Meat, but climate-friendly: This is how clever agriculture works

Old Madlitz Benedikt Bösel reaches into the soil of his test field in the Mark Brandenburg. “Here the hummus is nice and cool, although it has hardly rained for months,” says the organic farmer. Next door, in the field with organic rye, there are cracks in the ground almost like in the Sahara.

Various plants grow on four floors in Bösel’s agroforestry cultures. Herbs at the bottom, then useful shrubs such as hazel or raspberries, fruit trees above and poplars and birches at the top. Their foliage serves as a windbreak against erosion. It provides shade and nutrient-rich biomass for herbs, nuts and berries.

Normal farming is possible between the curved rows of trees, each six meters apart. After the harvest, Bösel’s chickens can eat the undersown clover grass. “Agroforestry enables multiple harvests of different crops on a small area – without fertilizers and pesticides at lower costs,” explains the 37-year-old. “The system has the potential to keep itself completely self-sufficient.”

When Bösel took over his parents’ 3,000-hectare organic farm in Alt Madlitz in 2016, he quickly realized: “It can’t go on like this.” The Mark Brandenburg with its sandy soil is one of the driest regions in Germany anyway. But soon droughts and hot summers put the harvests in question.

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“Agricultural businesses around the world urgently need to adapt to climate change,” says Bösel. “We have to get out of an industrial agricultural system that is destroying the environment and climate and making farmers dependent on buying in seed, fertilizer and pesticides.” His 30-strong team is experimenting with regenerative agriculture, which is intended to actively counteract climate change. “Agriculture is by far the most important lever in the fight against climate change,” explains the farmer.

There is no denying that something has to change. Because the climate balance of the agricultural sector is devastating. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, around 31 percent of global CO2 emissions are caused by the production of food: animal husbandry, liquid manure, the high-energy production of artificial fertilizers, pesticides, packaging and transport have a negative impact – as does the loss of forest, moor and humus.

According to the EU Commission, 60 to 70 percent soils not in good condition due to intensive farming. The loss of humus and fertile soil is not only a major threat to world food security, as the United Nations warns.

Above all, humus, which consists of organic residues and 60 percent carbon, plays an essential role in storing climate-damaging carbon dioxide. After the oceans, soil is the most important carbon store on earth. Four times as much carbon is stored in humus as in above-ground vegetation.

However, conventionally cultivated soils store less CO2 than natural areas. Active humus build-up by farmers, so-called carbon farming, is therefore a central part of the EU’s Green Deal on the way to climate neutrality by 2050.

Humus build-up absorbs carbon dioxide

The so-called four per thousand initiative of the Paris World Climate Conference goes in the same direction. With four parts per thousand more organic material in all agricultural soils every year, global man-made greenhouse gases could be offset. However, it is disputed how measurable humus build-up is and how useful certificates for carbon farming are.

Farmer Bösel wants to show that regenerative agriculture is not just eco-crap but is definitely worth it – not just for the climate. The investment costs for three hectares of agroforestry amounted to 60,000 euros. The former investment banker calculates and points to the rye field next door. “With our classic organic farming, we could only earn 2,700 euros on the same area.”

agroforestry

In Alt Madlitz, Benedikt Bösel is experimenting with regenerative agriculture. Various plants grow in a self-sufficient cycle on four levels.

(Photo: Gut & Bösel)

Bösel has collected knowledge for climate-friendly floors in a self-sufficient circular economy from all over the world. “The methods are ancient. Regardless of the climate zone, the be-all and end-all is a high level of biodiversity and year-round vegetation,” he says. He has created a digital twin of all areas. Using a drone and GPS, his team documents the growth of each plant. Bösel wants to later share the knowledge with the help of his own foundation.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change sees the reduction of global arable land as the solution to the climate problem in agriculture. Many scientists see the key to this in less animal husbandry. After all, 59 percent of the global corn harvest, 57 percent of oilseeds such as rapeseed and soybeans and 20 percent of wheat end up in the stomachs of animals, according to data from the meat atlas of the Böll Foundation.

Many calories are lost via the detour animal. The conversion rate from plant to animal calories is 3:1 in pigs, milk and eggs and 7:1 in cattle, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

graphic

“Changes in eating habits are an important factor in reducing the negative environmental and climate effects of agriculture. Above all, a significant reduction in meat consumption plays an important role here,” emphasizes Matin Qaim, Professor of Agricultural Economics at the University of Bonn.

According to an international commission of experts, ten billion people could be fed healthily without crossing planetary boundaries. To do this, however, the consumption of meat and sugar would have to be halved and that of fruit and vegetables, legumes and nuts doubled.

Cows as climate killers? “It’s not the cow, it’s the how”

Organic farmer Bösel, meanwhile, consciously integrates animals into his sustainable agricultural cycle: “Cows are considered climate killers. But they are a key to building up humus against climate change. It’s not the cow, it’s the how,” he says. His herd of 150 Angus and Salers cattle stays outside all year round. In winter they eat the undersown crops in fields where winter grain is harvested.

They are currently grazing on grass and clover on arable land. “They change the rotation pasture four times a day,” explains Bösel. The hooves loosen the soil, grazing stimulates the roots to grow. This binds more carbon and water. The cow dung fertilizes the soil and inoculates it with important microbes. A study by the University of Michigan showed that emissions from cattle on rotary pastures are 66 percent lower than those in stables. However, the animals require 2.5 times the area.

Harmful methane emissions from cows can also be reduced in stables. The Danish dairy cooperative Arla is currently testing the feed additive Bovaer from the Dutch company DSM on 10,000 dairy cows in Germany, Denmark and Sweden. This inhibits an enzyme in the digestive tract. A quarter teaspoon a day should be enough to reduce the amount of methane by 30 percent.

Milking carousel on a farm in Brandenburg

Industrial livestock farming generates a lot of emissions.

(Photo: dpa)

Scientists see a lot of potential for climate protection through more efficient cultivation methods alone – especially in sub-Saharan Africa, India and parts of Latin America. The same yield can be achieved on only half of the world’s arable land through more targeted use of fertilizer and optimized sowing dates and pest and disease control. This is what researchers at the Universities of Munich, Basel and Hohenheim calculated for 15 crops. Renaturation of the fields results in an additional carbon storage of between 114 and 151 gigatonnes of CO2.

Climate-resistant plants are more frugal

The agricultural industry wants to protect the climate with new plant varieties. Bayer, for example, has conventionally bred a climate-resilient type of maize. Vitala corn is smaller and more resistant to wind. Since the corn has deeper roots, it tolerates drought better. Tests in Mexico show that Vitala corn requires up to 30 percent less acreage.

Agricultural research at Bayer

Scientists are breeding crops that are more climate-resilient and use fewer resources.

(Photo: picture alliance/dpa)

Agrofuels have also been considered a contribution to climate protection. More than 1.2 million hectares worldwide are planted with rapeseed or grain for German biofuel alone. “If you were to leave these areas to nature instead of practicing intensive agriculture, climate protection would be served much better than by replacing fossil fuels,” says Horst Fehrenbach from the Heidelberg Institute for Energy and Environmental Research.

Instead of monocultures, natural vegetation could develop there, which binds large amounts of CO2. 16.4 million tons of CO2 could be absorbed per year. That is 7.2 million tons more than agrofuels saved in Germany in 2020 according to official figures.

An important lever against climate-damaging agricultural emissions is often overlooked: the fight against food waste. The FAO estimates that almost a third of all food ends up as landfill. This causes about 3600 million tons of CO2. Half of the waste is generated by consumers. In Germany alone, 10 out of 18 million tons of waste could already be avoided today, according to the nature conservation organization WWF.

2.6 million hectares would be cultivated “for nothing”, an area of ​​​​Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Saarland together. If this agricultural area were renatured, 48 million tons of greenhouse gases could be saved each year. So it’s not just producers who can reduce emissions in agriculture.

More: Agricultural city Singapore: With new technologies to more sustainability

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