The Nation's First Regenerative Dairy Works with Nature to Heal the Soil—at Scale

Symbrosia, a clean-tech startup in Hawaii, is taking seaweed from the ocean and turning it into a powder that can be used to feed livestock to reduce the amount of methane they produce — a key contribution to greenhouse gas emissions. The company worked with an organic farm in Upstate New York to test the product and found that sheep given a high dosage of the supplement had up to 70 percent reduction in methane emission. Creating the powder takes weeks and a lot of steps, but the startup is hopeful the product can become a mass-produced commodity.

After realizing that his soil was becoming more saline after repeated uses of chemical fertilizer, a farmer in India made the switch to organic farming with the hopes of saving his crops. By switching to organic farming he has a lower crop yield than he would by using chemicals, but he is hopeful others will see the benefits of this method.

In Brazil, 45% of agriculturally viable land is owned by 1% of tenants. To combat this inequitable ratio, the Landless Workers’ Movement formed and took a stand for seizing lands that are "not fulfilling a productive or social use." The group successfully reclaimed an area known as Mario Lago and has since begun a reforestation process alongside agroforestry which has allowed for an increase in diversity of food produced. The farmers haven't stopped there, however. To sell their produce, they have implemented a system of turning the consumer into a co-producer thus ensuring economic stability.

By using new technology and shared knowledge, the Dutch have become global leaders in agricultural innovation and solutions to fight famine. Work being done at Wageningen University & Research has allowed farmers in the Netherlands to grow crops year-round and in all kinds of weather, while eliminating the use of chemical pesticides and reducing the dependence on water by as much as 90 percent at some farms. Exporting these techniques to other countries has its challenges, but international graduate students are working to implement these programs in their home regions to help people experiencing hunger.

Three biointensive mini-farms in the US are teaching small-scale farmers from throughout the world how to grow more food through sustainable practices that focus on using less water and land. After bringing these farmers onto the US farms to learn the methods through a hands-on approach, the farmers then return to their home countries to implement and encourage the biointensive practices.

A barley farm in southern Oregon transformed 70 of its 400 acres into a wetland sanctuary after it had spent years leaking phosphorus pollution into the Upper Klamath Lake. A team of scientists and advocates collaborated with the farmer to finance and construct the new natural ecosystem, which began to yield the farmer both environmental and financial benefits after only one year.

Regenerative agriculture — a technique originally developed by Native peoples — is a farming practice that can not only improve the quality of farms and their products but also serves as a response to growing climate change concerns. While regenerative agriculture currently only accounts for 10% of farms and ranches today, the numbers are slowly increasing.

A new Hydrogen nutrition technology allows a rancher in Utah to turn alfalfa seed into cattle feed within a few days with less than one-tenth of the water used in traditional hay fields. By using this technology, he’s been able to manage the drought in the region and preserve his farmland. While many could be skeptical of the system, the Legislature is planning to study how effective it could be for others in the state.

Kitovu Technology is a social enterprise that aims to use data and technology to help farmers in Nigeria increase their crop yields and access new markets. Since 2017, the company has trained over 300 agents to work with about 12,000 farmers on using the mobile app to track their progress. The company also partnered with the government on a pilot program to introduce an electronic warehouse system to allow farmers to store their grains.

Venture capitalists are increasingly interested in investing in indoor vertical farms as a way to combat supply chain disruptions and grow crop yields in a changing climate. A number of these farms are opening in the coming years throughout the United States and the industry is expected to grow to $9.7 billion worldwide by 2026. However, running an indoor vertical farm does have some technological limits and can result in high energy costs.