Know Your Context

by CRARS staff member Sheryl Karas. M.A.

There’s a “new” approach being adopted by public health organizations around the world called One Health(opens in new window). It’s based on the idea that human health is closely connected to the health of animals, plants, and our shared environment and that a truly effective approach to public health, including disease control, food safety and security, needs to include the wider context of how environmental issues, climate change, and societal factors are impacting our lives in any particular geographic region. That’s because what works in one region is not necessarily appropriate everywhere else. In fact, without awareness of the greater context, the same choices could even do harm. This is also a mindset being increasingly adopted by practitioners of regenerative agriculture who learn to recognize and make decisions based on these interconnections the more they think of their operations as a whole system where context is the key to success in everything they do.   

Of course, the worldview of seeing everything as an interconnected whole and making decisions accordingly is not really new—it’s closer to the norm in indigenous cultures. But European and U.S. societies eventually grew away from that approach in the light of scientific discoveries based on a more mechanistic view of the world and, furthermore, in the name of expanding yields to feed a growing population. That was effective and profitable, but all decisions have consequences that need to be monitored and sometimes revised. Mark Biaggi, CRARS mentor-farmer and ranch manager at TomKat Ranch(opens in new window) makes the point well in regards to regenerative agriculture (RA):

“Since the earliest days of agriculture there have been people who are in tune with the land and nature, aware of the value of protecting the soils and the plants while still cultivating the bounty they and their communities needed to thrive. They were practicing regenerative farming. 

How we approach RA is the key. This may be more important in the long run than how we implement some of the practices or even which practices we use. We need to recognize that we humans are linear thinkers, good at connecting the dots, solving problems, and producing predictable results. Agriculture is not an entity unto itself but an integral part of the natural world, ultimately governed by the laws of nature which are non-linear. Natural systems are highly complex, multi-circular, incredibly interconnected, and ever changing. Should we ignore the complexity of nature and forge ahead with our linear thinking only, best tools in hand, with a production-only mentality, we eventually create many of the challenges facing the agriculture industry today worldwide. Every decision we make produces corresponding and cascading impacts in the natural world."

For that reason it is important to know your context.

The Context for Regenerative Practices 

While people frequently believe that all a farm needs to be regenerative is to add cover crops or employ some other regenerative practice, chances of success are greatly reduced without thoroughly analyzing the entirety of your situation. Context includes what you want to achieve (for yourself, your family, your property, the greater local community, or the world), the resources you have to work with both in terms of the land (the type and condition of the soil, hilly or flat, typical seasonal and annual rainfall, other water sources, what naturally grows there, etc.) and other material resources like money, physical structure, tools, materials, and sources of support. It also includes the values you wish to embody along the way in terms of relationships with others on the farm and in the community and the impacts you wish to have or avoid. Regenerative principles include avoiding disturbing the soil biology through excessive tillage, keeping the soil covered and protected, keeping a living root in the ground as much of the year as possible, promoting biodiversity, and including livestock when possible. But the context helps determine how this might best be done.   

For example, if you want to add cover crops, what cover crops should you use? Without knowing the condition of your soil and your overall goals, that’s hard to determine. Is your soil poor in nitrogen? Then you would want to choose at least some plants in your cover crop mix that fix nitrogen like legumes. Is your soil compacted? Then you might want to choose plants with a deep taproot like digger radish that would address that problem. Do you want to use those cover crops as forage for animals or as an additional cash crop? Or do you need to address issues with soil erosion, weed suppression, pollinator attraction, or find choices for cool or warm weather, etc.? All of these goals and desires lead to different choices. 

More from Mark Biaggi:

“What is context in the agricultural world? It is understanding who we are, our partners, our families, our employees, and the communities in which we live, work, support, and nourish with food we produce as well as the land we work, the soil that is the land, and the vast microbial communities which organize and maintain soil health. Our context is understanding the relationship on our farm of the microbes below our feet that provide the healthy soil to grow the plants to feed ourselves and our animals. It is understanding the water cycle, the mineral/carbon cycle, the energy cycle, and the community dynamics for our farm. It is understanding where our farm/ranch and our region fall on the brittleness scale—from a tropical ecosystem to a desert ecosystem. Understanding one’s context allows you to make the right decisions on enterprises and practices. 

“Knowing your context will not prevent you from making mistakes, poor decisions, or facing challenges, but if you understand your context and always keep it in mind, it will provide you a guide throughout all of your decision making processes.” 

Every farm or ranch and every farmer will have different parameters to take into consideration. Furthermore, these may change as a farmer encounters different weather conditions, unanticipated economic or societal conditions that affect the market, or a need to make different choices in their personal life. If you adopt the mindset of seeing your work within a broader and ever-changing economic, environmental and social context, you will develop the habit of reviewing that context regularly (at least once a year), analyzing how well past decisions worked (knowing that you couldn’t and can’t anticipate everything), and make new decisions based on what you learned from past choices and what you want to achieve now.  

Paying attention to the current context (knowing it will likely change) and developing the flexibility to make new decisions will help you adapt to those changing conditions. While this is not “new”, it does require a much different mindset than what many people learn growing up at home or in school. Applying principles instead of rules in the context of the greater whole can feel challenging at first, but farmers often say they find it a more empowering and hopeful approach.