© Erin Schaff/The New York Times
A regenerative scheme has shown early promise, with herders hopeful it can restore degraded pastures
Ibrahima Ka, dressed in flowing indigo robes, gathers his herd with those of his neighbours before a stretch of lush, untouched pasture. The bellowing, heaving and trampling of 350 impatient zebu cows behind a wire perimeter marks a break with centuries of herding tradition in Senegal, west Africa. Rather than roaming freely across the country’s vast grasslands, shepherds tightly pack the herd together, confining them to graze in short, intensive bursts before being moved to a new plot.
Ka, the village chief of Thignol, is spearheading the first pilot of “mob grazing” in Senegal, aiming to mimic, on a much smaller scale, how wildebeest flow across the Serengeti, moving to protect themselves against lions and cheetahs. The idea that intense grazing can regenerate grasslands rather than accelerate their decline has been controversial. Initially, proponents argued it could help to solve the climate crisis through storing carbon in regenerated grasslands – a claim with little scientific basis. But there is some evidence that the method can boost biodiversity and grassland health in dry areas such as Senegal.
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© Photograph: Guy Peterson
© Photograph: Guy Peterson
© Photograph: Guy Peterson
© Ruth Mcdowall for The New York Times
Growers are reporting a difficult apple season, which is having a knock-on effect for local tourism
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At this time of year, Pine Crest Orchard in the Blue Mountains town of Bilpin would usually have about 1,000 visitors a day picking their own fruit from trees laden with apples.
But this season, the trees are mostly bare – and no one really knows why.
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© Photograph: Pine Crest Orchard
© Photograph: Pine Crest Orchard
© Photograph: Pine Crest Orchard
From back gardens to hi-tech hydroponics, the future of food doesn’t have to be rural
In 1982, artist Agnes Denes planted 2.2 acres of wheat on waste ground in New York’s Battery Park, near the recently completed World Trade Center. The towers soared over a golden field, as if dropped into Andrew Wyeth’s bucolic painting Christina’s World. Denes’s Wheatfield: A Confrontation was a challenge to what she called a “powerful paradox”: the absurdity of hunger in a wealthy world.
The global population in 1982 was 4.6 billion. By 2050, it will be more than double that, and the prospect of feeding everyone looks uncertain. Food insecurity already affects 2.3 billion people. Covid-19 and extreme weather have revealed the fragility of the food system. Denes was called a prophet for drawing attention to ecological breakdown decades before widespread public awareness. But perhaps she was prophetic, too, in foreseeing how we would feed ourselves. By 2050, more than two-thirds of us will live in cities. Could urban farming feed 10 billion?
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© Illustration: Elia Barbieri/The Guardian
© Illustration: Elia Barbieri/The Guardian
© Illustration: Elia Barbieri/The Guardian
Bridport, Dorset: The appropriately named Dorset Horns are perfectly content to have lambs in cooler months, thanks to an obscure genetic quirk
Chubby lambs gambolling over green grass – surely that’s a scene which belongs to spring? But here they are, leaping and bouncing on a sunny hilltop in November.
Autumn lambs have been a familiar part of country life in these parts for hundreds of years. As far back as the 17th century, sheep from west Dorset and south Somerset were renowned for their ability to lamb out of season, due to a genetic quirk which somehow arose in the region. With careful planning, healthy ewes could have three pregnancies in 24 months.
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© Photograph: Sara Hudston
© Photograph: Sara Hudston
© Photograph: Sara Hudston
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