Regenerating Our Food
The agricultural industry has been facing stressors for years. With the population growth continuing to rise, its focus remained heavily on tonnage of production. Recently, this has shifted with the greater awareness of nutrition quality in foods. Regenerative agriculture has many benefits, it is a tool for climate regulation and mitigation, it is also a pathway toward food richer in nutrient and lower in chemical residues. This in turn, provides more benefits for the environment generally with less chemical run off and other issues conventional agriculture contributes.
Soil health and biodiversity are increasingly understood to be vital foundations in health benefits of the population.
Jam Packed Nutrition
It’s been found in multiple studies that regenerative farms have higher nutrient content for the consumer than conventionally farmed. Conventional farming utilises a wide range of chemicals for fertilisers, insecticides, fungicides, herbicides or plant growth regulators. In the UK they suspect this has contributed to the significant drop in insect life and anticipate that they only have a few decades left to regenerate their ecosystem. The movement toward regenerative agriculture, is just that. It aims to regenerate the soils and the ecosystem while benefitting consumers.
Differing to organic farming, regenerative agriculture aims at consulting with scientists and specialists to investigate the nutrient deficiency within the crops and soil of that particular farm land. They then introduce methods such as no-till, ground cover crops, diversifying and rotations of crop for different benefits.
The key for regenerative agriculture is allowing the soil and ecosystem time to rest and raise the nutrient levels by reducing its dependency on synthetic agro-chemicals. By minimising or eliminating synthetic fertilisers, pesticides and the like and introducing natural means to achieve these results, we allow the soil and plant life time to heal. Natural means are those such as:
ground cover crops that may have been found to add higher levels of magnesium into the soil
crop rotations again for different attributes to soil that then can be absorbed into the next crop species
organic matter amendments in lieu of chemical based products
integrating livestock, for example ducks love to eat snails in your vegetable garden or goats that will eat the remainder of a crop and fertilise the area as they go
Lowering this dependency means that there will be less chemical run off into neighbouring ecosystems, less chemical emissions into the surrounding air and less chemicals detectable in your foods. Cambridge University Press & Assessment announced findings that compared to organic farming, conventional farming had 4 times the amount of detectable pesticide residues. Even low levels of these residues impact human health greatly when exposure is regular and chronic. The regenerative approach aims to aid in decreasing this exposure as well.
Lowering Chemical Load
Regenerative agriculture holds biodiversity and soil health are foundational importance for the growth of the industry. Biodiversity is what the relationship between natural things including animals, plants and soils co-exist and contribute with each-other for an outcome. A common example of biodiversity is the symbiotic relationship between bees and plant life or birds and plant life. Both above and below the ground are impacted by biodiverse systems. By introducing pollinators, encouraging insect life and wildlife pests are naturally suppressed, soil churning occurs naturally which aids in oxygenation and water retention in the ground. Vital for healthy plant life. Below ground, the establishment of ground cover crops, rotating crops with various properties diversifying crops and managed animal grazing, a wide range of bacteria, fungi and earthworms contribute to improving the soil health.
The structure, chemistry and living biology of soils are imperative for plant life whose fruits, vegetables, grains or nuts are nutritionally superior. Regenerative practices in farming have been found to increase soil organic matter, enhance natural soil composition with balanced acidity levels and higher nutrient content and improve biological properties such as microbial diversity and respiratory levels.
Optimistic For The Future
Looking ahead over the next 50 years of the agricultural industry, we are optimistic that leading scientists and specialists in this field are aiming at integrating these methods, improving food nutrition value and quality and improving the environmental conditions in highly farmed regions.
Nutrition-First Farming
Success of a farm will not only rely on yield and profit for validation. A new quantitative measure for nutrition yield may be introduced. Certification and market signals will reward high-nutrient dense and low chemical residue produce.
Precision Ecosystem Management
The integration of tools such as soil health monitoring for microbial diversity, organic matter and bioavailable minerals will be vital to maintain high nutrient produce.
Embedding Biodiversity in Farming
Agroforestry, intercropping, hedgerows, integrated livestock and perennial systems are becoming a concepts common to the industry. It will be engineered into landscapes for both environmental benefits and enhancement of food quality.
Reduction of Chemical Dependancy
Synthetic fertilisers and pesticides will not be used as readily throughout the industry. Genetic, biological and microbial methods will compliment or replace many chemical inputs.
Policy & Market Alignment for Nutrient Health
It is likely with the amount of studies proving the benefits of this ancient technology that regulatory bodies will develop standards for nutrient content and chemical residues. Typically this would involve an insurance or subsidies incentive for the farmers. However, it will mostly involve the reporting and tracking of the nutrient levels produce provided.
Equitable Scaling
Knowledge, tools and systems will be available to both small or large agriculture farms. These principals are available to any to implement into their produce. This may require advancements with tech for cost efficiencies, collaborative networks and fair-trade schemes to ensure the widespread of benefits.
If these trends of regenerative agriculture continue through to standardisation, we could be facing a significant evolutionary advancement. This would be an active contribution to the healing of the planet with both soil and atmosphere. It would improve the health of wildlife in immediate surrounds and improve the health of many people. We will no longer face the need to have a green smoothy in powder form every morning to ensure we have enough vitamins and nutrition. Simply by returning to the vegetables and fruit we evolved with. Nutrition content should be considered a quantitative measure of success in this industry.
