Farmers at the Root of Sustainable Agriculture Transformation
Spring’s arrival in the northern hemisphere spotlights farming and agriculture’s ongoing dedication to growing food to feed an expanding population. This growth will require the world’s farms to produce approximately 70 percent more food over the next 30 years. To do so sustainably, Cargill is focused on advancing nature-positive agriculture production and famer-centric approaches to sustainably nourish the world.
“If we’re going to succeed in sustainably transforming our food and agriculture system, we have to help farmers take a nature-positive approach,” says Pilar Cruz, Cargill’s Chief Sustainability Officer.“That’s why we’re working directly with farmers around the world on initiatives that protect, regenerate, and restore the land. This is how we will make a meaningful difference, one field and one farm at a time.”
Nature-positive production focuses on limiting the destruction and depletion of land by evolving the techniques proven to increase volume and efficiency, while adopting regenerative agriculture practices that prioritize land sustainability. By doing so, farmers can feed more people and address climate change.
These practices include planting cover crops and implementing reduced- or no-till farming to help sequester carbon in the ground, build soil resilience and improve water quality. One way Cargill is helping make these practices more tenable for farmers is through RegenConnect™, a voluntary market-based program that pays farmers per ton of carbon captured in their soil.
Another way Cargill is helping farmers make sustainable agriculture economically feasible is by ensuring they receive a premium for sustainably sourced crops. Through the Triple S™ (sustainability sourced and supplied) soy program in South America, Cargill provides customers in Asia, Europe and North America certified deforestation-free soy from farmers in Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina.
These programs demonstrate how scaling sustainable agriculture requires removal of the financial and market access barriers that still exist in farming. Changing the way any business is run poses financial risk, but this is particularly acute for farmers whose margins often leave little room for the financial risks involved in changing the way they farm. By making sustainable, regenerative agriculture financially viable for farmers, these nature-positive production practices can scale more quickly and become standard.
