Maybe you’ve heard of regenerative agriculture?
If not, here’s a bog-standard definition:
‘Regenerative agriculture is a holistic land-management practice that uses the power of photosynthesis in plants to sequester carbon in the soil while improving soil health, crop yields, water resilience, and nutrient density.’
Basically you’re trying to bring back real, pesticide-free, ecosystems to farmed land, and thus the planet.
One pathway to regenerative agriculture holds that you need big grass-munching, tree scratching, earth trodding, plenty-pooping animals (e.g., cows/pigs) as part of the ecosystem you put in place to renew the land—often farmland previously taken to the brink by traditional, intensive, pesticide-based destruction.
And since land put into renewal like this can be paradise for a small herd of cows and bulls or a bunch of pigs, they’re going to multiply like crazy, which is then no longer ideal for a fixed area of land. So this is how such farms try to survive financially: “culling” their herds and selling at a premium the meat from free ranging animals on pesticide-free pasture. They even do this at the amazing Knepp Estate rewilding project in the UK.
Making it economically otherwise is even less obvious, at least to start with as the land is renewed from its terrible state back into working ecosystems, with improving soil and the carbon sequestration that goes with it. This is not some snap-your-fingers magic, it’s a backbreaking decades-long effort.
Farmers such as Jake in this excellent Guardian piece are basically trying to put the planet back into a better state, a few hundred or thousand hectares at a time, while one day hoping to pay back their investors. If you want to hurt your head a little bit, try and comprehend why, for example, the US government continues to subsidise farmers growing mono-crop grains on massive Mid-West farms, drowning in pesticides, in order to feed cattle and pigs in ghastly conditions in various levels of factory farm, while not making it financially possible for someone like Jake to get off the ground on his own, as he puts the natural world back together again for the eventual good of all.
I’m guessing that this big-government mega-meat focus will gradually have to change as this decade goes forward. There are hints it is underway already.
Right, so, if you’re willing to be truly inspired, this video made by Jake’s buddy as they walk around his regenerating property, is bloody brilliant, and has apparently turned Jake into a mini-online rockstar, unexpectedly. He’s literally dripping with passion. It’s addictive!
Now, before any of my meat-munching friends try to use Jake’s example as some kind of justification for zooming off to the meat section of the supermarket, just remember: none or almost none of the meat you eat lived a life like Jake’s animals do. There are plenty of photos and videos of the true lives of what you eat online. You know the ones I’m talking about. If the farming world was turning massively towards regenerative agriculture under models like Jake’s, meat would become a special “treat” from time to time, like the occasional bottle of champagne or something.
Be part of the change. The planet will thank you: the birds, the trees, the butterflies, not to mention the soil—without which we are especially fucked.
[Thanks to Tyler for giving me the heads-up on the Netflix documentary on soil: Kiss the Ground. It’s a bit one-sided but still inspiring.]