Sue Lani Madsen: It’s all about the food – and the soil it grows in

Food, glorious food. The centerpiece of every holiday. Whatever your Thanksgiving tradition, food is the constant, whether it’s turkey with sausage stuffing or vegan roasted pumpkin with riced cauliflower dressing. What could be more basic to human existence and thus worthy of thanks?

Food – and not farming – is the real focus of the farm bill currently in conference seeking consensus between the U.S. House and Senate. About 79 percent of the $867 billion proposed in the House version of the 2018 bill is for SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as food stamps.

SNAP eligibility requirements are behind the highest-profile skirmish in the negotiations between the House and Senate. The House version proposes expanding work or training requirements for work-ready individuals applying for SNAP assistance. Other key issues include the economic safety net for farmers through crop insurance premium subsidies, market access and other supporting programs. Both safety nets generate lazy stereotypes of welfare dependency by supposedly rich farmers or presumably low-skilled workers.

The stereotypes have roots in serious policy questions on how to provide appropriate support without creating unhealthy dependency. But they shouldn’t be the main event if we are interested in food security and the long-term sustainability of American agriculture.

Civilizations rise and fall on the health of their soil. Soil is more than just dirt. It’s a complex ecosystem of microbes, bacteria and fungi converting sunlight and minerals into tasty digestible form for our tables. When the soil is unhealthy, so is the food it produces. We are just beginning to understand the impact on human health from lack of micronutrients in basic food. If the soil doesn’t contain the minerals and micronutrients needed for human health, then neither will the foods grown in or grazed over that soil.

Soil health requires holistic systems thinking, mimicking nature instead of fighting it. Healthier food is one good reason regenerative agriculture should be the focus of the farm bill policy debate. It’s not the only reason. Healthy soil better absorbs rainfall and resists drought. Using cover crops and diversifying land uses to incorporate animal impact captures and recycles minerals into the soil. And healthy soil has the potential to provide carbon sequestration by using natural cycles instead of spending energy on artificial injections of carbon into plain old dirt.

There is still debate over how much impact humans have on long-term climate cycles. But for anyone convinced humans are driving climate change by releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, it’s critical to look beyond fossil fuels. We have been releasing carbon from the soil into the atmosphere for over 200 centuries. Since the Industrial Revolution, atmospheric carbon from burning fossil fuels has been roughly equal to the carbon released by converting grasslands, forest and other arable land to active agriculture during the same time period. According to an article published in the journal Nature last November, “soil carbon sequestration … is an important mitigation pathway to achieve the less than 2 degrees Celsius global target of the Paris Climate Agreement.”

Regenerative agriculture does not necessarily mean organic. Organic certification is focused on a list of products avoided. Regenerative agriculture looks to improving soil health first as a way to reduce even if not eliminate herbicides, to conserve soil and water, sequester carbon, and to keep farm operations truly sustainable for generations.

It’s become part of the normal conversation when farmers get together in Eastern Washington. Direct seeding is expanding into areas where people once thought it wouldn’t work. Small experiments with cover crops and alternative cropping rotations are changing the landscape.

But survival still comes first. More research dollars are being directed toward best ways to incorporate new practices for the long term while safety net programs support farmers who still have to pay the bills this year.

Survival is what the first national Thanksgiving celebration in 1789 was all about, when President George Washington proclaimed “to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God.” Pass the turkey and stuffing, and don’t hold back on the gravy.