Farmers have a significant responsibility to maintain the sustenance of our society and to be the steward of the environment, starting from the soil they nurture in order to produce food. In conventional farms, the use of poison to protect crops is a common practice, which makes farmers to be the gateway of these toxicants to pollute the environment, as well as harming their own health and consumers as an effect. The complexity of changing the social behavior of farmers to produce food organically are further enveloped by consumers creating a demand for conventional food production, as many are not aware of how their food is grown.
The negative consequences of exploitative food production as a result, have caused many environmental degradations and illnesses we see today. Without transparency in the food system, production of food has caused loss of biodiversity in farmlands areas, contamination of agricultural runoffs to the ocean, and production of unsafe food. Moreover, the inefficient management, storage and distribution of these conventional products often do not reach the end market. Creating food loss and also waste problems by entering the local landfills and producing greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change.
The unsustainable production and consumption of food can be remediated by the implementation of regenerative farming methods and access for consumers to support it. Regional farmers collaborate techniques of organic, integrated farm management with the guidance of Little Spoon Farm’s team, while also taking in account their own wisdom passed down from generations, as the means to supply food for the market. Some techniques we apply are soil restoration using microbe rich amendment, raise awareness of growing local crops that are resilient, practice multi-cropping farm management, harvest forecast administration, maintain technical and market support for committed local farmers, and creating an online platform for accessibility to the market, vice versa. As a result, the farmers’ incomes increase and they also gain a progressive improvement to their livelihoods.
Practicing regenerative agriculture, when multiplied by many, can bring a significant positive impact for the environment and improve the livelihoods of all communities that depend on it. Little Spoon Farm now have maintained restorative food growing practices in ten partnering smallholder farms with close established relationships, and continue the outreach to their neighboring farmers to be on board. We started this project in the strategic heritage island of Bali.