As a soil scientist by profession I’m, quite frankly, shocked by the statements made in this article. I don’t know who has written this but this person has definitely no idea about agroecosystems at all. This myth about mineral soil depletion and reduced mineral/vitamin contents in crops has been around for years though there’s no scientific evidence at all for such a relationship. Reduced mineral/vitamin contents is mainly the result of modern varieties which were mainly selected for high yields and less for mineral/vitamin content, e.g. the mineral uptake capacity of their root systems was improved to a lesser degree than the growth of the plants’ harvestable parts. This is the simple explanation.

Soil depletion has become a serious issue with soil organic matter, mainly as a result of intensive tillage practices. This situation has become better in recent years since many farmers adopted a technique called minimal- or no-tillage. In these systems tillage is kept to a minimum allowing organic matter to build up again. Regarding mineral/vitamin contents in crops, there’s no issue with soil organic matter since the latter has almost no influence the former.

Soil depletion drives farmers to grow GM crops because yields are declining? Where does the author have this information from? The main reason for growing GM crops is simply more profit through improved herbicide efficacy leading to less competition by weeds. Furthermore they have to spray less. This combined leads to higher yield + less costs for spraying = more profit.