Much of the credit for biointensive’s global impact goes to Ecology Action, which has brought Benedict, Mlegwah and about 100 other interns and apprentices to California mini-farms for internships since 2001. Perhaps most intriguingly, biointensive methods "grow" farmable soil - at a rate 60 times faster than occurs in nature - while traditional farming methods tend to deplete farmable soil through wind and water erosion. Research shows that biointensive farms use 50 to 75 percent less land, 50 to 100 percent less fertilizer, 67 to 88 percent less water and 94 to 99 percent less energy to produce a given amount of food than does conventional farming. Research shows that biointensive farms use 50 to 75 percent less land and 50 to 100 percent less fertilizer to produce a given amount of food. These methods are rarely practiced on large farms, where mechanization is more profitable, but they can be life-changing for the 90 percent of the world’s farmers who work 4 acres or less by helping them to make the most of a given plot of land. Still, millions of small-scale farmers, especially in Latin America and Africa, are turning to it because it’s low-cost and low-tech, and it produces far greater yields than conventional agriculture while using far less land and water.īiointensive’s key components besides transplanting and double-digging are on-site composting, close plant spacing, use of seeds from plants that have been naturally pollinated and specific food-to-compost crop ratios. Three miles over the hills on another small farm, Jonnes Mlegwah is double-digging the soil with a spading fork, preparing to plant potatoes.īoth are Africans, but these mini-farms are 140 miles north of San Francisco in Mendocino County, better known for the harvesting of redwood trees and marijuana plants than kale and potatoes.īenedict and Mlegwah are a long way from home, and the biointensive farming system they’re mastering is a long way from becoming the norm - in the U.S. Her face shaded by a wide-brimmed straw hat, Olawumi Benedict is cheerfully tending to her "little babies" - kale seedlings growing in shallow wooden flats until they’re hardy enough for transplantation into soil beds. This article originally appeared on Ensia.
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