it definitely does not that it is not there it is very much there but right now the way we structured the world we can't stop that tomorrow morning all right it will take time people can talk as much as they want it may take another 30 to 50 years before we make a significant turnaround in that area but the nature of the soil is such that if we are willing if all of us are determined if the governments make the policies in the next anywhere between six to twelve years we can make a significant turnaround and soil accounts for 40% of the climate change it's really fascinating to me I think when I start thinking about you know initiatives like this and you know one thing I've always loved about you Sadhguru is is is you're very optimistic but solution-based and and I think that you know because you're not you're not a doomsayer but I also think that it's important for people to realize the importance of educating themselves and the responsibility they have to do that you know because just because we say that we can turn it around in 16 years doesn't mean that it will be if we do nothing about it and I think that's something that I'm learning along the way just from I'm speaking to you and actually speaking to Gustav as well and and doing my own research is just like how important it is for for my generation and the younger generations to to take it upon themselves as a moral obligation to our planet to to educate themselves as best they can on these scenarios. It's very important but right now the most important thing is see whether it is going to happen in the next eight ten years or not is still a question mark I'm not denying that but if if it gets instituted in the policy now see as a part of this what we have done is we have written to all the heads of state the letters are in the process of being delivered and we have written to 730 political parties on the planet because we are telling them in your election manifestos you must make soil and ecology an important part of your election manifesto depending on your nation your economic condition whatever but you just do this why this is so easy see once it gets instituted in the policy policy of a nation if they have money they may start tomorrow if they don't have money they may do it slowly if they're lazy they will do it after five years but it is bound to happen once it's in the policy if it's not in the policy it will be ad hoc something here and there will be done but the real thing will not happen now I'm talking about like there are building laws in a urban area we need agricultural laws where if you own agriculture land minimum three to six percent organic content must be there initially give them incentives nudge them to do it as things get worse we have to make it mandatory it's going to happen anyway all right when things get bad when food food production gets hit it will happen but the reverse that can happen is as already some of the agencies UN agencies are speaking about is to bridge the to bridge the food shortages that will inevitably come after 2030 they're talking about making GMO crops the only way to do cropping in most of the countries because they want to bridge that food crisis when there is no food eat some damn food that is the philosophy I agree with them when there is no food you have to eat something that's fine but that bridge will last only for twenty to twenty five years after that when we crash that will be a real crash that will be a very bad crash so the more sensible thing will be to enrich the soil we are not advocating any particular kind of farming it is for the farmer to decide what kind of farming he wants to do but we are just asking keep the soil alive for yourself and future generations for this you need three to six percent organic content only then the soil will stay alive otherwise soil will become sand can I ask you do you do you think most farmers just out of curiosity do you think or at least from the people you spoke to you do you think they know that or do you think and are ignoring or do you think that they're not even aware that soil needs three to six percent organic content in it I have lived on the farms in India every farmer knew this 40 years ago 50 years ago there was simply no question everybody knew this whether they understood three six three percent six percent or not that's not the point but if they took soil in their hand they would always feel for the organic content whether it's there or not so they knew and they always practice that because India is the land where we have had agricultural organized agriculture for over 12,000 years probably the longest in the world so 12,000 years we maintained and managed our soil richness but in 40 to 50 years we've destroyed it all right why this has happened is somebody told them there is a better idea all this you know picking up of dung and picking up bullshit this picking up dung and putting into the land is all bullshit so I will give you a magic powder just throw it everything will be fantastic and it was for some three to eight years time it worked in most lands you threw the fertilizer and boom everything came up like never before all right so now they are paying the prize after 15, 20, 25 years of fertilizer usage and now the costs are simply going up to such a point that over 300,000 farmers in India have committed suicide in the last 20 years even in United States people tell me that in the last 12 years 50 percent 50 percent of the American farmers have not seen a dollar of profit okay and the highest numbers of the highest number of suicides in America of all the professions it is the farmers hmm so the farmer always knew but now he's forgotten because somebody to sell whatever they want to sell has advised him but at the same time I'm not against fertilizer I'm not against pesticide I'm not against anything all I'm saying is let's keep the soil as a living entity for ourselves and future generations this is a must but isn't some of the means in order to do that to decrease fertilizers and then and pesticides this is its other way around if you increase organic content the need for fertilizer and pesticide will come down by itself so I'm saying first increase the organic content see right now suppose you take away all the fertilizer from the planet your food production in the world will go down by 50 to 60 percent take away all the pesticides and fertilizers together then your food production will go to something like 25 to 30 percent of what it is right now so let us not talk about that you cannot remove those things right now this is all fanciful things you do your house garden in an organic way and you think you can do it that way if you look at the cost of production and what's coming out of it you will know it can't provide food for the world we are talking about world's food produce so do not talk about impractical things increase the organic content if you increase the organic content for example one thing I can say for sure is if you increase the organic content to eight to ten percent in the soil the irrigation requirement will come down to 30 percent of what is right now to 70 percent of the water you will save if you raise the organic content to 12 to 15 percent your irrigation requirement will come down to 10 to 15 percent that means if you are using 100 liters of water 15 liters of water will do the same job for you because organically rich soil retained soil if people don't understand what I'm saying ask them to walk into a rich stick forest and just with your hands not with any implement with your hands with your fingers you just dig three inches you will see it is damp that's what a crop needs moisture so organic content when you say that what what is some where are some examples of this organics you can't get it from the moon or mars there is only two sources of organic content either you know plant material or animal waste this is only two ways you either need you know a lot of plant material that like cover crops and other things that you put back into the soil or you need trees where you can use the leaves to fertilize the soil or you need animal waste there is simply no other way right now the problem is most farms don't have either trees or animals on them you know agricultural farm they have to bring their organic material buy somewhere and bring it it will not work it will simply not work that way because the costs are too high you know in the southern India I've been running this campaign for over 24 25 years now that I went on campaigning for farmers to plant 10 percent of their land as trees 10 percent of land produces enough organic material for the remaining 90 percent and your yield on the 90 percent is better than what the 100 percent were doing before and the organic organic content is high water tables have come up and the nutritional value has gone up significantly this is another important part right now see most countries have put their covid you know deaths down but in u.s. still you're hitting about nearly 2000 number per day which is a disastrous number well people can ascribe it to many things one fundamental thing is any any rudimentary doctor I'm not saying some virology expert or something and a simple doctor basic education doctor can clearly tell you if you don't have enough vitamin a vitamin b b6 b12 c e and foliate and iron and you know these things in your body you become susceptible to respiratory infections this is commonly known upper respiratory infections and lack of micronutrients are very directly connected in united states in 1920 let's say a vegetable for example today everybody is going for salads believing they're eating something healthy all right at least in california another place i don't think these atlanta people are still eating salads i'm just joking okay so for example lettuce is one of the you know important part of any salad anywhere these days at least in the western countries what lettuce was offering you as nourishment in 1920 what it is offering to you now is only 10 percent of what it was in 1920 10 percent 90 percent nourishment is lost if you ate one orange in 1920 in 2022 you have to eat eight oranges to get the same stuff yesterday i was at our school all the little tiny tots were there and i said can you eat eight oranges per day just so we can they're not giving it to us we can eat eight oranges per day they're saying that's why i've been i've been reading a few a few books about nutrition content in food nowadays compared to how it was and it is just truly um staggering um but saguru i know you i know you are so busy and i just i can't thank you enough uh for your time and it's always such a pleasure to see you thank you and uh yourself and all the others of your tribe i'm not talking about the wikings i'm talking about all the actors humans you know people the boss of my tribe my wife is so make sure from march 21st for 100 days the whole world should talk about soil this is what is important it's not about supporting me they don't have to support me they must talk about soil if they do this on the social media platforms we'll aggregate these numbers if we move 3.5 billion people which amounts to 60 percent of the world's electorate on the planet then we can move the governments we can give confidence to the governments that they can invest in this direction right now the problem is people have not spoken it's time the people speak first march 21st yes for that month for 100 days from there 100 days from there okay 100 days from there when i am on the road for 100 days every day say something about soil can i can i just raise one concern if i may yes do you feel like there that there might be a risk that governments will see this as a potential cop out to deal with the carbon emissions see this is a concern that most activists have and that is one reason why they have never brought soil into the picture i was talking to environment ministers who have attended the cop 26 in glasco and they said sadguru what is the matter we were there for one whole week we did not hear the word soil see because you want to fix one industry you leave a huge gap in what way in what way will enhancing the soil organic content will make oil companies automobile companies escape that because that momentum has already happened most governments are committed it's only a question of speed all right all governments in the world are already committed to changing or reducing their fossil fuel consumption in a big way everybody has committed to timelines it is only a question of speed but they're not they're not acting on those timelines though no no that is during the pandemic they they they they gave three hundred and seventy billion dollars in in in the economical support to the fossil fuel industry that is true uh gustav that is true but you need to understand the economic conditions of different nations because they they can't just turn around like that it's not possible for them to do it so there are many challenges but everybody largely is committed to the direction of going free of fossil fuels in a certain amount of time speed is a question what you're talking about is speed so that speed we must keep the pressure on them for speed that we are we need not relax just because we enhance the organic content in the soil we need not relax that and the beautiful thing about soil is enhancing the carbon organic carbon in the soil is one thing is it's not against anybody nobody will resist this it's for everybody and its costs are very very low it is just a commitment that is needed but shifting from fossil fuel to something else one thing is it's a question of technology people are not sharing technology they're advising everybody but they're not sharing technology they're advising everybody they're not willing to compensate uh you know nations which are not able to do it in their period of time they're not able to look at the per capita consumption of a given nation uh we're talking standards which are not all right okay so naturally some nations will resist but every nation right now is committed to move in the direction we must continuously inspire them encourage them support them uh buttress them to see that they're able to fulfill that inner reasonable amount of time not stretching it endlessly but see now a war breaks out all right we could have easily avoided this i don't want to get into the politics of it but i'm saying a war breaks out just after the pandemic when nations are just beginning to recover just beginning to have reasonable normal life a war breaks out well if all the wise men who are ruling the world got together we could avoid this right very easily we're talking about fossil fuels what do you fight a war with with air is it with sunlight are we fighting are we fighting a war with sunlight no gas oil no yes endless amount of that stuff and worse worse kind of poisons we are throwing all over the place so i'm saying i'm i'm not saying that carbon fuels is not a issue it's a serious issue it's a significant issue we should not let up on that but that's not connected to this because this doesn't cost money this is not against any industry or any lobby this is for everybody this we must do because this is a easier piece to do and it accounts to 36 to 40 percent of the problem right yeah thank you so thank you we are going to spread the word and again we're so grateful for you this is not this is not my planet this is our planet let's make it happen yeah that's it that's it for sure i definitely wanted and get your get your viking tribe going what other new work you're doing i have not seen both of you you see vikings i saw oh because my my daughter my daughter insisted that i must see that's amazing i've i've met yon and flokey i just have to meet uh what uh lot bug guy oh yeah exactly we'll bring them on next time thank you thank you very much it's so good to see you hope to help to meet you again it's our guru namaskaram see you later be safe