With the world climate crisis creeping up on us all, the field of agriculture is standing its ground as the key to solving urgent environmental issues.
About a year and a half ago, I took an environmental science class where we visited a local farm right in my hometown of Montgomeryville, PA. The farmer in charge showed us around the many plots of land where he grew spinach, raised chickens and kept a large pile of compost. The farmer explained the way he rotated his makeshift chicken coop, so the grass they feed on is never dead; as an added bonus, their droppings fertilize the soil underneath them. He then took us into his greenhouse where the soil surrounding little green plants remained untilled, and the flimsy walls were beaded with condensation. After, he showed us his large tarp topped with compost, a brown soot made from materials such as food scraps and dead leaves. Using our prior knowledge of what we knew about the carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus cycles, we as a class were able to learn about the firsthand application of agricultural methods like permaculture and regenerative agriculture.
Regenerative agriculture is an approach to farming that involves no-till farming, organic annual cropping, composting, holistically-managed grazing and perennial crops. By using no-till farming, less carbon is emitted into the earth’s atmosphere and is instead trapped in the ground. By using annual and perennial cropping and composting, nutrients such as carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus, and water — all which are essential to life on earth — are kept in a closed system of farming. What is used commonly today to feed America is what is known as industrial agriculture. Industrial agriculture is a large-scale company-led system that involves use of harmful chemicals in pesticides, animal antibiotics and intensive production. This is what most of us are used to experiencing when we buy groceries in the supermarket. Rather, regenerative agriculture aims to capture carbon in topsoil and aboveground biomass by keeping plants and crops going year round, increasing biodiversity, enriching soils, improving watersheds and enhancing ecosystem services. This process also leads to higher yield in crops and higher health in farm communities. The methods that my local farmer used — composting, year-round greenhouse growing and balanced animal grazing — are all techniques used from regenerative agriculture that not only allow his farm to be increasingly environmentally beneficial but also raise his annual yield. In such a small town, the local support and evolved methods are offering insight to how protecting plants is a key to solving the human climate crisis.
Similarly, permaculture is a closed-loop synergetic farming system that integrates land, resources, people and the environment together. Its aim is to create little to no waste in the farming process, which happens so often in industrial agriculture’s dirty little secrets. (In industrial agriculture, if one crop fails, the whole field fails, thus wasting time, resources and energy.) Permaculture is applicable in rural and urban contexts at any scale. It is seen to be applied in hydrology, forestry, waste management, animal systems, aquaculture as well as economics and community development. For these reasons, permaculture methods are practiced in many different countries in the world.
The climate crisis’ specialized place in farming is exposed by food journalists such as Michael Pollan, who writes about the origins of our food in one of his books, “The Omnivore’s Dilemma.” Pollan is a published writer who focuses on discovering how and where food and our plates intersect with our gardens, our environment and the food on our plates. The correlation between Americans’ health and our diets does intersect with the climate crisis in the sense that the kind of agriculture we invest in as a country determines how we grow as a world, as a community and as people.
If we’re standing on plots of land predominantly used and abused by the current food and agricultural industries, it is not enough to notice there is a problem. The atmosphere is warming exponentially compared to previous decades, and many local farmers, like mine from class, are putting their foot down. The way to reverse climate change may be right under our noses if we just look down.
Kristine Kearns is a first-year English major with minors in Creative Writing and Sustainability. KK947319@wcupa.edu