The purpose of our project is to teach apprentices and farmers skills and knowledge in order to respond to the challenges the agricultural sector is experiencing. The delivery of an innovative vocational curriculum on Regenerative Agriculture will provide practical solutions to transform agriculture landscapes and practices resulting in sustainable cultivation methods, balanced ecosystems and healthy products.

The industrial farming systems succeeds in producing large volumes of food for the global market. In the European Union, more than 90% of the fields are cultivated conventionally. However, this type of cultivation creates serious problems for human health, the climate, biodiversity, soils’ fertility, freshwater bodies and the ecosystem as a whole. It also promotes an enormous freshwater and nitrogen footprint, along with agriculture’s large share of up to 25% of all anthropogenic GHG emissions. (UNEP Foresight Brief, 013, May 2019)

But climate change with increased occurrences of weather extremes such as droughts and storms, potential shortage of mineral fertilizers, soil erosion, decline of pollinators and other factors are not only exacerbated by conventional farming but at the same time represent serious challenges for the current agricultural system itself.

While in 1990, 2.3 million tons of pesticides were used worldwide, today it is approximately 4.1 million tons. (Toxic exports. Exports of highly dangerous pesticides from Germany to the world. https://pan-germany.org/download/giftige-exporte-ausfuhr-hochgefaehrlicher-pestizide-von-deutschland-in-die-welt/; EU Pesticides database: https://ec.europa.eu/food/plant/pesticides/eu-pesticides-database/public/?event=activesubstance.selection&language=EN)

Agricultural toxins do not just affect the plants and living organisms against which they are used. As a collateral damage, they destroy wild herbs and insects, which in turn are lacking as a source of food for many other animal species. We hence experience a critical loss of biodiversity. Up to 1 million species are threatened with extinction, many within decades. (2019 Report of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES))

Pesticides pollute our food, our groundwater and reach our bodies. Over 90 percent of conventional fruit and vegetables are contaminated with pesticide residues. Such residues are also found in drinking water resources and need to be removed by water suppliers at high costs.
Research on the potential impact on human health show that exposure to glyphosate – the most widely applied herbicide in agriculture – is associated with non-Hodgkin lymphoma and other hematopoietic cancers. The IARC Report reveals that Glyphosate exposure causes DNA and chromosomal damage in human cells, as well as genotoxic, hormonal and enzymatic effects in mammals. (Andreotti, G. et al. Glyphosate Use and Cancer Incidence in the Agricultural Health Study. JNCI J. Natl. Cancer Inst. (2017). doi:10.1093/jnci/djx233; International Agency for Research on Cancer, W. H. O. WHO IARC Monographs Volume 112. Evaluation of five organophosphate insecticides and herbicides. 2 (2015).

23% of land areas have seen a reduction in productivity due to land degradation. (IPBES Report 2019)
Pesticides alter and disrupt the population of microbes in the soil and decrease the population of beneficial fungi, which play a vital role in facilitating water and nutrient uptake from plant roots.

The fragility of soils, the thin layer of the earth which is the foundation of nearly everything growing and almost all that we eat, puts the “sustainability” of industrialized agriculture into question. In many regions, soil fertility has been decreasing for decades, and large amounts of fertile soil have been (and continue to be) washed into rivers, lakes and oceans – gone forever, and with it, much carbon, originating from the oxidation of humus has been released into the atmosphere in the form of CO2, all of these with severe economic implications.

Regenerative Agriculture responds to all above-mentioned problems as it is a conservation and rehabilitation approach to farming systems focussing on topsoil regeneration, increasing biodiversity, improving the water cycle, supporting bio-sequestration, increasing resilience to climate change, and enhancing soil fertility. Such a fundamentally different model of agriculture based on diversifying farms and landscapes supports fulfilling many of the sustainable development goals (SDGs), especially those related to alleviating poverty (#1), ending hunger (#2), improving health (#3), clean water (#6), economic growth (#8), and climate action (#13).

However, one of the biggest challenges we face is missing information about already existing solutions. Alternative practices in farming and their positive impacts are not yet taught in agricultural schools or universities where we see lack of a focused approach on (eco-)system “agriculture” and its many beneficial relationships between plants and soil.

Therefore, the aim of our project is to provide apprentices in agriculture, farmers and other professionals in the agricultural sector the skills and knowledge to apply alternative cultivation methods which are not only beneficial for the environment and the consumers but are also economically feasible for the farmers.

In addition, the awareness raising measures applied during the project give the public a coherent picture of the state of the art of regenerative agriculture and help foster the perception about alternative farming, its benefits and the possibilities to upscale measures and crops.