What are the connections between healthy farm practices, healthy soil, healthy produce, healthy gut and healthy people? In the Nutrient Density in Food series we go deep into the relationship between regenerative agriculture practices that build soil health and the nutritional quality of the food we end up eating.

We are at the telegraph stage of nutrition says Tina Owens, regenerative agriculture consultant and part of the Nutrient Density Alliance (for Regenerative Agriculture), and that means lots of opportunities for companies. What does it mean that only 1% of nutrition data is tracked on food labels? Does it mean we should wait until the science is completely clear? Or, is there a lot of space on which food companies, large and small, can already act and secure a leading role in a space that seems completely open at the moment.

Can chickens ever be regenerative? With Paul Greive of Pasturebird we explored the impact on degraded farmland, replacing fossil fuel and toxic fertilisers and, of course, one of the biggest exits in the regen space! Not many can say that they build a successful pasture chicken operation, sold it to a 8 billion a year chicken company and, after this successful exit, continued from within this massive corporation to scale pasture-raised birds to millions of chickens.

Why regional agriculture processing is crucial for healthy soil, healthy people and healthy local communities. Not hyper local because that is fragile. At Cairnspring Mills, they are now hitting a ceiling and will scale up. With Kevin Morse we unpacked flour, flavour and nutrients, how a back to the future mill changes everything for wheat farmers.

It is all about soil biology. Regenerative farmer Erwin Westers found it out after farming low till and with cover crops for over 5 years, not without results, but not with the impact he hoped it would have. Until it clicked: with help of the German regenerative movement they started to focus on soil biology because if that isn’t there the cover crops are not digested on time to provide the fertilisation for your cash crop. It almost sounds like magic, but you can really reduce your inputs (organic manure, chemical NPKs etc. to almost zero) and still harvest an interesting cash crop year after year.

According Olivier Husson, engineer, system agronomist and agroecologist, instead, everything starts with plants and optimal photosynthesis, but most plants are too sick to optimally turn sunlight into energy. So, they are not able to create or regenerate soils. This is a fascinating deep dive into healthy plants and non-healthy plants. In short, it is all about energy and energy we either get from photosynthesis or photosynthesis from a few million years ago, aka fossil fuels.

Thank you to everyone in this amazing community, for listening, sharing and getting involved!
Antonella and Koen

0 comments

3RD EPISODE OF WALKING THE LAND WITH A REGENERATIVE FARMER IS OUT!

Walking Amadeco Syntropic Farm with regen farmer Felipe Pasini

The framework of the video course is now online!

Your Path Forward in Regenerative Food and Agriculture is now out!

Episode 2 Farmers’ Philosophy video series

See all posts from How to Invest in Regenerative Agriculture and Food?