Just to quickly and assertively let the cat out of the bag – the answer is a very confident YES! Let us explain.
As shared on our “Why Regenerative?” introduction page, we define regenerative agriculture as feeding the world while healing our planet at the same time. To us, it is simply not enough to be sustainable. Our food choices have a profound connection to our environment and global crises like climate change and systemic poverty.
As a refresher, regenerative agriculture encompasses a set of farming and ranching management practices that help to rebuild soil and, in the process, sequester carbon (capturing and long-term storage of atmospheric carbon dioxide to mitigate and avoid dangerous climate change). Regenerative agriculture may use cover crops and perennials so that bare soil is never exposed, and graze animals in ways that mimic animals in nature. Additional benefits are: stopping soil erosion, remineralizing soil, protecting the purity of groundwater, fill groundwater aquifers and reducing damaging pesticide and fertilizer runoff.
Slow Food
According to SlowFood.com, the slow food movement was started to counteract fast food and fast life, and educate locals about their regional fare. The Slow Food movement has three main goals: taste education, defense of biodiversity and interaction between food producers.
One can say then, that regenerative agriculture represents the epitomy of slow food–especially in the areas of biodiversity and interaction between producers. But does this also mean regenerative agriculture is so slow (which in agriculture gets expensive) that it becomes impractical for feeding a rapidly climbing global population?
Can we really feed the world with slow food and regenerative agriculture? The answer is yes!
Going Slow to Grow Faster
Scientific research and real-farm data are on our side. The agriculture and food industry are learning every year that regenerative methods can outperform traditional conventional methods. Don’t believe us?
- Ask David Brandt, a farmer in Ohio, that never tills his soil and is dubbed by one government agency as the “Obi-Wan Kenobi of soil.”
- Or this scientific study that concludes regenerative approaches could significantly contribute to “feeding the world”, and thereby contribute to a “real green revolution.”
- Finally, regenerative agriculture can fight poverty. Another scientific study found improvements in yields through “introduction of new regenerative elements into farm systems.” And that, “promising advances in the adoption of practices and technologies that are likely to be more sustainable, with substantial benefits for the rural poor.”
Regenerative is Profitable
The additional benefits of regenerative agriculture can be found in common sense economics. As soil is built up by keeping it covered, this crowds out weeds and retains moisture. The result is fertilizer and herbicide inputs can be reduced or eliminated entirely. And less use of external inputs means more profit margins for farmers. Regenerative farmers report additional profits from selling products into multiple markets. For example a conventional farmer usually only produces a single crop or commodity in one field where as a regenerative farmer might produce several products on the same area of land in the form of various crops and livestock. This is called enterprise stacking. So rather than producing a single food source on a piece of land the regenerative system approach might produce four or five different products. This can spread out the risk, improve marketing opportunities and increase total yield. That’s why it’s profitable.
We haven’t even begin to explore what this all means for accelerated carbon sequestering. We’ll save that for another post. In the mean time, you can know that regenerative farming and slow food is major foundation for feeding the world and healing our planet, very, very, quickly.
Thoughts or questions? Leave a comment below!