Soil fertility is the foundation for a healthy and productive crop. A fertile soil is characterized by being able to provide crops with the necessary nutrients and maintain proper drainage and water retention. Understanding how to cultivate a fertile soil is essential for a productive crop. In this article, we’ll delve into the ways in which soil fertility influences the yield and quality of crops and the importance of a well-thought-out soil management with regenerative farming practices.

The Role of Soil Fertility in Crop Productivity:

Soil fertility is primarily about the availability of essential nutrients. Healthy, fertile soil contains a balanced supply of macronutrients (nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium) and micronutrients (like iron, zinc, and copper). These nutrients are vital for plant growth, as they influence everything from root development to photosynthesis. Fertile soils also provide plants with the nutrients they need to grow and resist diseases and pests. When soil is lacking in essential nutrients, plants become stressed and are more susceptible to a range of issues, leading to reduced productivity. Fertile soil also results in higher crop yields and better-quality produce. Plants grown in nutrient-rich soil are more likely to produce larger, healthier fruits, vegetables, and grains.

Soil Management to Improve Soil Fertility:

In addition to a soil’s inherent qualities, like sand and clay content, how you manage your soil and which farming strategies you use are the key to long-term fertile soils. Conventional farming practices such as plowing can deplete the soil of carbon, and leaving the soil bare for long periods of time can cause leaching of valuable nutrients like nitrogen. How you manage your soil is highly important in ensuring soil fertility but if you adhere to regenerative farming practices, you can build up your soil’s fertility over time.

Minimal soil disturbance: Soil structure is an important and often overlooked aspect of soil fertility. A soil with a good porous crumb structure will be able to retain water for longer periods of time, which is beneficial during the more frequent droughts many farmers are currently experiencing. At the same time, a porous soil isn’t prone to waterlogging and will be able to drain off the excess water during periods with intense precipitation. Switching to no-till practices allows earthworms and microorganisms to build up the soil structure with micro and macro pores.

Crop Rotation: Another key strategy for maintaining soil fertility is crop rotation. By alternating crops, you can prevent the depletion of specific nutrients from the soil and utilize different areas of the soil profile. Different crops have varying nutrient demands, so crop rotation helps to maintain a balanced nutrient profile as well as being a key strategy to breaking pest cycles.

Cover Crops: Planting cover crops and keeping the soil covered after harvesting the cash crop can help improve the soil fertility by catching excess nutrients in the soil and making them available for the following year’s cash crop. Additionally, legume cover crops can fix nitrogen from the atmosphere. Cover crops can also help build soil organic matter since having growing crops in the soil year-round can allow the Liquid Carbon Pathway to occur.

Organic Matter: Organic matter, such as compost, manure or straw, is a valuable addition to soil. It improves soil structure, moisture retention, and provides a slow-release source of nutrients. Regularly adding organic matter to the soil is essential for long-term fertility.

Improve soil microbial life: Soil microbes drive a myriad of beneficial processes that are essential for a healthy soil. Increased microbial activity leads to higher nutrient availability as well as nutrient retention in the soil. Additionally, incorporating practices that encourage abundance and diversity of soil microbes improves soil aggregation, water penetration, and water retention and decreases soil erosion.

In Conclusion:

Soil fertility is the cornerstone of agricultural productivity, influencing everything from plant growth to disease resistance. It’s not just about nutrients but a delicate balance that requires thoughtful management.

Regenerative farming practices like no-till farming, crop rotation, and cover crops play crucial roles in maintaining fertile soil. These methods prevent nutrient depletion, enhance water retention, and contribute to the overall health of the soil. Prioritizing sustainable soil management practices ensures our soils remain fertile, paving the way for consistently productive crops.

What is the Liquid Carbon Pathway?

The Liquid Carbon Pathway (LCP) is the process where plants turn CO2 from the atmosphere into soil carbon. The plants use some of the CO2 they take up to exude simple sugars through their roots to feed mycorrhizal fungi. By forming symbiosis with mycorrhizal fungi, the fungi help the plants access water and nutrients in exchange for carbon from their host. These root exudates are then turned into stable humus molecules by soil microorganisms. Keeping this process in mind can be an efficient way to increase the humus content in your soil.

Why is humus important?

Increasing the humus content in your soil is beneficial for several reasons like improved soil structure, better water-holding capacity, and increased nutrient availability, which all give more resilient crops.

The Liquid Carbon Pathway is the quick way to build humus in the soil. In agricultural systems, the way we usually work with increasing carbon content is by incorporating dead organic matter into the soil, which is known as the decomposition pathway (DP). It has been estimated that the LCP builds soil carbon 5-30 times faster than carbon derived from aboveground biomass decomposition so if we as farmers want to increase the carbon content of our soils, it is worth considering how we can increase the LCP.

The LCP and the DP function in fundamentally different ways and these differences are worth considering due to their impact on soil health and carbon sequestration.

The differences between LCP and DP

The DP is an aerobic process that decomposes organic matter, which releases CO2. This pathway adds carbon-rich mulch to the soil, but since decomposition is an active process, this carbon won’t stay in the soil but rather slowly disappear over time.

The LCP however, is a low oxygen process where the microbial life in the soil turns the root exudates into humus, which are very stable compounds that can stay in the soil for many years.

Both processes form new topsoil but in quite different ways. The DP adds soil carbon through the decomposition of dead organic material at the soil surface, which results in carbon being added only to the very top of the soil.

The LCP requires photosynthesis which is what makes the exudation of sugars from the plant roots possible. These sugars then undergo humification where the simple sugar exudates are joined together into the more complex and stable humus molecules. The humification is a four step process that requires an array of microorganisms including mycorrhizal fungi, nitrogen fixing bacteria, and phosphorus solubilising bacteria, all of which need their energy from the plant root exudates to exist. This process forms topsoil in much greater depth than through the DP.

LCP in agricultural ecosystems

The LCP is limited, if not absent, in agricultural soils due to currently prevalent farming practices. When the soil is disturbed by plowing and tilling, the mycorrhizal fungi are destroyed, which means that the plant-fungi symbiosis can’t form.

Additionally, most agricultural soils are still left bare for large periods of the year, but in order for the LCP to occur, there must be living, green plants growing in the soil. Mycorrhizal fungi get their energy as the simple sugars in liquid form from actively growing plants. This means that if there are no living plants growing in the soil, the LCP cannot occur, and no humus is formed.

The key to farming with the Liquid Carbon Pathway

If you want to get the benefits from the Liquid Carbon Pathway, these two things are what you need to focus on.

1) As little soil disturbance as possible. No-till practices allow for the mycorrhizal fungi to form hyphae in the soil so the symbiosis can happen. When the hyphae are left intact, the symbiosis can be established, and the LCP will be encouraged.

2) Make sure to incorporate cover crops in your rotation. Growing green plants in the soil year round by using cover crops (or living mulch, intercropping, etc) allows for photosynthesis to occur which fuels the LCP, generating humus.

Embracing these two strategies in your farming system will allow you to get the benefits from the Liquid Carbon Pathway and increase the humus content in your soil.

In regenerative farming, we are constantly on the lookout for new methods that help us take care of and improve our soil. Frederik V. Larsen, no-till agronomy consultant with Agroganic is one of those regenerative farmers who is experimenting with new, innovative solutions, and his current project is all about finding the optimal crop to use as living mulch. His research and field experiments so far have found that lucerne might be the ideal candidate.

But what exactly is living mulch? And why is it such a valuable tool in regenerative agriculture?

Leaving the soil bare after harvest, plowing or tillage can lead to adverse effects such as erosion from wind and precipitation and loss of valuable nutrients, as well as providing conditions for weeds to germinate and grow without competition. This is part of the reason regenerative agriculture aims to have the soil covered throughout the year. Introducing a living mulch to your fields is one way to do that. A living mulch is a cover crop that is sown either before or with the cash crop and kept as a living ground cover throughout the growing season and throughout the following crops in the rotation. Growing a living mulch can help with weed suppression, soil temperature regulation, evaporation, soil structure, erosion from rain and wind, as well as nutrient retention and addition.

Many annual species have been used as cover crops, but Frederik sees the potential in perennial living mulches (a perennial cover crop), which is why he started experimenting with lucerne as a living mulch in his cereal crops. Lucerne has an array of beneficial properties that makes it a great choice as a living mulch, especially in cereals; It’s perennial, it fixes nitrogen from the air, it has a taproot, it’s herbicide tolerant, and it might help prevent the spread of fungal diseases such as septoria.

No need to resow every year

Usually, cover crops are resown every year, and often during a time where there is much else that needs doing in the field. Every time you need to establish a crop it comes with risks. With a perennial cover crop, you avoid the stress of needing to make sure the cover crop gets sown and established every single year. With no-till techniques, you can keep the lucerne as a living mulch in the ground for years while establishing a new annual cash crop into it every year.

Decreasing the need for mineral nitrogen fertilizer

Like many popular cover crop species, lucerne is a legume, which means it has nitrogen fixing abilities, and not only that, but lucerne is especially efficient at it, providing high quality biomass to the benefit of the soil fertility. Both from an environmental and economical perspective, reducing the need for mineral fertilizers is desirable, and since lucerne is capable of fixing up to 400 kgN/ha yearly or 100 kgN/ha as an off-season living mulch, it provides valuable nitrogen to the cash crop.

Less root competition

Another desirable quality of lucerne is that unlike many other legume living mulch species, it has a deep taproot. Cereal crops have shallow fibrous roots and growing a cover crop that also has fibrous roots increases the competition between these crops, which causes decreased cereal yields. The taproot allows the lucerne to grow deeper, utilizing a different part of the soil profile than the cereal, resulting in less competition between the crops.

Doesn’t compromise chemical weed management

Lucerne’s powerful taproot makes it tolerate high doses of herbicide compared to other cover crop species with shallow fibrous roots, which makes it possible to still chemically treat grass weeds without killing the lucerne.

Prevents spread of fungal diseases 

Potentially, a living mulch like lucerne also has the capacity to reduce the infection rate of fungal diseases like septoria. Research is still being done to quantify this case in the field, but the theory is as follows; Septoria infects crops by being splashed up from the ground by precipitation. However, since septoria only affects its host species, the septoria spores will become inactive when landing on the leaves of a non-host. Since living mulch provides a year-round soil cover, fewer spores are being sent into circulation by rain-soil contact. Lucerne is a non-host, so the spores will become inactive when landing on the leaves, and since the perennial lucerne is already well established before the wheat emerges, lucerne has the potential to reduce the infection rate significantly.

In conclusion, lucerne has a lot of potential as a living mulch crop, and if you want to follow Frederik and his lucerne living mulch experiments, you can find him on X as @fredVLarsen and updates from his experiments under the hashtag #livingmulch.

If you are interested in getting started with living mulch, contact us at Agroganic today to learn more about how we can help you.

Farmers deliver food, feed, and fuel to the world, and while these services are essential, it is also necessary that they are provided in a sustainable way.

Your agricultural business, like every business, is deeply intertwined with environmental, social, and governance concerns, and this inseparable connection represents risks to avoid but also valuable opportunities to pursue if you know how to utilize them.

If you own farmland, it can be beneficial to begin your sustainability documentation to stay ahead of the curve and stand out to potential collaborators. More and more legislation that aims to protect the environment, as well as societal and governance sustainability measures, is implemented every year, and as a farmer, it can be difficult to keep track of what that means for your business. One of the newly implemented proposals for the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), requires large companies to report on sustainability measures in their value chain. From next year, large companies will be required to report on sustainability in their value chain using standards developed by the EU.

That means that if you have an agribusiness that supplies, or wants to supply, produce to large companies like Nestlé, Orkla, or Unilever, or their suppliers, you have an opportunity to be more attractive to them if you have documented your sustainability actions and already know which further sustainability efforts you intend to focus on. Many farmers struggle with figuring out which sustainability actions to prioritize but that is what a “double materiality assessment” can help you with!

Sustainable development and ESG reports (Environmental, Social, and Governance) have come to stay, and Agroganic is here to help you navigate the possibilities that producing in a sustainable way and reporting on your sustainability measures offer.

What is a double materiality assessment?

A double materiality assessment is a type of sustainability and strategy analysis that will help you prioritize your sustainability actions and make it easier for you to decide which efforts to spend your time and money on.

This tool helps you identify which sustainability measures your business should prioritize while taking your specific risks and opportunities into account. The “double” in double materiality refers to assessing the importance of an activity’s impact in relation to BOTH the impact on environment and society AND the financial risks or opportunities associated with it for your company.

Sustainability actions can be taken to avoid risks of impacting the environment negatively (such as pollution), but they can also be taken to increase opportunities and to impact the environment positively. For example, if you are considering implementing regenerative farming methods in your operation, it can impact the environment positively as well as provide increased opportunities to work with big companies that demand regenerative crops.

Agroganic’s experts are ready to help

Agroganic’s team of consultants are experts in the field and have 18 years of experience with sustainability and strategy analyses from the agricultural and financial sector, and we are ready to help. Contact our strategy consultant Kirsten Marie Risbjerg at +4523225102 to learn more about how we can assist you with your double materiality assessment to prioritize your sustainability actions.

Running an agriculture business in the Baltics is not for the faint of heart. The enormous size of the large-scale properties takes hard work, determination, and a vast knowledge of the area to manage, and no one can do it alone.

That is how Agroganic made their entry into farming consultancy in the Baltics. Agroganic is a team of agronomy consultants that have been helping large-scale farmers in the Baltics for more than twenty years. Currently, Agroganic has clients all over the Baltic countries and helps manage almost 100,000 hectares of land.

Agroganic’s success is no coincidence, though. Our team of seasoned consultants knows all the ins and outs of dealing with the challenges that come with this type of farming and we know how to put that knowledge into action. Understanding the day to day work and the unique needs of every property is fundamental for creating financially thriving businesses.

That is why our consultants all have many years of hands-on experience with farm management. We understand how important every investment is and we know what worksand what doesn’t because we have tried it all. We have built our business on being expertsat rationalization and optimization as well as creating turnaround solutions for countless clients.

We believe that farming should be financially sustainable while being environmentally sound and that is why we have worked with regenerative principles since the very beginning. Our experience with no-till farming is unparalleled and we always keepup with the newest technologies and know how to implement them in the ways that will be most beneficial to the client.

Are you interested in working with Agroganic? Call us today at +45 2010 0096 to learn more about our work and how we can help you improve your agribusiness.

Soil microbes drive a myriad of beneficial processes that are essential for a healthy soil. Increased microbial activity leads to higher nutrient availability as well as nutrient retention in the soil and incorporating practices that encourage abundance and diversity of soil microbes improves soil aggregation, water penetration, and water retention and decreases soil erosion. All of these factors create more resilient crops as well as regenerate depleted soils.

There are billions of microorganisms for every gram of soil. The soil organisms are made up of a complex food web of primarily bacteria, fungi, nematodes, and protozoa which all impact soil health.

But what exactly makes them so important?

Bacteria make up the largest part of the soil microorganisms, both in number and volume. They live in the water film around soil particles and in the rhizosphere where they take care of many important functions. Bacteria are a very diverse group and can do anything from improve soil aggregation abilities and nutrient cycling to fixing nitrogen from the atmosphere.

Fungi are important decomposers since they’re capable of breaking down lignin and other compounds that other organisms aren’t able to decompose. They also form symbiosis with plants and help them access otherwise inaccessible nutrients because their tiny hyphae allow them to take up nutrients from areas that plant roots are too big to utilize. Fungi do better in undisturbed soils where their long hyphae aren’t broken.

Nematodes directly impact nutrient availability as they consume nitrogen from feeding on bacteria and release readily available ammonium. They are also beneficial in the decomposition of organic material because their feeding accelerates the decomposition process.

Protozoa are the grazers of the soil where they feed on bacteria and fungi which releases plant-available ammonium. They consume more than 50% of bacterial productivity in soil and thereby enhance nutrient cycling to the benefit of crops.

Because of all these vital functions, taking care of soil microorganisms and improving their conditions can lead to healthier soils and more resilient crops. At Agroganic, we work WITH the soil and know the importance of taking care of the soil’s microbiome. Contact us today to learn more about regenerative farming and how you can take care of your soil’s microbial life and improve your soil health!

Companion crops are a secondary crop grown with the cash crop and are an important part of regenerative agriculture.

“When done right, companion crops can add nutrients to the soil, reduce pest attacks on the cash crop, minimize weeds, and save input,” our consultant David Hans Dresen states.

Choosing the right companion crops can be an excellent way to reduce the amount of money spent on input. Some companion crops allow you to use less fertilizer by providing nutrients for the cash crops. Legumes like clover or vetch can add N to the soil because of their nitrogen fixing abilities while phacelia is in a symbiosis with mycorrhiza fungi that can make soil phosphorus available. Other companion crops can be used to combat pests and weeds, reducing the need for insecticides and herbicides.

Choose the companion crop(s) in accordance with which issues you want to tackle. The companion crop can be sown together with or after the main crop but which strategy to use depends on the cash crop and the companion crop. It is important to make sure the companion crop doesn’t grow too vigorously, causing it to compete with the cash crop.

“Finding the right companion crop strategy is a delicate balance to get right and making sure the cover crop delivers the right benefits while ensuring it doesn’t outcompete the cash crop is essential,” David says and adds, “Companion crops are part of the future of farming whether we want them or not. We might as well get started with finding a beneficial companion crop strategy now before legislation forces our hand.”

Getting your companion crop right can be a challenge, but you don’t have to figure it out alone. Contact Agroganic today to hear more about how our experts can help you with your companion crop strategy.

The path to regenerative farming is a journey, not an overnight change, but it pays off in the end. Farming regeneratively results in more resilient crops, more stable yields, less work, and reduced input costs. But how do you get started?

Few people start out as regenerative farmers, especially on a large scale, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be done. Generally, large scale farmers will approach the journey to regenerative agriculture either as conventional or organic farmers. Being regenerative isn’t an either-or-situation but rather a scale of how well you incorporate the principles in ways that make sense for each individual field.

Agroganic has a history of large-scale conventional farming and has worked with conservation agriculture (CA) for many years before choosing to be extra ambitious and take the next step towards regenerative agriculture.

As seen from this figure from the project ‘Design for Sustainable Agrifood Systems’ by Kristine Fisker and Sara Dømler, different types of farming systems can achieve better regenerative practices, depending on their starting points. Organic farmers can achieve better regenerative results by working towards less soil disturbance, while CA farmers can work on reducing their pesticide use. Conventional farmers need to work on both their soil disturbance approach as well as their pesticide use. All three farming methods are valid starting points, and the figure shows that different measures are needed to become more regenerative in different kinds of farming systems.

Regenerative farming is not a one-size-fits-all solution. Each measure will affect fields in different ways depending on the field history, soil types, and local conditions like weather, and it can take time to achieve the desired conditions. Once you have though, nature takes over many of the tasks and makes it easier to be a farmer. The benefits speak for themselves, and regenerative farming increases the resilience of your crops as well as your agribusiness.

How to move towards regenerative agriculture

There are many steps you can take already today to get started with turning your agribusiness regenerative and you don’t have to do it alone. At Agrogaric our consultants are experts in regenerative agriculture and have many years of experience with helping large scale farmers work with regenerative principles. Contact us today to here more on +45 2010 0096 or at contact@agroganic.com

Your first question might be: what exactly is an ESG report? ESG stands for Environment (E), Social (S), and Governance (G), and to make an ESG report is a way to document the sustainable development of your business. In this article, we explain how ESG reports can be beneficial to you and how it works.

Farmers deliver essential food, feed and fuel to the world. Sustainability can be defined as minimizing impact on the planet while meeting the needs of consumers and communities. Your agricultural business, like every business, is deeply intertwined with environmental, social, and governance concerns and the subjects represent possibilities to pursue as well as risks to avoid.

If you own and farm land it is an advantage to begin to document your sustainable efforts and areas of actions in an ESG report sooner rather than later. ESG-reporting can help point out business opportunities as well as risks for farmers and landowners. At the same time, it serves as documentation of current sustainability efforts and progress. The documentation functions as a sustainability assurance and risk assessment to your stakeholders.

What are the components of the ESG report? 

The E in ESG, environmental criteria, includes the resources your company takes in, the waste it discharges, and the consequences for living beings as a result. For an agricultural enterprise important areas to focus on include water and air quality, nature and biodiversity, soil fertility, and optimal resource use. Not least, E encompasses carbon emissions and influence on climate change.

S, social criteria, addresses the relationships your company has and the reputation it fosters with the people and institutions in the communities where you farm the land and do business. For agriculture, S translates into areas such as employee well-being and working conditions, livestock health and welfare, as well as local anchoring and interaction with the local community.

G, governance, is the internal system of practices, controls, and procedures your company adopts in order to govern itself, make effective decisions, comply with law, and meet the needs of external stakeholders. Working actively with company strategy, a thorough risk management scheme, and third-party certifications, like Global GAP, are ways of establishing good governance of your company.

A strong environmental, social, and governance (ESG) proposition can create value for you in five essential ways:

Top-line growth: A strong ESG proposition helps companies tap into new markets and expand in existing markets, while it also drives consumer preference.

Cost reductions: Resource efficiency is a step in the sustainable direction while also optimising economic outcome.

Productivity uplift: A strong ESG proposition can help attract and retain quality employees which is very desirable as employee turnover lowers productivity significantly. At the same time, it can enhance motivation and instill a sense of purpose.

Investment and asset optimisation: When it comes to ESG, it’s important to bear in mind that a do nothing approach is usually an eroding line, not a straight line. While investments to update your operations can be substantial, continuing to rely on less sustainable stables, equipment, or practises can be the most expensive option in the end. The rules of the game are shifting all the time: Bans or limitations  on less sustainable production will likely  introduce new constraints. Consumer preferences shifting market shares towards greater sustainability will affect market value of production facilities including farms that are not up to date.

Regulatory and legal interventions: Company behaviour considered unsustainable by society is prone to taxes and penalties, like carbon emissions. On the other hand, measures towards greater sustainability are sometimes subsidised by the government or the EU like subsidies for investing in green technology or eco-schemes, part of the EU CAP reform, which aim to encourage the adoption of sustainable agricultural practices.

The benefits of ESG reporting are many, and at Agroganic, our consultant Kirsten Marie Risbjerg has great experience on the topic and is ready to assist you with creating your ESG proposition. Contact us here to learn more about what ESG can do for you and how we can help you.