Food producers have studies under way to find out more about regenerative agriculture. Photo / Supplied
As a recent Country Calendar episode revealed, the idea of "regenerative agriculture" has plenty of critics, but it is being taken seriously by some big food producers.
The episode, which profiled Lake Hāwea Station and its owners - Kiwi entrepreneurs and 42 Below vodka founders Geoff and Justine Ross - drew intense online backlash, leading to the TVNZ show replying to the critics on its Facebook page.
Among other things, the TV programme canvassed what is known as regenerative agriculture - techniques aimed at producing food, but with a much lighter impact on the environment than conventional agriculture, including much less use of fertiliser.
It's a divisive subject.
Dr Jacqueline Rowarth, an adjunct professor with Lincoln University, writing in the latest edition of the Ravensdown magazine Ground Effect, said it was difficult to understand the push behind regenerative agriculture.
She said agricultural scientists were concerned about the current push towards organic and regenerative farming systems.
"We've asked the questions, done the analysis and have concluded that the unintended outcome will be a reduction in food production resulting in escalating food prices," said Rowarth, who is a farmer-elected director on the boards of Dairy NZ and Ravensdown, a fertiliser co-op.
But while regenerative agriculture has its sceptics, big food producers appear to be keeping an open mind.
There is a lot of anecdotal evidence about the impacts of regenerative practices, and a lot of talk. And trials are under way to find out if regenerative techniques can be commercially viable.
Late last year, Agriculture Minister Damien O'Connor announced a partnership between Synlait Milk and French food giant Danone, science provider AgResearch, and the Ministry for Primary Industries' Sustainable Food and Fibre Futures Fund, to look into the subject.
The project involves studying soil health on 10 farms in Waikato, Canterbury and Otago over five years, to determine the impacts of changes in soil health on production, farm resilience and the environment, including climate change.
"Soils underpin New Zealand's food and fibre sector and managing for healthy soils improves the natural capacity of soil to sustain plants, animals and humans," O'Connor said.
"However, assessment of soil health on farms is not routinely measured in New Zealand, and so practical tools are needed to help farmers understand the detailed state of the soils and how best to manage them," he said at the time.
Two paddocks on each of the 10 farms will be dedicated to a comparison between conventional and regenerative practices, focusing on greater pasture diversity and reduced nitrogen fertiliser use.
The findings will help respond to the need for evidence that regenerative practices can make a positive difference in sustainable food production.
In an update provided to the Herald, Synlait and the other parties said baseline soil health measurements have been completed across the 10 participating farms and soil health improvement plans developed.
The "two-paddock" comparison - comparing conventional and regenerative practices - has been set up on most farms.
The regenerative paddocks will receive reduced applications of synthetic fertiliser - down to as low as one third of the regional averages by year two or year three.
Modelling has started on what impact these changes might have on the farms' environmental performance, as well as their financial performance, the parties said.
The Government has put in $2.8 million for the five-year study, which aims to provide information for farmers throughout New Zealand on how to measure soil health and how they can better manage their soils.
Regenerative techniques are also set to be trialled in horticulture.
A project led by LeaderBrand Produce, supermarket chain Countdown and Plant & Food Research is the first industry-wide collaboration to investigate the impacts of regenerative farming practices in vegetable farming.
LeaderBrand - a family-owned supplier of broccoli, lettuce and pre-packaged salads as well as some seasonal crops such as sweet corn and watermelon - is running the project out of its vegetable operation in Gisborne.
A demonstration site is being established to test regenerative practices and evaluate the impacts of using compost and cover crops across varied crop rotations.
The trial site will run next to a control site operating under current management practices, so the impacts of the regenerative practices can be compared over time.
The project is also focused on the role of perennial plantings in helping restore ecosystems, and will engage with staff, community and iwi to create practices that work with, and for, the wider community, the company says.
Gordon McPhail, LeaderBrand's general manager of farming, said the project's research focus would help to create tools allowing vegetable growers to make informed decisions about implementing their own regenerative farming practices.
"Ultimately, we want this project to deliver a framework for how LeaderBrand and other farmers can produce food more sustainably, now and for future generations."
The project will aim to find solutions for integrated pest management, nutrient budgeting, soil management and crop rotation.
McPhail said much of New Zealand's existing research on regenerative agriculture has been focused on pastoral land use, so this project will provide invaluable evidence for horticulture.
LeaderBrand agronomists and Plant & Food Research scientists are now reviewing experience and literature on options for cover crops.
They're also evaluating the likely benefits and risks in ecosystem restoration ahead of field trials in Gisborne later in the project.
The study has started with an assessment of nutrient release characteristics from compost applied at various rates on different soil types, at Plant & Food Research's Hawke's Bay Research Centre.
The parties said the project was an important first step to understanding alternative sources of crop nutrition and how they might complement or offset conventional fertilisers.
LeaderBrand and supermarket chain Countdown have each supported this project with an investment of $300,000 in cash and in-kind support, with research and data backing from Plant & Food Research.
Countdown's director of corporate affairs, safety and sustainability, Kiri Hannifin, said the project would push the boundaries of conventional vegetable growing.
"To ensure we have a sustainable, resilient and secure food supply, it has never been more important to make sure we're doing everything we can to protect and care for our land," Hannifin said in a statement.
LeaderBrand is large domestic player, with farms in four regions of New Zealand.
McPhail sees regenerative agriculture as being more than a catchphrase. "We have to make sure that it's more than a buzzword and that it's real," he said in an interview.
He said the issue had drawn both positive and negative publicity.
"What you are seeing around the country is the Government and industry investing in taking it wider than that - whether it's in dairy farming on in permanent horticulture or intensive vegetables," he told the Herald.
"We see it as our licence to farm into the future, and how we do what we do more sustainably.
"We are trying to find a system that works for intensive vegetable growing - so taking all the learnings from pastoral and to a lesser extent dairy - to try to find ways that it can work in vegetable growing.
"There is no doubt that we have an impact on the ecosystem - our soil or the runoff into the streams - and an impact on our people and our communities."
The trial will aim to find species to go along with crops that will improve soil structure and soil composition, and compost to potentially offset the use of synthetic fertilisers or just to improve crop output.
Side-by-side trials will take place over three years.
"They will involve a 'control' versus how we may or may not do it tomorrow."
The aim is to make growing vegetables less intrusive for the environment.
"Let's not get into the argument as to whether it's right or wrong, but we see challenges with being completely organic.
"There are some real challenges around sustainability of organics.
"This is a reduced impact programme. It's trying to find the best of both worlds."
McPhail says that if all goes well, regenerative techniques may not surrender too much in lost production, if at all.
"I would hope that we will be better off for it improving our output with potentially less input.
"I believe that there is upside in doing this, especially since all our inputs have increased so much in price," he said.
The key input for farmers has been fertiliser. Prices were already high before Russia's invasion of Ukraine - and have since headed higher still.
McPhail says barley and sorghum are typically used as cover crops - species that don't compete with other crops.
He says other cover crops may be better at locking up carbon.
The regenerative project will be aimed at developing practices that are financially sustainable as well as being easier on the environment.
Ultimately, the partners don't want food to cost more because of regenerative farming practices.
McPhail says he doesn't want farmers saying the costs are prohibitive.
"This has to deliver to the bottom line," he says. "It can't simply be driven by warm fuzzies - there has to be a commercial piece to this.
"And I 100 per cent believe that there is."
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