Agricultura regenerativa: una manera de hacer más sustentable al campo argentino

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En la agricultura está irrumpiendo una nueva manera de pensar. Hoy, la sustentabilidad y las buenas prácticas posibilitan hacer frente a los desafíos exógenos más complejos, como el cambio climático.

“Hay un cambio de paradigma: hay que producir más alimentos para el mundo porque la población sigue creciendo y hoy el campo es un actor fundamental en ese sentido, pero tenemos que hacerlo de una manera sustentable, que siga contribuyendo a regenerar el ambiente”, manifestó en la última edición de “Infobae talks: Campo” Marcos Bradley, director de Marketing de Syngenta Latinoamérica Sur.

La biodiversidad es otro aspecto que mejora la productividad de los campos, a lo que se le suma el desafío que presenta el cambio climático y la captura de carbono. “La agricultura tiene un potencial que ningún otro sector tiene de ser parte de la solución, ya que tiene la capacidad de reducir emisiones y captar carbono de la atmósfera para llevarlo al suelo.

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Renaming Regenerative Agriculture Could Open Doors

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SHOULD the term ‘regenerative agriculture’ be changed to encourage more growers to adopt the practices encompassed within the emerging industry?

This was the topic that was debated by speakers during the University of Western Australia Public Policy Institute’s recent webinar, Sustainable food systems: food production & security in a changing climate.

Based in Western Australia, Wheatbelt Development Commission director regional development, I-Lyn Loo, called the term “divisive”.

She said using different language may reduce the level of pull-back from growers and others in the agricultural industry.

“In the end, regenerative agriculture is quite a contentious term still,” Ms Loo said.

“It is getting more mainstream now… as we are moving into the early adopter phase.

“There are challenges in accepting that term.”

She said often the term implies that growers need to change their practices in order to consider themselves good land managers.

KEEP READING ON GRAIN CENTRAL

Managing Plant Surplus Carbon to Generate Soil Organic Matter in Regenerative Agriculture

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Soil degradation is a global problem. A third of the planet’s land is already severely degraded, and soil is being degraded at a speed that threatens the health of the planet and the civilizations that depend on it (Whitmee et al. 2015). Depletion of soil organic carbon (SOC) resulting from extractive agriculture is a key driver of soil degradation (Lal et al. 2015). Much of this SOC has been released to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide (CO2), a potent greenhouse gas contributing to ongoing climate change, including extreme weather events. Soil degradation also diminishes water infiltration and retention, biodiversity, watershed functions, and the nutritional value of food. Reversing soil degradation is a top global priority (UNCCD 2017).

Yields of major crops have increased substantially in the last century, primarily through intensive chemical fertilization. However, the greater aboveground plant biomass production resulting from chemical fertilization has usually not led to proportional gains in plant inputs to soil and soil organic matter (SOM) accrual.

KEEP READING ON JOURNAL OF SOIL AND WATER CONSERVATION

 

El camino de Uruguay para ser pionero en carne carbono neutral

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MONTEVIDEO – «El ganado no es el problema, es parte de la solución; el ganado come pasto que vuelve a crecer y en ese proceso fija carbono en el suelo”, afirma Sebastián Olaso, mientras se calza las botas para salir a recorrer su campo de Rincón del Sauce, en el departamento de Florida, en el centro-sur de Uruguay.

En sus 1300 hectáreas Olaso engorda cientos de novillos Angus, la etapa final del proceso de producción de las primeras carnes certificadas como carbono neutrales en Uruguay y las primeras en el mundo en ser exportadas bajo este sello. La escala por ahora es pequeña: unas 60 toneladas anuales.

El concepto “ganadería climáticamente inteligente” define a los proyectos públicos y emprendimientos privados que apuntan a mejorar el balance de gases de efecto invernadero en el sector ganadero, a certificar procedimientos y generar productos con mayor valor agregado.

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Love Regenerative Agriculture? Thank Indigenous Peoples

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“Regenerative agriculture” has become a bigtime buzz word(s) in farming circles in recent years. And for good reason.

It is, in short, a system of farming principles and a set of practices that seeks to rehabilitate and enhance the entire ecosystem of the farm. Those practices include conservation tillage (aka, as little soil disturbance as possible), crop rotation, and polyculture – the planting of compatible, supportive plant species together to limit pests, suppress weeds, and improve the health of the soil.

Importantly, regenerative agriculture is one way farmers are responding to the climate crisis.

The benefits of doing so are numerous: Regenerative practices increase soil biodiversity and organic matter, leading to more resilient soils that can better withstand climate change impacts like flooding and drought. Healthy soils beget higher yields and nutrient-rich crops. It also diminishes erosion and fertilizer runoff, leading to improved water quality on and off the farm.

KEEP READING ON THE CLIMATE REALITY PROJECT

Chile y Costa Rica intercambian experiencias territoriales en Modelos de Desarrollo Regenerativos

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Se trata de un intercambio entre las regiones de La Araucanía y Guanacaste, con aproximación regenerativa en materia de indicadores, turismo y seguridad alimentaria.

Con el objetivo de fortalecer el ecosistema de emprendimiento regenerativo y territorial, Chile Regenerativo, iniciativa del Laboratorio de Innovación Social de la Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile y Fundación Kawoq; y Costa Rica Regenerativa, de la Universidad para la Cooperación Internacional de Costa Rica, lanzaron el proyecto “Nuevos modelos de desarrollo regenerativo: Experiencias y desafíos entre Costa Rica y Chile”, que cuenta con el apoyo de la Agencia Chilena de Cooperación Internacional para el Desarrollo (AGCID) y el Ministerio de Planificación Nacional y Política Económica (Mideplan) costarricense.

La ceremonia inaugural fue encabezada por Camilo Luco, Jefe (s) del Departamento de Cooperación Sur -Sur y Desarrollo Nacional de la AGCID; Pablo Cea, representante de Chile Regenerativo; la Embajadora de Costa Rica en Chile, Adriana Murillo; y Eduard Muller, representante de Costa Rica Regenerativo.

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‘Viable, Just & Necessary’: Agroecology Is a Movement in Brazil

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The Landless Workers Movement in Brazil (or MST, its acronym in Portuguese) is one of the largest social movements in the world. Born in the early 1980s at the end of the country’s 21-year military dictatorship and in the midst of persistent land inequality, the movement has been at the forefront of land reform in Brazil for decades. Their work is focused on making a reality of the country’s constitutional promise that land should ‘serve a social purpose.’ Against a backdrop of great inequality – 10% of the largest farms occupy nearly three-quarters of agricultural land – the MST has been organizing families to occupy, settle, and farm throughout the country.

In the four decades since its creation, the MST has organized more than 350,000 families to create communities, cooperatives, farms, small-scale food processing enterprises, and farmers markets. An additional 90,000 families still live in informal encampments on contested land, struggling for official land title.

KEEP READING ON MONGABAY

Agroecología, un modelo para una agricultura sostenible en Hidalgo

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El uso de agroquímicos se ha considerado uno de los principales métodos para el control de plagas en el sector agrícola, como parte de una agricultura intensiva o convencional. El uso intensivo de estos productos químicos ha generado diversas controversias debido a los efectos adversos que se han demostrado que pueden causar a la salud humana y al medio ambiente.

Por ello, en el sector agrícola surge la necesidad de implementar prácticas que garanticen la preservación de nuestros recursos naturales y, en este sentido, la Unidad Regional Hidalgo del Centro de Investigación en Alimentación y Desarrollo participa en el proyecto “Transición agroecológica para una producción de maíz a escala comercial libre de agrotóxicos 2022-2024”, el cual apoya la estrategia para alcanzar la suficiencia alimentaria en nuestro país.

De acuerdo con la Organización de las Naciones Unidas para la Alimentación y la Agricultura (FAO, por sus siglas en inglés), la agroecología es una ciencia que pretende optimizar las interacciones entre plantas, animales, seres humanos y medio ambiente.

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Let’s Be Careful Not to Greenwash Regenerative Agriculture

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Food companies like to use descriptors such as “non-GMO”, “gluten-free”, “humane certified” and numerous labels to differentiate their products in the marketplace. These often follow consumer trends, usually initiated by lobbyists for environmental, animal welfare, nutrition and health groups.

They can also be considered greenwashing when they are used incorrectly or fraudulently.

The latest trend appears to be regenerative agriculture, although it has yet to have a clear descriptor, for food product packaging at least. But regardless, investments being made indicate a growing interest.

An example is the recent announcement that fast food giant McDonald’s has formed a partnership with McCain Foods to invest $1 million in regenerative soil education and practices for Canadian potato production. They’ve set up a potato farming fund to help 130 of McCain’s potato growers adopt regenerative soil practices through cost-share grant applications over the next year.

KEEP READING ON MANITOBA COOPERATOR

The Onslaught of Genetic Engineering 2.0

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Over the past 30 years OCA and our allies across the world have fought hard against gene-spliced GMO foods and crops and the toxic pesticides and chemicals that always accompany them, exposing their dangers, limiting their market share, and in some countries bringing about mand

atory bans (Mexico) and/or labeling and safety-testing. (USA and Europe)

But now Bill Gates, the gene-engineers, the World Economic Forum, and the Davos “Great Reset” technocrats and authoritarians, the folks who anticipated and profited off of COVID and the lockdowns, have a bold new plan to shove down our throats: get rid of animal agriculture, ranching, and small farms entirely. Make lab-engineered fake meat, fake milk, and fake cheese the new normal. Pretend they’re not genetically engineered and therefore they don’t have to be properly safety-tested and labeled. Divide and conquer vegans and carnivores, urban consumers and rural communities.  Drive into bankruptcy and off the land the billion ranchers, small farmers, and herdsmen/women around the world, who depend on raising animals and livestock for their survival.

The powerful Lab Meat and Lab Dairy lobby, funded by Bill Gates and a growing number of Silicon Valley tycoons, pay lip service to reducing the CO2, methane, and nitrous oxide emissions from factory farms, and rhetorically decry animal cruelty, but their highest priority seems to be undermining and destroying organic and regenerative farmers, especially those practicing holistic grazing and pasturing, those raising animals without glyphosate, neonics, GMO grains, or other chemical-intensive inputs.  Gates and the Great Resetters seem hell bent on establishing a new, unregulated monopoly of lab engineered (and of course patented) Frankenfoods. Tellingly enough the Big Meat giants (JBS, Cargill, Tyson, et al) and the Dairy Giants (Unilever and Nestle) are all now investing in fake meat and dairy as well, hedging their bets and diversifying their greed.

The cheerleaders and fake-hip entrepreneurs of Frankenfoods 2.0 claim their products are not really genetically engineered (a lie); that they are entirely plant-based (a lie); and that they are safe (the government allows these companies to self-declare their SynBio products as safe), nutritious (a lie), ethical (a lie), and basically equivalent to real meat and dairy (another lie).

As Organic Insider points out:

“In recent years, ‘animal-free’ dairy proteins have found their way into everything from ice cream to cream cheese to snack bars, but many shoppers, food manufacturers and retailers are unaware that these are actually unlabeled and unregulated GMOs. Further compounding the problem is that consumers may be misled into thinking that these products are ‘natural,’ which could potentially take market share away from the organic industry.”

“‘Companies call these things ‘synthetic biology’ and ‘fermentation technology,’ but these foods are all just GMOs,’ said Michael Hansen, Senior Staff Scientist at Consumer Reports. ‘They are using terms people do not understand, so that people will not realize these are GMO ingredients.’”

A recent poll in the UK indicates that 60% of consumers do not want to eat GE lab meat.

The cabal pushing lab meats and dairy, and their Monsanto/Bayer/Syngenta/ Dow/DuPont counterparts pushing pesticide-drenched, first generation GMOs (1.0), claim that organic farming and holistic grazing and the pasturing of animals are inefficient and even dangerous, and that in our Brave New World of gene-splicing, gene-editing, and so-called precision fermentation, only elite lab engineers, large corporations, and technocrats can feed the world and mitigate the environmental and climate crisis.

But in fact there is a growing body of evidence that these 21st Century Frankenfoods are neither safe nor nutritious. SynBio Frankenfoods are neither sustainable nor-plant based, nor by any stretch of the imagination equitable for family farmers, ranchers, and indigenous/traditional communities. SynBio foods are not properly safety-tested nor labeled. Indeed upon closer examination, looking at the official risk disclosures that publicly-traded SynBio manufacturers such as Ginko Bioworks are required to provide to investors, this new generation of GE foods pose a potentially catastrophic threat to our health, environment, and the livelihoods of the world’s three billion small farmers, ranchers, indigenous herders, and rural villagers.

As Ginko admits:

“The release of genetically modified organisms or materials, whether inadvertent or purposeful, into uncontrolled environments could have unintended consequences… we cannot guarantee that these preventative measures will eliminate or reduce the risk of the domestic and global opportunities for the misuse or negligent use of our engineered cells materials, and organisms and production processes.”

Although there has been a small but longstanding resistance to Synthetic Biology, spearheaded by public interest non-governmental organizations (NGOs) such as ETC Group, Friends of the Earth, and the International Center for Technology Assessment, which we have supported in the past, OCA believes the time is ripe to build up a new, vastly expanded U.S. and global campaign of farmers and consumers to stop the Frankenfoods 2.0 fake meat, fake dairy onslaught.

Through mass public education, litigation, boycotts, and protests, the goal of this revitalized farmer/consumer campaign will be to drive these genetically engineered Frankenfoods (fake meat, fake milk, fake cheese) off the market, and, in the process, turn back the planned demolition of our organic and small farmer-based food and farming system by Bill Gates, the Rockefeller Foundation, Silicon Valley Big Meat, Big Dairy, and the Davos Crowd.

Learn more: The Playbook for GMO 2.0 Is Going Exactly To Plan, Brands Step in to Combat It

Read lots more articles on SynBio by going to the Real Farms, Not Fake Food campaign page.

Stay tuned for future developments.

Ronnie Cummins is co-founder of the Organic Consumers Association (OCA) and Regeneration International, and the author of “Grassroots Rising: A Call to Action on Food, Farming, Climate and a Green New Deal.”