The Concept of Regenerative Agriculture:

Regenerative Agriculture is a holistic approach to implementing best management practices that aim to restore and enhance the health of the soil and ecosystem, conserve soil and water resources and biodiversity while reducing the need for costly external inputs, provide sustainable food production, and improve crop yield and crop quality. Thus, it assures greater resilience to market volatility and extreme climate events.

The most important part of regenerative agriculture has been attributed to the accumulation of SOM at the soil surface, which protects against erosion, enhances water infiltration and storage, and efficiently cycles nutrients. 

Conservation Agriculture with enhanced carbon management is also called Regenerative Agriculture.

The synergistic simplicity of Conservation Agriculture (minimizes carbon and soil loss) is the use of diverse rotations and cover crop mixes (maximizes soil coverage and carbon input), which allows for the protection of soil biodiversity and regeneration. With less intensive tillage, greater environmental benefits accrue with lower input costs (Please read through the Conservation Agriculture chapter).

Agriculture always means disturbing natural ecosystems and exploiting precious organic matter and nutrients. There is no free lunch, but it is important to communicate the effects and nuances of human interventions to the public while supporting the resilience of the rural communities and broader the value supply chains in which they are situated. Therefore, “REGENERATIVE” means for farmers and investors remain highly in flux. Still, broadly it tends to refer to more holistic approaches to agricultural systems that work with natural systems to restore, improve, and enhance the biological vitality, carrying capacity, and ecosystem services.

However, the concept of regenerative agriculture practices has been gaining traction in recent years, with an increasing number of businesses and organizations exploring ways to incorporate sustainable and restorative practices into their operations. 

Research-Based Overview of Regenerative Agriculture:

Historically, the regenerative agriculture movement has focused primarily on adopting management practices promoting healthy soils, such as cover cropping and reduced tillage. These practices can help hold and potentially increase soil carbon concentrations over time, potentially generating multiple benefits that may include increased yields, reduced erosion and runoff, and increased biodiversity and resilience.

According to (Poore and Nemecek, 2018), the global food system currently releases about 25% of annual anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, causes about one-third of terrestrial acidification, and is responsible for the majority of global eutrophication of surface waters.

If our food system continues with current practices, using synthetic pesticides, artificial fertilizers, and fossil fuels and producing food waste, the planet's carrying capacity will likely be surpassed (Campbell et al., 2017). Therefore, the key challenge for humanity is to produce enough safe and nutritious food for a growing and wealthier population within the planet's carrying capacity (Willett et al., 2019).

This challenge has led to new narratives for sustainable agriculture. Some of these narratives are production-oriented, while others argue that the production-oriented approach is insufficient to deal with the key challenge for humanity and that consumption patterns should be adjusted for the global food system to function within the boundaries of our planet. Likely, the inclusion of regenerative agriculture is needed to integrate the production and consumption-oriented approaches and, at this stage, should be in balance with their ecological environment, believing that the food systems’ perspective aims at safeguarding natural resources by closing nutrients and carbon cycles in the food system as far as possible, also referred to as a circular food system.

According to (Schreefel et al., 2020), recent research proved the convergence of these narratives within their definitions allowed the formulation of core themes of Regenerative Agriculture that focus strongly on the environmental dimension of sustainability, which includes themes such as enhancing and improving soil health, optimize resource management, alleviate climate change, improve nutrient cycling and water quality and availability, articulated by both objectives (e.g. improve soil quality) and activities (e.g. use perennials). These themes enhance food security by contributing to provisioning (e.g., food, feed, and fiber), regulating (e.g., climate regulation, soil erosion, and water purification), and supporting (e.g., nutrient cycling and soil formation) ecosystem services. In addition to the socioeconomic dimension in Regenerative Agriculture, it is used to improve human health and economic prosperity, which relate to aspects of cultural ecosystem services. This socioeconomic dimension, however, currently relies on divergent objectives and lacks a framework for implementation. 

Backed by scientists, social movements, farmers, and governments, agroecology is already providing solutions across the world. Therefore, we propose a provisional definition that defines Regenerative Agriculture as an approach to farming that uses conventional soil conservation as the entry point to regenerate and contribute to multiple provisioning, regulating, and supporting services, with the objective that this will enhance not only the environmental but also the social and economic dimensions of sustainable food production. To foster the transition towards Regenerative Agriculture, this review contributes to establishing a uniform definition; subsequently, indicators and benchmarks should be created to assess Regenerative Agriculture.

Adoption and Complexities:

Regenerative systems have the potential to revolutionize our approach to sustainability. However, the design for the implementation of regenerative systems is a complex undertaking. 

• One of the biggest challenges preventing their adoption is the lack of understanding and investment from stakeholders. Up to date, the current regulations and policies fail to account for the complexity that we face in transitioning to regenerative futures, leaving a vacuum in the necessary policies to truly enable and support industries to transition to regenerative. 

• The 2nd major challenge facing farmers and food production is the food supply chain. Thus, regenerative agriculture can help farmers maintain production while reducing the need for these costly external inputs, which helps them become more profitable and resilient.

By identifying and addressing these challenges, we can move towards a more sustainable future for ourselves and for generations to come. The practical aspects of addressing these challenges are to work together to generate the conditions to address these barriers.

While regenerative agriculture holds great promise for addressing various environmental and agricultural challenges, it also faces several obstacles and challenges in terms of:

• Resistance to adoption within the conventional agricultural industry, due to the initial investment, the need to relearn farming techniques, and the fear of reduced yields during the transition period.

• Knowledge and Education: Farmers often lack the necessary knowledge and training to implement regenerative practices effectively. This includes understanding soil health, conservation agriculture, crop rotation, cover cropping, and other regenerative techniques.

• The financial barriers and transitioning to regenerative agriculture require significant upfront investments in infrastructure and equipment, which can be a financial barrier for many farmers.

• Long-term viability and economic viability of regenerative practices, as it can take time to see the full benefits and financial returns.

• Developing standardized metrics and data collection methods for assessing the ecological and economic outcomes of regenerative agriculture is crucial. There is a need for more data and research to demonstrate the economic benefits of regenerative agriculture. A process will help in monitoring progress and making evidence-based decisions.

• Existing agricultural policies and regulations may not be conducive to regenerative practices. Governments need to create a supportive policy framework that encourages and rewards regenerative farming while also addressing potential regulatory hurdles.

• Consumer Awareness and Demand: There is a need to raise consumer awareness about the benefits of regenerative agriculture and create demand for products produced using branding packages and logo methods to market their commodities.

• Climate Change and Environmental Factors: Regenerative agriculture can be affected by climate change-related challenges, such as changing weather patterns and extreme weather events. These factors can impact the success of regenerative practices.

• A need for investments in infrastructure and technology, such as precision farming tools, access to seeds, and other resources needed for regenerative agriculture.

Despite these challenges, regenerative agriculture has the potential to play a significant role in addressing environmental issues, enhancing soil health, sequestering carbon, and providing sustainable food production. Overcoming these obstacles will require collaboration among farmers, researchers, policymakers, and the private sector to create a more supportive and conducive environment for regenerative agriculture to thrive. And to promote the investors that are increasingly interested in financing not simply “sustainable” agriculture but agriculture that is deemed explicitly “regenerative.” 

Louise Fresco (2016) reminds us that, in the same way, we can translate the will for suitability into achievable steps toward Regenerative Agriculture, through the following: 

• Make production processes more efficient by using less raw materials and energy per unit of production, e.g. using less fertilizer by better placement and timing• 

• Find alternatives to non-renewable inputs like fossil fuels and their derivatives, e.g. substitute biological nitrogen and biological pest controls for chemicals.

• Re-use raw materials—close the cycles so that outputs become inputs: e.g. crop residues become mulch or stock feed, then manure or bio-fuels, then a source of soil organic matter

• Conservation No-till (NT), or minimized tillage. Unfortunately, despite the known benefits of conservation tillage, my observations around NT in Michigan hovers less than 10% of crop acreage. 

• Perennial grains and legumes to replace annuals.

• Land use planning: plants and products for places, produce where there is a competitive advantage, and at the same time avoid unnecessary transport. So as said, tropical fruits are best grown in the tropics.

Climate variability, and the complexities of cover crop species, timing, and cash crop rotation equate to a matrix of options with hard-to-quantify results. The main introduction should foster regenerative agriculture practices like cover crops and reduced tillage and pay dividends when resiliency matters most.

The outcomes from regenerative agriculture

The outcomes from regenerative agriculture can also enhance the biodiversity of farming landscapes, improve the water cycle, and strengthen the broader resilience of both ecosystems and food systems while bolstering the economies of rural communities. Additionally, these various outcomes and impacts of regenerative agriculture align with several United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, which growing numbers of investors are beginning to integrate into investment decision-making frameworks. 

Therefore, to advance the potential that regenerative agriculture presents in mitigating climate change, improving soil health, and building community resilience, significant capital needs to be deployed on farms, as well as across valued chains.