Avoiding the degradation of soil and nature in general is the new vision they are working with Farm San Adolfoafter the international organization SGS awarded him Carbon Negative Certification on April 5, which according to Hosted by Rafael Velarde making him the first in the country to receive this recognition.

“It is a great motivation to know that we give back to nature a little of what it gives us, it allows us to have animals, harvest various types of crops, and all we as humans have done is degradation…”, Velarde points out.

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The certification process began in 2021 with Tonicorp, Arca Continental and The Coca-Cola Company advising the 841-hectare farm, located on the El Triunfo-Bucay road, in the province of Guayas.

According to Velarde, they started by measuring the carbon footprint and how much impact they had on livestock practices, which resulted in 2,178 tons per year, but with remediation practices they captured 58,000 tons of CO2.

“We still emit 2,178 tons, the difference is that we capture 58,000 tons with remediation practices, that is carbon negativity, that is, we capture much more than what we pollute,” he explains.

After they found out how much they were polluting, they took remedial measures, which included several aspects, among them, they focused on regenerative livestock management, which consists of soil recovery, complete cessation of the use of chemicals, herbicides, fertilizers, insecticides.

At the San Adolfo farm, they changed the modality of cattle grazing. Photo: Courtesy

In addition, they have changed the grazing system to one that mimics nature, the complete opposite of traditional animal husbandry and grazing, in which a few animals are kept in a wide area for several days, which does not allow grass and soil to recover, and what it does is release CO2 into the environment and because of this – he says – cattle are accused of global warming and greenhouse gases, but in fact it is due to poor grazing management.

Explain that they are now doing the movements of many animals in small spaces and for short periods of time. As an example, he states that they have groups of 100 to 200 animals that move three times a day within a certain area and this enables better and faster recovery of grass and soil.

“We may be from the tropical zone, one of the few farms that managed to implement this management system on such a large area, otherwise regenerative management was done on farms or on small farms…”, he confirms.

Reduced operating costs and increased productivity

By introducing regenerative livestock farming, Velarde claims the farm’s operating costs have also been reduced by more than 32%. This shows that although it would seem that grass production would be reduced by not using chemicals, the opposite happened, the productivity of the farm increased and they went from managing 1.5 animals per hectare to 2.5 and the goal for this year is to finish in 3.

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He notes that before they managed 1,200 head on 841 hectares, in 2022 they concluded with 1,700, and the goal for 2023 is to finish between 2,400 and 2,500.

San Adolfo Farm received advice from Tonicorp to obtain certification. Photo: Courtesy

He emphasizes that regenerative animal husbandry has also changed the way indicators are measured. Traditionally, he says, animals are measured per hectare or liters per cow, but the new modality has started to measure kilograms of animals per hectare and liters of milk per hectare.

“Before, we had a production of 400 to 500 liters of milk per day, but while keeping cows on 130 hectares of pasture. Currently, we have the same production, but we run it on 70 hectares, where there are milking cows, that is, we have increased the productivity per hectare and this allows us to leave more pastures for breeding cattle”, he explains.

The San Adolfo farm sells an average of 500 liters per day to Tonicorp, and the goal for this year is to close at 800 liters by December.

As a remedial measure, they also annually plant between 500 and 1,000 trees endemic to the area: guayacán blanco, laurel and fernansánchez. This initiative started in 2021, with exactly 500, it was the same in 2022, and for this 2023, the goal is to plant 1,000 trees.