Practical Regeneration

Book excerpt: “To begin evaluating an agricultural system, you’ll need to get to the core ideas and features that actually drive the system to ensure that you have a grounding for best methods and practices.” In his consulting career as an agronomist, and as a lifelong gardener, Scott Gillespie has learned to critically evaluate information before jumping into something new. Particularly in these days of climate-change anxiety, he has seen people choose agricultural systems that seem right on the surface but aren’t actually making a difference. Many times, a new idea is simply a good hypothesis. Early success can mean things get picked up quickly and are applied before they are fully tested. Practical Regeneration starts out broadly talking about what Scott has learned in his garden and from researching and thinking through the claims of regenerative agriculture advocates. It then gets practical in how farmers can think about implementing the main healthy-soil practices such as cover crops and intercropping. The next section covers how they can advance their practice above the basics. The book culminates by looking into the future and examining how farmers can look at profitability in the long term. While based on Scott’s experiences in the prairies of western Canada, the principles can be applied to many areas of the world. Erudite, but entertaining too, Practical Regeneration sifts through the hype to critically evaluate the soil regeneration movement so that its principles can be practically applied helping both the farmer and the climate.