Photosynthesis is a process by which plants use sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide to make their own food and release oxygen. We all have read this in our 3rd grade textbooks. Maybe you can still picture that. Green leaves, yellow sun, some arrows pointing here and there.

But do we know anything more about plants than this?

If you look around you for a moment, that tree, which is right outside your home, is not just standing there. It is making that whole area cooler. It is giving shade to people walking by. It is holding the soil tightly so it does not wash away during heavy rains. It’s absorbing hundreds of litres of rainwater, so your street doesn’t flood when it pours.

It all starts with plants.

Plants are literally the reason we have food. Every single thing you ate today came from a plant or from an animal that ate plants. The rice, the vegetables, the fruit, even the chicken and milk. 

At this exact moment, while you read this article, the plants are filtering the air you are breathing. They are pulling out toxins and pollutants that you cannot see or smell. Formaldehyde from your furniture, benzene from detergents, and carbon monoxide from cooking- the plants are absorbing all of it and giving you back cleaner air.  

They are more than just the ‘green’ and ‘decorative’ label!

Some plants are medicine. Actual medicine that has been healing people for thousands of years, before pharmacies existed. Some plants are food. Wild fruits, edible leaves, and roots you can cook. Some plants feed the bees and butterflies that pollinate the crops we eat. Some give us wood, cotton, rubber, and paper. 

Under the soil, plants are connected to millions of tiny fungi and bacteria. These microscopic creatures are trading nutrients with plant roots like underworld dealing. The plants give them sugars. They give the plants minerals and water. No one programmed them to happen this way. We didn’t even know it was happening or why. But it is.

Are we slowly killing the system?

But did you notice in recent days that there are the same plants everywhere? Same grass, same hedges and same ornamental trees? Of course, they are easy to maintain and look clean and organised, but they are also dead in a way. 

When you only plant a few types of plants and repeat them everywhere, you kill the system. By doing this, we remove many benefits that plants give us for free. The bees don’t come because there’s nothing for them. The helpful insects disappear. The soil gets weaker because there’s no variety feeding it. The underground network breaks down. Then we add chemical fertilisers, sprinkler systems, and pesticides. 

We are spending money to do a bad version of what a diverse garden would have done perfectly for free. 

It’s not about planting more, but planting better, together. When communities start choosing the right plants and growing them in the right way, everything slowly begins to work better on its own.