BE A REGENERATIVE CONSUMER
Once you understand why food produced from farms using regenerative methods are better for you, your family and the environment, you will be looking out for it!
Currently though, it’s hard to source and continually support local farmers on the regenerative path but if you are interested in changing this in your area, please kindly get in touch.
Learn new recipes for produce that is in season.
By increasing the amount of peas and beans to your diet, you are helping add nitrogen to the soil naturally.
Get to know your labels.
There are currently two regenerative labels being promoted to farmers in the UK but uptake is slow. Our current main organic food label from the Soil Association is looking to work together with one or two of these new ‘regenerative’ certification bodies. So for now, if money allows, we can only seek out; ‘Organic, Pasture For Life, RSPCA assured, Outdoor bred /reared and Free-range’. None of these are perfect but certainly better than something calling itself just ‘Fresh’ for example! For more information, please visit our food labels page
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Improve cooking skills
including different cuts and choose high welfare options, preferably from farms using regenerative methods. We should be eating more of the animal as well and rabbit, (wild not intensively farmed) and venison, for example. Bear in mind also that buying rose veal enables dairy calves to have a longer life. Don’t buy ‘suspect’ meat if you can help it!
Eat what’s in season and local as much as possible
You’ll have to get creative but it’s important that we reduce what is transported around the world! If there is a glut of produce locally try and preserve it somehow.
Good places to source food include
Nature Friendly Farmers – https://www.nffn.org.uk/covid-19-nffn-farmers/?fbclid=IwAR0qP6vwAmWYP3YvqF_OHbwkd3KJtliwQ9PEil_EkbZEMKfDvPjNK0Zzjfg
From your local Community Supported Agriculture group – https://communitysupportedagriculture.org.uk/find-csa/
Farms to Feed Us, database. Look for regenerative, biodynamic & organic producers https://farmstofeedus.org/database
Better Food Traders – https://betterfoodtraders.org/
The Open Food Network – https://openfoodnetwork.org.uk/
If in London https://www.farmdrop.com/london
https://thegreatbritishfoodhub.com/ – these are local but not necessarily regenerative. You can help influence them though!
Speak to your food suppliers
Get to know who supplies your local greengrocer and butcher. Are they using regenerative methods? Do they know what they are, do they know what is at stake? It’s awkward but let’s spread the word!
Get support
Get other regenerative, organic and biodynamic farms you know to sign onto the Farms to Feed Us site above, as this will help them get support and it’s free.
Less meat
Here are links to help you cook veggie or reduced meat meals … It takes getting used to but it works out cheaper.
https://www.rspcaassured.org.uk/media/1763/rspca-assured-eat-less-eat-better-meal-planner.pdf
https://www.reducetarian.org/recipes https://www.rspcaassured.org.uk/media/1763/rspca-assured-eat-less-eat-better-meal-planner.pdf
Cook from scratch
Cook from scratch as much as possible as it’s not only cheaper but also better for you. Cooking can be therapy!
Compost
Compost at home or set up a neighbourhood compost. Try and get your green food waste, or indeed all of it, into a good composting scheme to kick off some carbon capturing, healthier, local food. Food waste is heavy and therefore very expensive to transport. For more information, please visit our compost page.
Share our website
This is such a positive and interesting story worth sharing.
Waste less food
Waste less food by buying less and getting creative with leftovers. – See https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/collection/leftovers
https://www.lovefoodhatewaste.com/recipes
https://guelphfamilyhealthstudy.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Rock-What-Youve-Got-Recipes-Sept-2019-Web.pdf
Gleaning network
Set up or join a Gleaning network to reduce and reuse food that would be wasted in fields –
https://gleaning.feedbackglobal.org/
Grow your own.
Educate your children
Educate your children about the nuances of their food choices. If you would like your local schools or colleges to help provide your children with some positive lesson and assembly plans around how soil and our food choices link to their health, climate change and biodiversity, please get in touch.
Garden for Carbon
https://www.audubon.org/news/the-hidden-carbon-trap-your-garden-its-all-about-soil.
Don’t use chemicals in your garden!
Round up and slug pellets are nasty. Companion planting and natural spays provide better alternatives.
http://www.organicgarden.org.uk/gardening/pests-diseases/sprays-organic-for-pest-control/ Get clover in your lawn to add nitrogen – https://www.lawnstarter.com/blog/lawn-care-2/were-thinking-over-why-we-kill-clover/
Support nature in your garden
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2020/may/12/more-birds-and-bees-please-12-easy-expert-ways-to-rewild-your-garden
Real seeds
Buy or swap seeds that aren’t genetically modified and/ or treated with chemicals. This disrupts natural coding and biodiversity. For more information, visit our seeds page.
https://seedcooperative.org.uk/
Seed swapping contacts and info – https://www.plotty.co.uk/en/
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1401329833483609/
https://www.edenproject.com/learn/for-everyone/organise-a-seed-exchange
Rewilding
Donate or offer land to Rewilding Britain https://www.rewildingbritain.org.uk/ Or donate land to the Ecological Land Coop – https://ecologicalland.coop/donate-land
Become a farmer
Become a farmer, we need more people doing this!
The Ecological farm coop – https://ecologicalland.coop/join-elc-as-an-ecological-farmer/ and Farmstart may be able to help – https://landworkersalliance.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Farm-Start.pdf
Community supported food
Get involved with a local CSA or sustainable food place if there is one nearby –
https://communitysupportedagriculture.org.uk/find-csa/ https://www.sustainablefoodplaces.org/about/
Create a food hub
Hopefully, in a few years, our food quality and farming techniques will improve, partly down to the new payment scheme for farmers, ELMS. We can kick start positive steps forward by helping create local shops selling food from regenerative farmers. If interested, please contact holly@regenerativefoodandfarming.co.uk for support.
Go foraging
Buy or carefully and sustainably forage more of a variety of local foods. Variety helps keep your gut healthy, this includes herbs.
Embrace virtuous beans!
Eat more pulses, beans, peas, lentils as these are legumes that help microbes fix nitrogen in the soil, which reduces the need for artificial fertilisers. Eat less rice, as, like ruminants, it produces methane. Eat less potatoes, they are difficult to grow in our climate. Replace potatoes and rice sometimes with pulses, squashes, swedes, turnips and cauliflower rice.
Know your labels and ask your butcher and grocer where their food is from.
COUNTRY OVERSHOOT DAYS
You can see here that if we all lived like someone in the UK, we would have used up all the worlds resources by the middle of May.
Be a regenerative consumer.
A ‘regenerative consumer’, is a bit of an oxymoron, as we need to massively reduce what we consume. We also need to make better choices when we do consume! It’s not easy but like the farmers, weaning themselves of the artificial fertilisers and chemicals, we too need to wean ourselves off some of the harmful foods and practices in our own lives.
