Regenerating the Land Through Sustainable Farming Practices

Plowing and tilling damage the soil structure and leaves it vulnerable to wind and water erosion. When the soil’s macro and micro pores are destroyed during soil disturbance, it lessens the soil’s ability to retain water and leaves crops more vulnerable during droughts. Soil disturbance also releases CO2 and erodes humus from the soil, decreasing the soil’s fertility.

No-till practices, like direct drilling, protect the soil, leaving the pores intact, letting the water infiltrate and be retained instead of running off. It’s beneficial for the soil biology like earthworms and fungi which both increase the soil’s aggregate forming abilities, and are beneficial for nutrient cycling and uptake. Practicing no-till also increases soil organic matter, reduces CO2 emissions, and has the potential to improve carbon sequestration as well.

The way we practice minimal soil disturbance is by seeding directly and neither using plowing nor deep harrowing, but only strip tillage and shallow surface tillage.

Having plants growing in the soil year round improves soil health and lessens carbon emissions. The roots growing in the soil prevent erosion and form macro and micro pores, which improves soil structure and prevents nutrient leaching. The leaves of the permanent plant cover increase the fields’ ability to sequester CO2, and leaving the plant residue in the soil instead of plowing insures that the carbon stays in the soil instead of being released to the atmosphere, which also increases the soil humus content. The green cover also provides shade for the soil, increasing soil moisture and decreasing evaporation.

In practice, permanent plant cover is achieved by cultivating cover crops on the entire available area with the aim of having living roots year-round. Organic material such as straw is not removed from the field after harvest.

A well thought-out crop rotation is essential for pest and weed management. Rotating between different types of crops can break pest cycles while helping beneficial microbes in the soil with a more diverse diet. Different crops have different needs for nutrients and are usually vulnerable to different diseases and pests, so rotating which crop is grown on which fields can reduce nutrient depletion and decrease the need for pesticides. Rotating between nitrogen-fixing crops like fava beans and crops that need a lot of nitrogen input, like corn, can also reduce the need for fertilizers.

Achieving a diverse crop rotation involves planting different crop species and families year after year, as well as integrating companion crops, cover crops, polycultures, and perennial crops into one’s crop rotation.

We advocate for using as little synthetic input as possible, although we acknowledge that some amount may be necessary to achieve a successful no-till harvest. We aim to reduce the use of pesticides and artificial fertilizers by employing Integrated Pest Management (IPM), diverse cover crop blends, and precision farming, which allows us to apply the optimal amount only where necessary, instead of wasting valuable resources on treating the entire field. Additionally, biostimulants or foliar fertilization are utilized to enhance the efficiency of our synthetic inputs.

Recycling of nutrients

It is important to utilize the resources available to us, and therefore we believe that recycling resources is the next step. Manure from livestock, municipal compost, and recycled fertilizers from biogas, sludge, etc., are all valuable organic materials that we can incorporate into the soil to improve soil structure as well as humus content and nutrient availability.

Nature on the farm

Sustainable agriculture has a responsibility to help nature and take biodiversity into account. When the regenerative principles are adopted and successful in the field, initiatives should be incorporated to enhance nature beyond the fields, thereby increasing overall biodiversity on the farm. This can be done in many different ways depending on the type of property. For example, areas with wildflowers can be created, windbreaks can be established, ponds can be made, agroforestry can be practiced, etc.