Canadians eat two times more meat than the global average, exacerbating the problem of carbon emissions produced by our food. To meet this voracious demand, the handful of meat producers who control the bulk of Canada’s meat industry depend on industrial farms and meat processing plants, despite the industry’s questionable track record when it comes to protecting the environment and workers’ rights.

In the face of these problems, everyone from farmers to governments to big food companies are eyeing so-called “regenerative farming,” a suite of practices that use plants and livestock to improve soil health. Soil is typically home to billions of microbes that transform dead organisms and animal dung into nutrients, sequestering carbon into the ground. 

But on conventional industrial farms, artificial fertilizers and pesticides circumvent this natural process, allowing farmers to grow crops without manure. Meanwhile, industrially produced meat is grown in feedlots on diets of conventionally grown soy and corn. Regenerative farming rejects many of these practices in favour of carefully raising crops and livestock together and other methods that promote soil health.

[British Columbian farmer Tristan] Banwell, like other regenerative ranchers, uses animals judiciously to support pastures and grasslands, ecosystems renowned for their ability to sequester carbon and promote biodiversity. Cows, pigs and chickens aerate and fertilize the soil — a close relationship between animals, plants and people unimaginable on an industrial farm. 

“Factory farming (has) broken the contract that we have with livestock,” Banwell said as the cows munched on a bale of hay. “Understanding their needs and being connected to them is part of regenerative farming to me.” 

…

“The reality of the world is really messy and complicated and all sorts of grey,” he said. “There’s many infinite ways to produce food, and from a consumer perspective, there’s good, better and best (options). Just make the best choice with the resources you have available at that time and don’t beat yourself up about the rest.” 

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