Managing our earth in a holistic, sustainable and natural way – that is how regenerative agriculture could be summed up in a nutshell.
After various documentaries, educational campaigns and newspaper articles in recent years have clearly shown society at large the devastating effects our conventional agriculture has on many aspects of our lives and the environment, the need for change has become indisputable for many.
The traditional, profit-oriented agriculture of large-scale industry has compromised the quality of our food and animal welfare in the long term. In many cases, it can even be described as animal cruelty. In this article, we would like to explain why the agriculture practiced to date can also make our soil permanently infertile, cause lasting damage to the environment and minimize biodiversity. We also provide information on how the concept of regenerative agriculture addresses precisely these critical points and aims to ensure improvement, rethinking and sustainability in agriculture.
What is regenerative agriculture?
First of all, it is important to note that regenerative agriculture is an evolving process and there is no definitive definition for this practice yet – as is often the case in science, nothing is final.
The pioneer of regenerative agriculture is the American Robert Rodale, who initiated a rethink in the agricultural world with his alternative, organic farming. In the USA, regenerative agriculture was promoted with the slogan “Put the Carbon Back to Soil”.
The word carbon can serve as a keyword here. The living carbon in the soil is largely found in what is known as “humus”. Humus is an important component of our topsoil and a metabolic product of soil life. It forms the basis for soil fertility and therefore also for crop yields. Regenerative agriculture aims to restore carbon in the soil by building up humus from atmospheric greenhouse gases. This should be done using methods and processes that support the laws of nature and work in harmony with them.
Depending on the agricultural niche, regenerative agriculture is not only about farming in harmony with nature, but also about the technical development of operational cultivation methods in which soil life and the metabolic activities of plants are used as a measure for work processes. The same applies to farming with animals. The consideration of the plant, the animal, the soil and the humus formation in the soil should determine the farmers' processes. Such processes must be adapted to the individual farm in order to do justice to the principles of regenerative agriculture.
On the subject of “principle”: What are the principles of regenerative agriculture?
The 5 Principles of Regenerative Agriculture
Since the 1970s, when Robert Rodale laid the foundations for regenerative agriculture, the following five principles have been developed as basic principles of regenerative agriculture based on previous experience with regenerative agriculture and the efforts of farmers:
- Biodiversity in and above the ground
- Minimal soil disturbance
- Permanently rooted soil
- Permanently covered ground
- integration of animals
These five principles may surprise some people, as many people assume that these points must and should be taken into account in agriculture. However, this is not the case. In order to better understand the problems of conventional agriculture, we would like to briefly address “intensive agriculture”, i.e. the type of agriculture that is mainly practiced internationally and nationally.
To what extent is conventional agriculture problematic?
“Intensive agriculture” refers to various types of agriculture that have been practiced by the majority of farmers worldwide for decades. The aim of this modern agriculture is to generate as much profit as possible and thus also as much yield as possible from the harvest while keeping costs low in order to maximize profit. Nutritional quality, animal welfare and ecological sustainability are therefore not relevant factors in this type of agriculture.
Examples of different types of intensive agriculture include agribusiness (marketing and processing of agricultural products by large private companies), the (not so) “Green Revolution” (high-performance varieties) and factory farming (rationalized processes for the highest possible number of animals), as well as specialized agriculture (concentration on the production of certain plants or animals).
Factory farming – profit at the expense of animal welfare
Unfortunately, the integration of animal welfare is a foreign concept to many conventional farmers: factory farming is one of the best-known practices that conventional farmers use to increase their yields and profits.
Cruel practices such as the killing of male chicks, painful milking machines, caged farming and beak trimming are just some of the cruel examples of the impact of this agricultural practice on animal welfare.
Chemical fertilizers – soil disturbance
Our topsoil is not only disturbed by conventional agriculture, but often even rendered infertile in the long term by chemical fertilizers. Most farmers fertilize their soil with chemically synthesized nitrogen and phosphorus, as these substances ensure very rapid plant growth. In fast-growing vegetables, this chemical fertilization often leads to an undesirably high nitrate content. The soil is also contaminated with nitrate.
Chemical nitrogen fertilization also makes plants more susceptible to pest infestation and compromises the synergistic effects of the microorganisms and soil organisms living in the soil. Chemical fertilization also has a negative impact on the nutrient content and quality of the food grown.
destruction of biodiversity
Biodiversity, our variety of species, is being damaged by conventional agriculture. The conventional fertilizers that ensure quick and rich harvests are usually easily water-soluble mineral fertilizers.
These easily water-soluble mineral fertilizers, which are extensively applied to agricultural land, enter bodies of water such as streams and rivers through soil erosion and rainfall, and then often find their way into the sea or our groundwater.
This unnaturally high nutrient supply leads to over-fertilization of the waters, which causes excessive algae growth. This algae growth, which is artificially caused by humans, can in turn lead to a lack of oxygen in the deeper layers of the waters and destroys the biological balance and the livelihood of many aquatic creatures.
Groundwater contaminated with nitrate not only endangers the health of fish and microorganisms, but also of humans.
BE THE CHANGE & Regenerative Agriculture
We at BE THE CHANGE see regenerative agriculture as one of the duties of our modern society. It is now up to us to find the way back to nature and to practice agriculture in harmony with it. Not only nature and future generations will thank us, but also our bodies, which will receive natural and nutrient-rich food in return.
Through the regenerative agriculture promoted by BE THE CHANGE, the soil and nature can recover. With our own innovative projects, such as our SWISS WOW COW project, we generate our own food sources that set new sustainable standards internationally.
For us, sustainability means that our food is healthy and nutritious in the long term and that we not only preserve nature but also allow it to regenerate so that we can live with it and feed off it in the long term. This requires new paths that are being paved step by step in cooperation with farmers in long-term partnerships. We are proud to be playing a part in the development and continuation of regenerative agriculture.
BE THE CHANGE produces entirely in Switzerland. The geographical proximity to our farmers enables us to maintain personal partnerships with suppliers and to work on our own agricultural projects on site. The distances to our production and manufacturing facilities are only a few kilometers short, which keeps our ecological footprint to a minimum and ensures complete quality assurance and transparency.
Animals, from earthworms to cows, play an important role in regenerative agriculture. They are part of the regeneration process of our earth, the air and the environment. Biodiversity is a fragile and living complex in which our agriculture, if it is operated regeneratively and carefully, can also play a positive role. We are actively committed to dignified and species-appropriate animal husbandry, which, among other things, ensures that the animals have access to pastures and use local and species-appropriate feed.
Through our SWISS WOW COW project, we know the name of every single mother animal that contributes valuable ingredients to our products, which we gratefully and consciously use. The species-appropriate life, loving care and nurturing, as well as the dignity of every living being are our focus.
Regenerative agriculture is not only close to our hearts at BE THE CHANGE, but accompanies us every day.
We are actively involved in the creation and further development process of regenerative agriculture and see it as one of our cornerstones.
Sources:
https://www.regenerativ.ch/regenerative-landwirtschaft
https://www.regenerative-landwirtschaft.de/definition.html
https://www.cleanenergy-project.de/umwelt/umweltschutz/uba-studie-so-schaedlich-ist-die-intensive-landwirtschaft/# :~:text=Agriculture%20and%20climate,carbon%20dioxide%20(CO2)%2D%C3%84equivalents%20responsible .
https://www.studysmarter.de/schule/geographie/landwirtschaft/intensive-landwirtschaft/
https://naturkost.de/naturkost-von-az/naturkost-abc/chemisch-synthetische-duengung/