In a world of cheap fossil fuels, often more energy is used to grow, transport and process our food than is actually in the food we consume.
How is this so?
Is it always the case?
On our Biodynamic farms all of the energy that is required to grow our pastures comes from the sun which in conjunction with healthy soil, ample rain and diverse plant species gives us all of the tools to grow healthy nutritious food.
However, on most conventional farms, synthetic fertilizers, agricultural chemicals, tillage and the purchase of grains all require a huge input of energy.
Most of these farms grow a monoculture crop of just one type of grass or crop which requires massive doses of fertilizer to sustain this unnatural practice.
As an example, it takes 5 tons of coal to manufacture one ton of urea which is a common fertilizer.
Many farms use half a ton of urea per hectare every year to grow pasture and their hundreds of thousands of hectares of farmland throughout Australia.
Also only 10 to 50% of the fertilizer applied is used by the crop, the rest either leaches into the ground water polluting the ground water or evaporates up into the atmosphere as Nitrous Oxide. Nitrous Oxide is 300 times more potent as a greenhouse gas than CO2.
Think about the waste of energy that is required to grow grass when nature does it for free.
At Mungalli, we use legumes and natural nitrogen fixing bacteria from the Biodynamic preparations in the soil to do the same thing with minimal cost to ourselves and the environment.
Also, on Mungalli farms we have permanent pastures and so do not plough either with machinery or with chemicals. Cultivation breaks down organic matter in the soil and releases CO2 into the atmosphere.
Our farms at Mungalli have an organic matter of 10% whereas many Australia farms have less than 2%.
Biodynamic and regenerative farming actively pull CO2 out of the atmosphere and store it in the soil as stable humus which is the exact opposite of farms that cultivate the soil.
Transport of food over vast distances also consumes a lot of energy and so it is probably best to purchase food which has been grown in your local area.
If you are worried about the environment and global warming it is best to purchase to purchase food that has been grown using regenerative practices that heal the land and atmosphere rather than destroy it.
Farmer Rob
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