The current mainstream cultural conversation is about organic agriculture vs conventional agriculture. It’s interesting to note that conventional agriculture (the general practices of most farmers) was regenerative/organic farming for tens of thousands of years. Over time farming through chemical controls became known as conventional. Historically, this transition took place in the last 70 years and during my lifetime.
We are slowly discovering that the real conversation and comparison needs to be about regenerative or sustainable farming vs conventional farming. Organic farming uses most of the conventional mainstream efforts and simply replaces chemical compounds with plant compounds, maybe a step in the right direction of human health and is only a small step in the right direction for planetary health.
There are those, especially large scale farmers, that say we can’t feed the planet with anything other than conventional farming. They are relaying on the old age “if it ain’t broke (and we are making money) don’t fix it” idea. However, making the connection to our planet’s condition as being a part of the assessment about its brokenness, is a shadow that few will give credence. It’s just too hard to get our arms around doing something about it. It takes the force of money to make most of us pay attention. Even when we are financially wiped out due to planetary forces like the force of an unusual hurricane, it’s still too hard for most to connect the dots.
However, in an answer to the question: What can one farmer do to take care of our planet? It is being answered in this regard every single day- with the proliferation of farmers markets. Even though not all farmers that sell in a farmers market are organic, they are all local and they are all small, which are two very important components of the shift. The badly needed shift will happen as local, small, organic, regenerative and sustainable farming become more a part of our conversations and most importantly the way we spend our money. As the big guys loose business to these other channels AND their bottom line is impacted they will look at meeting the markets demands.
Of course, the question du jour is: Will this transition give the planet the time to recover and our grandchildren a planetary home to survive? We don’t have to wait for the big guys to suddenly make planetary health a priority in their business plan. Each individual votes with our dollars. As more and more insist on organic and as more and more of the organic buyers insist on sustainable, and as documentaries come out that explain how mono cultures effect the planet and there is education about all of it, one farm at a time, one person at a time, we can do this!
This is a note written from Martin Mazzanti, founder of Ocean Grace Farms.
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