Jaggi Vasudev was born in 1957 in India. He is known to the world as Sadhguru, literally ‘uneducated guru’. Sadhguru has no training in spiritual matters. he bases himself only on his inner experience. He is a yogi, mystic and writer, and the founder of Isha Foundation, a non-profit organization that offers yoga programs in many countries around the world. His Save Soil movement aims to mobilize peoples and governments from all over the world to give rise to green action that gives new life to the soil.
Soil is dying. Soil extinction is the most dangerous threat that humanity faces today – one that has resulted in hunger, violence, poverty and death in many parts of the world. But with the rapid pace of soil degradation, we could soon be catapulted into a global disaster of unprecedented proportions.
To draw the world’s attention to the soil crisis, Sadhguru launched the Save Soil global movement earlier this year. As part of the movement, Sadhguru undertook an arduous 100-day, 30,000 km lone motorcycle journey from London to southern India, covering 27 countries across Europe, Central Asia, Middle East, and India. Sadhguru met with leaders and citizens in each country to appeal for national policies and action to increase soil organic matter to a minimum of 3-6%. His aim was to create public awareness, as it is only with people’s vocal support that nations can effectively implement soil-friendly policies. There were major public events in each country, as well as roadside meetings with campaign supporters, interviews, and private meetings.
We are happy to share that Save Soil has reached over 3.91 billion people, making it the world’s largest people’s movement. With the support of governments, organizations, influencers, celebrities, media and the citizens, it has led to a decisive shift in soil policies of countries across the globe. Eighty-one nations are aligned with the Save Soil policy and have expressed their commitment to regenerate soil.
Here, Sadhguru details a few of the many journey highlights, including some of the toughest and most dangerous stretches.
Sadhguru: “For me, the wonderful thing about being on two wheels is they will not allow you to be inattentive even for a moment. I see human attention as the key to all the wonderful things that a human being can experience. If you want to know the profoundness of life, keenness of attention is vital. And a motorcycle demands it and gets it. For me, as I get more speed, as the riding becomes more adventurous, as I put myself in a little more danger, I become very calm, very cool. I do not really experience rushes of adrenaline. But that sense of stillness within me, which has kept me alive for a long time, keeps me going even now. It's my wish that everyone must experience this sense of absolute stillness when you are in rapid motion. That is the basis of profoundness of experience in human life.
When I was a little under twenty years of age, for about four years, I literally lived on a motorcycle. I was doing around 60,000 km a year. I am probably one of the few people who crisscrossed India multiple times on a 250cc, two-stroke, single cylinder engine, when Indian roads were an adventure by themselves.
After that, for 32 years, I never got onto a motorcycle. Then about five years ago, when I was in Bengaluru during Rally for Rivers, someone brought a motorcycle and said, “Sadhguru, you must ride.” When I sat on it, I realized I hadn’t lost a day! Since then, I have been traveling only on the motorcycle. The pandemic time has been particularly good for me because riding fast enough on a motorcycle is a sure way to keep social distance.
Last year, when we launched the Save Soil movement, we had many plans as to how to do it. Because we wanted to move the youth in the world, I decided to use music and the motorcycle as a means to activate youth.
Soil is the habitat upon which 87% of life on Earth thrives. But United Nations agencies predict that the world has agricultural soil only for another eighty to hundred crops. That means by 2040, we will be producing 40% less food and our populations will be over 9 billion. That is not a world you would want to live in nor a world to leave behind for the next generation.
Regenerating soil across the world is important, but the problem is people have not spoken up. This is why we have taken up the Conscious Planet – Save Soil movement. To raise awareness and initiate government policies to revitalize soil, I rode as a lone motorcyclist – 30,000 km over 100 days through Europe, Central Asia, the Middle East and India. There were 691 events – for the public and the media.
There have been a lot of dangerous moments through this trip. In Europe I rode through rain, wind and snow. The wind was the biggest challenge. In some places it was over forty knots. My front wheel was just lifting up, being pushed off the road – you could kill yourself.
Every day, I was riding hundreds of kilometers, and there were nearly 7 events – media interviews, social media interactions, and meetings with influencers and parliamentarians. Even while I am riding, I was doing interviews. Every day ended at 1:30–2:00 AM. It felt like ten minutes and the day was over.
In northern Europe, we had fantastic sunlight all the time, so we thought southern Europe would be warm but it was really cold. Once we entered Italy, the ride became dicey as it was continuously raining. Above all, the traffic – mostly trucks – was insane. As the roads were slippery, their rear trailers would slide around a bit and it looked like they would come into your lane.
From Venice we rode down to Rome. In the plains, a lot of plowed land was left open to the sun for months; this is murder of the soil. But in the hilly terrains, the soil must be reasonably good because there is no excessive plowing and fertilizer usage. It is semi-forested as it is tree-based agriculture; orchards of olive trees and some yellow fields of mustard. Beautiful country.
The city of Rome was founded in 753 BC. After a few centuries of aggressive farming, the amount of soil erosion from the hill slopes caused the mainland to get connected with the island that was 15 km away. In many ways, this loss of soil was responsible for the fall of Rome as it gave rise to food shortages. Today, we are again facing this on a global scale which can definitely lead to civilizational collapse and civil wars. But as a generation, we are at a cusp of time where we can turn it around if we do the right things now. Fortunately, we had an engagement at the Food and Agriculture Organisation headquarters in Rome, which is completely in alignment with the Save Soil movement, with soil as one of their main agendas.
After dipping into Italy, we went back up towards Geneva, Switzerland, which in many ways is like the center of the world as so many UN agencies are located there. The Jet d’Eau fountain outside the UN headquarters, lit up in blue and green in solidarity with Save Soil. We rode through the Simplon Pass, a spectacular place. At the top, with the Alps in the background – Switzerland at its best!
Certain regions of Switzerland are UNESCO heritage sites, which have tourist vineyards. They are maintained in a top-class way in terms of soil organic content. But it is a sad that a rich land should become like an archival heritage – the whole world should be rich of Rich Soil. I had covered a little over 10,000 km of the journey before reaching Sofia, Bulgaria. Interestingly, some of the Bulgarian people claim that they originate from the Gangetic plains!
This part of Europe, Romania and Bulgaria, are part of a wind tunnel. If global temperatures rise by just 2 degrees Centigrade, wind speeds can pick up by 30 km/hr and millions of tons of sand from northern Africa could be deposited here, making it a desert overnight.
But when I was riding through, below zero temperatures and snow flurries accompanied us from Sofia to Bucharest. The rough roads bounced us around and literally pulled my arms from my shoulder sockets. There was also a traffic block in the mountains and the border crossing took so long. By the time we reached Bucharest, it was 11 pm. A TV crew had been waiting over 4 hours for me, so I gave them an interview in the night.
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From Bucharest, we were to take a ferry across the Black Sea to Georgia. But the ferry got delayed and we decided to go through Istanbul and the entire length of Turkey instead. We rode eighteen hours – from 8 AM to 2 AM the next morning to reach Istanbul. It happened to be both Turkey’s Sovereignty Day and Children’s Day. It was insightful to combine these two, as sovereignty means nothing without creating a future for our children. And that can only happen when we keep the soil rich. Turkey has had an ingenious way of doing agriculture for hundreds of years. They have built palaces for pigeons in the mountains, and collect thousands of tons of pigeon manure to keep their soil fertile.
After witnessing a mesmerizing Sufi whirling performance, and having a vibrant public event in Istanbul, we rode along the Black Sea. With the mountains on one side and the sea on the other – fantastic sight! The Black Sea is not black but an absolutely beautiful blue. They say it was a freshwater lake at one time, but thousands of years ago, when the Mediterranean Sea rose, it created the natural strait of Bosphorus. So now the sea has a unique semi-marine ecosystem which hosts unique kinds of life. We crossed the Bosphorus, which separates the European and Asian parts of Turkey, and rode across northern Turkey to enter Georgia. With that, we moved on from Europe to Central Asia.
As I was riding through Georgia from Batumi to Tbilisi, we had to do some really aggressive driving. I realized being on the Georgian roads was almost like home because they drive just like us Indians! I reached Tbilisi just 1 minute before the event and walked straight in without washing my face which was full of dust.
During the journey, people have been asking me, "Sadhguru, what is the secret of your energy? How come your back is not broken?" My back is a good advertisement for a Yogic back. Over the last forty years, I have been telling people, "Do some Yoga."
Our next destination was Azerbaijan. Baku looks like a desert, but if you move a hundred miles away, it is a rich forest. I spoke to government leaders about how they could easily bring that forest into the outskirts of the city. They were very receptive to the idea and the Save Soil movement, leading to the signing of an MOU with Azerbaijan.
From Central Asia, we rode down into Jordan, the second most water-stressed nation. If there is anyone who understands the concern of soil, it must be the people of Jordan. Riding here was quite hard because this is not a country for motorcycles – the wind was almost blowing me off the road. So I tried riding a camel but found it even more difficult!
From Jordan, we were privileged to visit a date palm nursery in Palestine, after waiting at the security gates for nearly 12 hours. Though the geopolitical issues here have not found a solution, it is important that the soil is kept alive for future generations. As human beings, we have divided the world in so many ways, but national borders mean nothing for soil or microbial life. Soil is a common factor for all of us; we all come from soil and will go back to soil. It is my wish that apart from being an ecological movement, the Save Soil movement be used as a unifying force for humanity.
When the rest of the world has been degrading soil into sand, Israel is one nation that has transformed desert into fertile soil. The ingenuity of Israeli agricultural technologies have hugely benefited the rest of the world, and they have set an example that everyone must emulate.
There are a lot of commonalities between India and Israel, which is the reason for the natural affinity that draws these two peoples towards each other. We had a smashing event in Tel Aviv attended by 4500 people. Also had the fortune to visit the ancient port city of Jaffa, which has a charm of its own. It is said to have been founded by Japheth, the son of Noah of the Ark, and today all the three Abrahamic faiths are present here.
Then we flew to Ivory Coast in western Africa for the UNCCD COP15 event, where I addressed delegates from 193 nations and presented a 3-pronged strategy to ensure soils have a minimum of 3-6% organic matter. It is important that we don’t just talk about soil in endless conferences, but come to simple solutions that can be implemented.
After flying back, we resumed the motorcycle journey in Saudi Arabia. Hard to believe, but this desert region was once a lush green forest a few thousand years ago. In the last few years, the kingdom has been quietly taking steps to transform its terrain into fertile lands, and is producing 54% of its food requirement today, which is phenomenal.
We rode through the night to UAE and I think the sand particles seeped into every pore of my skin! At noon, the temperature was almost 50 degrees Centigrade and I was the only two-wheeler on the road. The air gets so hot that your eyeballs heat up, making your vision a bit dazed and blurry. The bike’s GPS stopped working at one point, and my seat got so hot that I had to get off the bike at traffic lights.
We visited the mangrove plantations at Al Jubail Island, which are the life breath of the wetlands. They will free the land of salinity and in a few decades set up the necessary ecosystem for a rainforest. Later, the UAE signed an MoU with Save Soil. I feel in many ways, UAE could take the leadership in the region, of not just being an airline or shopping hub, but an ecological hub. In between events in the UAE, we flew to Davos for the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum, where I addressed representatives of many countries on the urgent need for soil regeneration.
To find out more about Sadhguru’s journey and Save Soil movement, visit the site.
Upon returning to the Gulf, we rode into Oman. After a fabulous public event in Muscat, we set sail on a boat across the Arabian Sea. During those three days, I fell sick – not sea sick, but sand sick – coughing up all the sand I had inhaled. By the time I had expunged the desert from my lungs, I was ready for beloved Bharat (India).
After 70 days of riding across 25 countries, there were no words to describe how it felt to be back in the sacred land of Bharat. Jamnagar port gave us a truly colourful welcome befitting the kaleidoscope of culture that India is. We had the privilege of meeting Indian Navy officials and were part of a public event organized by the royal family of Jamnagar. We also visited Banas Dairy – Asia’s largest milk producer – which is a phenomenally successful co-operative movement which has set an example of how to create prosperity on a very harsh land.
The first MoU in India was signed between the state of Gujarat and Save Soil. MoUs were also signed in all the other Indian states we passed through – Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, and Karnataka. It was wonderful to meet and interact with many of the Chief Ministers along the way.
On World Environment Day, the Hon’ble Prime Minister joined us for an event in Delhi. It was heartening to see the stacks of letters that 1.5 million children had written to him, expressing their concern for soil. Their voices are important as India will have the stewardship of the G20 Summit in the coming year, and has the opportunity to bring global focus to soil regeneration. Throughout the Middle East, the temperatures – sometimes hitting 54 degrees – were melting my bones. I thought India would be better, but Gujarat was competing with Muscat and Rajasthan was competing with Saudi Arabia! It was only when we crossed into Maharashtra we had our first most-welcome taste of monsoon.
This 100-day journey has turned the world’s attention to soil, reaching over 3.91 billion people and making this the world’s largest people’s movement. But the work is not over until the policies are implemented. Let us make it happen.
To learn more about Sadhguru’s journey, and the Save Soil movement, please visit: savesoil.org
