biodiversity—whether by growing multiple types of plants
at once or by integrating plants and animals on the same
farm, also called polyculture or diversified farming.At the grocery store, look for products with ingredients
grown through regenerative agricultural practices. You
can find those products by looking for a third-party label
launched as a pilot in 2018 that’s called “Regenerative
Organic Certified.” It includes the practices related to soil
health described above, as well as others related to animal
welfare and social justice. (regenorganic.org)
In the near future, when dining out or selecting packaged
foods, choose perennial crops when possible. Most crops
get planted and tilled annually, which releases carbon into
the atmosphere. Perennial crops (such as trees), by con-
trast, have deep roots. Kernza, a perennial grain, was the
first prototype crop launched in the United States, sold for
the first time commercially in Long Root Ale, a beer made
by Patagonia Provisions. According to the Land Institute,
in future years we’ll see many more perennial products
appear on shelves, like perennial sunflower oil and hum-
mus from perennial legumes. Not eroding soil keeps carbon
from being released (that’s a good thing), but in addition,
plants can actually pull existing carbon from the atmo-
sphere (where it’s damaging) and deposit it into the ground
(where it’s useful). This idea is called “carbon farming,”
meaning to pull carbon down from the sky, as opposed to
only emitting it upward. The two efforts—not tilling/main-
taining grasslands for prairie ecosystems, much like not
deforesting/maintaining forests in rainforest ecosystems—
work in concert. Choosing perennial crops isn’t a magic
bullet solution—just as with human health, there aren’t any
for environmental health—but it sure is a promising one.
74 how to be a Conscious Eater