Summer is a good moment to take some distance from our rutinary lives, and the projects we are already involved in. It can be a good moment to take some perspective from our objectives, and to reflect upon the meaning and relevance of our projects.
I am using this summertime to learn about “syntropic agriculture/agroforestry” in Galicia, Spain.
As we mentioned in a previous entry, as part of UAB research on «sustainable competencies» we started a collaboration with an agroecological farm close to our campus. Apart from producing food, this farm is also working on environmental education, which has a lot to do with sustainable competences.
Through direct observation and practice, we could observe the challenges of an agroecological project to engage in some tasks such as seed conservation or compost recirculation, while dealing with commercial needs.
From our perspective, dealing with seeds (the beginning of life) and compost (the end of the cycle) has a lot to do with learning sustainability competences for a circular economy.
However, around Collserola, where the project is inserted, there is an entire ecosystem of farmers who devote themselves to several tasks that complement each other. For example, Can Mandó is producing seeds that l’Ortiga can buy for its agroecological purposes. Some riding clubs (Can Domènech) generate great amounts of manure that can be brought back to the soil. So, seed conservation or compost recirculation is not a problem for the cooperative that needs to be solved. Reflections on sustainability and circularity created the interest to explore the possibility of introducing the tasks mentioned as educational material.
We suggested, for the purpose of working on the concept of circularity, creating a seed bank in l’Ortiga. This was received with enthusiasm. The problem is always the same, lack of time and resources. But we insisted and, to make it happen, a small trip to Galicia helped us to see which could be the purpose of focusing on the seeds.
The Agroecological Station of Vieiro (northern coast of Galicia) is a small piece of land owned by Jaime Otero Páramo, known by the dissemination of syntropic agriculture in Spain, a theory and practice on how to grow edible forests initiated by Ernst Götsch in Brasil. Syntropic agriculture can be defined as a regenerative agroforestry management driven by the power of natural succession. This is the tendency of Nature to restore itself, converting degraded landscapes into fertile fields and lush vegetation (Gietzen, 2016).
Gietzen, R. (2016). Abundancia agroforestal. Manual de agricultura sintrópica". Michigan. Retrieved from: https://assets.echocommunity.org/publication_issue/ae1d762e-d561-4a7e-80b3-de9ddeaa6259/es/abundancia-agroforestal-manual-de-agricultura-sintropica.pdf
Moreover, Syntropic agriculture “helps the farmer replicate and accelerate the natural processes of ecological succession and stratification, giving each plant the ideal conditions for its development, placing each one in their “just right” position in space (strata) and in time (succession). It is process-based agriculture, rather than input-based.”[1]. In this project, which is still in transformation and orienting towards educational purposes (already accepting volunteers who want to learn about syntropic agroforestry), circularity is very important.
One of the everyday tasks in the Station, especially in summer, is collecting seeds of the different varieties of vegetables that we can find and separating them from the pod. The objective is to save the seeds to plant them as soon as possible, if they are not distributed among other peasants or horticulturists. “Seeds need to be back to the soil, and never be kept for a long time”, explained Jaime.
After the collection of the seeds, we extend them in a net and let them dry under the sun.
Another task is called manejo in Spanish, which would be translated as agroforestry management. This is of crucial importance in syntropic agroforestry. This practice entails mowing/cutting the plants which are not «desired» (but necessary to help other species grow). This way, mowing entails giving back to the soil the biomass that was previously growing. We could go forward explaining the principles and practices of this entire process of growing forests. Moreover, syntropic management requires different levels of technical knowledge regarding the different species which are sowed in a particular ecosystem. Working in favor of natural succession entails quite a lot of environmental knowledge. The most important, however, is not theory, but practical conceptions of the ecosystem which we want to regenerate.
As a principle, syntropic management is contextualized and conjunctural, as well as transferred and adapted to each project.
In the end, syntropic agroforestry wants to generate abundance and make people able to manage this abundance without generating an impact to the soil that would considerably affect new generations. An important difference from the cooperatives in Collserola, is that the production in the Station is not oriented to the market, at least not yet. Their purposes are small-scale self-sufficiency and creating an edible forest that can be an educational example. Maybe this is also because syntropic agroforestry is quite new and still not disseminated as regenerative agriculture, for example, which is already strong in market-solutions.
Not for this reason should we underestimate the power of syntropic agroforestry to make changes in a bigger scale. It is possible to make big agroforestry projects. And this is also an opportunity to bring more people into the fields to contribute to nature restoration.
The challenge of this system is basically dealing with complexity. Some practices from organic agriculture have to deal with making it simpler to harvest and produce. Our generations were born in cities and urban areas, and the basic knowledge on how to produce food has somehow been lost. Consequently, first we need to work on some simple ideas of soil management and food production that start introducing concepts that we don’t normally use in our everyday lives.
For instance, before pruning an orange tree, we must know the life cycle of orange production, right? When is it planted? When are its fruits harvested?
Syntropic agriculture requires knowledge based on observation and practice, but mostly, it requires time. Nevertheless, there are many ideas that can be taken from this practice for educational purposes.
Can we teach «syntropic agriculture» to the new generations?
The Agroecological Station of Vieiro, a piece of it. We can see some ASF (agroforestry systems) surrounding the Galician pasture.
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