🐄Regenerative Farming

"Holistic management (HM) has been proposed as a means of restoring degraded deserts and grasslands and reversing climate change. The fundamental approach of this system is based on frequently rotating livestock herds to mimic native ungulates reacting to predators in order to break up biological soil crusts and trample plants and soils to promote restoration. This review could find no peer-reviewed studies that show that this management approach is superior to conventional grazing systems in outcomes. Any claims of success due to HM are likely due to the management aspects of goal setting, monitoring, and adapting to meet goals, not the ecological principles embodied in HM. Ecologically, the application of HM principles of trampling and intensive foraging are as detrimental to plants, soils, water storage, and plant productivity as are conventional grazing systems. Contrary to claims made that HM will reverse climate change, the scientific evidence is that global greenhouse gas emissions are vastly larger than the capacity of worldwide grasslands and deserts to store the carbon emitted each year." https://www.hindawi.com/journals/ijbd/2014/163431/

"This report finds that better management of grass-fed livestock, while worthwhile in and of itself, does not offer a significant solution to climate change as only under very specific conditions can they help sequester carbon. This sequestering of carbon is even then small, time-limited, reversible and substantially outweighed by the greenhouse gas emissions these grazing animals generate. The report concludes that although there can be other benefits to grazing livestock - solving climate change isn’t one of them." https://www.tabledebates.org/publication/grazed-and-confused

"Countless soil carbon NGOs and certification programs have sprouted up in the past decade, forming a veritable ranching public-relations complex, ranging from grassroots-flavored groups like Regeneration International to massive marketing academies astroturfed by conglomerates like Cargill, Nestlé, and General Mills.

"The regenerative ranching phenomenon is not just exaggerated. It’s fabricated, woven from a carbon-credit scheme for big oil, and is a marketing gold mine for big agriculture.

"Yet despite the cracks beginning to show, the reel keeps rolling. Perhaps it’s easy to believe. Like the oil companies, the meat industry would like us to think it just needs some tweaks and adjustments to solve our ecological crisis. In reality, it’s going to take a lot more than that.

"The evidence is clear that the carbon-negative cow is a fable and the ranching industry is a major contributor to global climate change. Worse yet, when assessing the bigger picture and considering its prominent role in driving pollution, hunger, land theft, and species extinction, the ranching industry’s regenerative rhetoric should be regarded as duplicitous as the fossil fuel industry’s empty promises of transition fuels and emissions offsets. After all, they’re financed by some of the same public relations budgets." https://jacobin.com/2022/03/big-agriculture-funding-regenerative-ranching-amp-grazing-soil-carbon