Dear Amir,
I am member of a French internet forum that is dedicated to the use of ramial wood chips as a soil amendment in agriculture, in French: Bois Rameal Fragmenté (BRF).
This technique was firstly introduced by a Canadian forestry scientist Lemieux, who did a lot of experiments and analysis especially concerning its properties, notably its tannin and lignin molecules, to decompose into more stable humus than heavy material does.
Especially in the frame of the discussion of carbon farming, this has the potential to be a game changer. Basically you can build up soil humus 10x faster with woody material than you can
do with non woody plants.
Now before everybody says "fresh wood on an agricultural field, no way!", in all experiments, and since more than 10 years there has been a lot in France, Belgium and a lot of African countries there were no major problems with nitrogen and certainly not with acidification.
A research promotion paper that explains it quite well, in French, is attached, from a former student of Lemieux, a belgium guy Benoit Noel.
(page 24)
English articles of Lemieux have become scarce on internet...
So I attach a lecture of him from my own library....... some interesting theoretical insights for all of us I think , and and the same time very practical!
Menno Houtstra
Ing. Tropical Engineering / Rural Development
Foundation for Nomad Farmers
IJdoornlaan 34
1024 KV Amsterdam
The Netherlands
0031 68595405