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This pandemic a lot of people conceived, at least where I stay. So one of the pregnant people bought soil and I was given some to eat. I told someone I ate the best soil and they found it odd, eating soil hmm. I have been eating soil ever since I can remember. To clarify it is not any soil, It is soil bought from the market. I have no reason for eating soil. It is just a desire I get when I see people eat it. Recently while in a taxi I sat near two women, Uganda roads have many potholes, the taxi was shaking and putting us in motion. one lady looked at the other and gave her a lump of soil. While eating one of the women told the other how soil helps to keep her from being nauseated .The conversation went on and I got interested so I decided to carry out a survey on my friends and also do some research. We shall be looking at the practice of eating soil in this article, the article also contains a section on analysis of the answers I was provided.

What Is Geophagy

Geophagy is the consumption of soil. The soil might be clay soil or any other earth soil prepared for consumption. Geophagy is a common practice in Subsaharan Africa. People may consume soil because it is a cultural practice, saw others consume it or because they have an eating disorder. In Uganda geophagy is most common among pregnant women. Soil is solid in local markets in Uganda and other parts of the world where the practice is common. In Haiti, mud biscuits are sold and Bentonite clay is sold as capsules in some food stores around the world.

What Is Geophagy Geophagy is the consumption of soil. The soil might be clay soil or any other earth soil prepared for consumption. Geophagy is a common practice in Subsaharan Africa. People may consume soil because it is a cultural practice, saw others consume it or because they have an eating disorder. In Uganda geophagy is most common among pregnant women. Soil is solid in local markets in Uganda and other parts of the world where the practice is common. In Haiti, mud biscuits are sold and Bentonite clay is sold as capsules in some food stores around the world.

Research And Survey I asked friends about geophagy. The questions were in two parts. Part one was if someone eats soil and part two was if they knew anyone that eats clay. I asked 25 people the questions, they were kind enough to answer my question because we all know people hate surveys. I added the answers to the CSV and analyzed it.

Research And Survey

I asked friends about geophagy. The questions were in two parts. Part one was if someone eats soil and part two was if they knew anyone that eats clay. I asked 25 people the questions, they were kind enough to answer my question because we all know people hate surveys. I added the answers to the CSV and analyzed it.

Question Template

Part One

Do you eat soil/Bumba?
When did you start?
How often do you eat it?
how/where do you get the soil?
What is the reason for eating soil?

Part Two

Do you know anyone that eats soil/Bumba?
What could be the reason to eat the soil?
Which type of people loves eating soil?

Analysis

Data dimension

The data has 25 rows and 10 columns

The columns contain the different attributes of the questions asked and the gender of the interviewee.

To do the analysis I used python programming which was me just being extra because excel would have done the job but I wanted to have a template I can use in future surveys and I hope it can help some of you. I will be adding the code here.

Eat Soil

This was the main question. This was almost a 50-50. The number of people that don’t eat soil is almost the same as those that it. This is not a representation of the general population, it is just for this survey. It just gives an idea

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Start Age

From our analysis, we see that most people start eating soil at a young age. Few said they started in while teenagers because of a bandwagon.

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Frequency

Once represents people that at soil at some point in their life and no longer it. Rarely represents people that rarely eat soil but will eat it when they find it. Often represents people that eat it all the time.

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Know Soil Eater

This was an interesting one because almost all people know at least a soil eater. I also did if someone knows an eater according to the gender of the respondent.

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Eater Kind I generated a word cloud for most of the kind of people that were proposed as soil eaters. The font size of the word shows how often it was given as an answer.

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Reason For Eating Soil

I also generated a word cloud having reasons why people eat soil. The most common answer was craving.

The Analysis was great I even grouped attributes but can’t exhaust all of the charts here.

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From the analysis above, the soil is mostly eaten by pregnant women, girls and children. In fact, most people ate soil when they were young.

Correlation between different attributes

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Where Is Soil

Most people get soil from the market, termite moulds and walls. Soil sold is cheap a large lump like people is sold at 100 Uganda shillings. Soil eater also comes in a variety of colours depending on where it is got. The most common colour in Uganda is black because most are got from swamps. The soil is baked and shaped before being sold in markets.

Additional Notes From The Survey Some people crave earth/soil during the rainy season One respondent had theories: sometimes the body lacks certain minerals so people get urges for soil to acquire them from them Then the other reason is people just follow trends or what they’ve seen other people do. I don’t eat for hygienic reasons, I like the smell of ground when it rains, I stand in rain to inhale as much as I can since I can’t eat it. Taking pot water helps. Pregnant women crave for it, craving soil indicates an iron deficiency.

Effects Of Eating Soil

Positive

Even though according to my survey most people don’t have a particular reason for eating soil, the soil has advantages like

ease morning sickness symptoms Absorbing toxins which help treat/prevent certain illness help improve stomach issues Prevent nausea Depending on religions soil can contain minerals such as calcium, copper, magnesium, iron and zinc. These minerals are important to the body These advantages haven’t been proven conclusively so they shouldn’t be the basis for you to eat soil. From one of the responders, not only do people eat soil, but it is also used to preserve herbal medicine. This kind of soil is called Mumbwa

Negative

Activities like mining may cause toxic materials like lead in the soil, these activities make soil not good for consumption. Other disadvantages include:

The soil might have toxics which may damage the liver and kidney. Eating soil is also addictive. The soil might contain parasites Large consumption might cause gastrointestinal problems

Solutions

I think from studies eating the oil itself is bad. The problem is when the soil has toxics. Eating soil is also addictive so one might also want to stop the habit. Below are some solutions.

People stop Computer finding suitable soil Kits can be made to test the kind of minerals in the soil and maybe proper minerals can be consumed by people and prevent toxic intake. The kits if computer-aided can also help someone know the amount and kind of minerals they are intaking

Conclusion

I read a lot of literature while writing this article, most of the research is controversial and inconclusive. This is because in some places soil eating maybe be considered a disorder while in other places like Uganda its is a socially accepted thing. All I can say is don’t eat soil in large qualities. Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed it.