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http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claude_B... Claude Bourguignon, born in 1951, is a French agricultural engineer, former collaborator of INRA. Founder of LAMS (Laboratory of Microbiological Analysis of Soils)1, he works in France, but also in Europe, America and Africa. He was among the first, in the 1970s, to have warned about the rapid degradation of biomass and the richness of soils in micro-organisms (bacteria and microscopic fungi), as well as the loss of humus and productivity capacity of European agricultural soils, or soils to which the same methods were applied in tropical or subtropical climates. He contributed to developing alternative techniques that have proven to be very effective, but which require good technical skills and knowledge of the ecological functioning of soils. Claude Bourguignon is an agricultural engineer trained at the Institut national agronomique Paris-Grignon (INA PG). He first worked at INRA where his work (method for measuring the biological activity of soils) attracted little interest. Seeing through his biological activity measurements that soils cultivated by ploughing with chemical fertilizers and pesticides were losing their microbial and fungal populations, and were "dying" by also losing their nutrients and eroding at an accelerated rate, he became one of the promoters, developers and specialists in techniques for restoring and preserving agricultural soils using techniques that respect the life of the soil and its functioning as a complex agro-ecosystem. Claude Bourguignon is also a lecturer and trainer, member of the Ecology Society, the American Society of Microbiology, and a teacher at the former Beaujeu School of Agrobiology. He deplored the absence of an official chair of soil microbiology in France (since the soil microbiology sector of the Pasteur Institute was closed), which resulted in a lack of training in microbiology among pedologists and agronomists. In the 1980s, he developed a method for measuring soil microbiological activity and noted that in Europe, 90% of soil microbiological activity had been destroyed. [ref. needed] Theory and recommendations The tools and concepts they developed are often used by organic or biodynamic farmers who have soils that are much more active and rich in living organisms and biodiversity than those of so-called "conventional" agriculture where sometimes there is almost no trace of life left. [ref. needed] Ploughing and intensive farming techniques nevertheless continue to be used. Claude Bourguignon estimates that today on conventional agricultural soil we lose on average "10 tonnes of soil per hectare per year" (in some cases, we reach 100 tonnes per year per hectare in areas where the soil is more fragile (e.g. the Canche basin in Pas-de-Calais, in the north of France2). He believes that European agriculture will necessarily have to change because it is no longer competitive (79% of farmers have disappeared in 50 years3), survives only thanks to subsidies, and produces poor quality products[ref. needed]. He wants agricultural practices to change and for us to learn to cultivate soil without eroding it. He challenges the dogma[ref. needed] which consists of believing that soil is an inert support which requires the addition of fertilizer (thus making plants sick and requiring the use of pesticides to treat them). He indicates that the soil, far from being inert, contains 80% of the biomass of the Earth and does not require any fertilizer and therefore no pesticides. He also recommends changing habits regarding cultivated species by replacing, for example, corn cultivation (which consumes too much water and is poorly adapted to the European climate) with sorghum. He advocates a return to hedges and agro-sylvo-pastoral agriculture and considers that the quickest and most effective way to revive dead soil is the massive use of fragmented ramial wood. Intervenes in the film Babylon Alert by Jean Druon, 2005 Intervenes in the film Under the Paving Stones, the Earth by Thierry Kruger and Pablo Girault, 2009 Intervenes in the film Local Solutions for a Global Disorder by Coline Serreau, 2010 Intervenes in the film The Time of Graces by Dominique Marchais, 2010 Intervenes in the film Journey Between Soil and Earth by Jean Will, 2010 Intervenes in the film Cultures in Transition by Nils Aguilar, 2012 http://www.assises-biodiversite.com/2... http://communautes.idealconnaissances...