The RegenNarration

Dianne and Ian Haggerty form a highly respected, pioneering regenerative farming duo. I’ve come to visit them in the central wheat belt of Western Australia, to learn more about what Charles Massy has called their ‘world breakthrough’ operation. They call it ‘natural intelligence’ farming. Guided by the microbiome, and a whole host of other living systems, the Haggerty’s are regenerating degraded drylands grappling with salinity, chemical residues, climate and other compounding issues, and turning it into thriving cropland, even with as little as 100ml of annual rain.

They’re finding it resulting in an extraordinary array of benefits, including clean quality produce, significant carbon drawdown, and a much less stressful way of life. And it doesn’t stop there. From detoxifying even the notorious herbicide glyphosate, to returning fresh water to salt-ridden lakes, they are constantly surprised by what nature is turning up. And they achieve all this while successfully producing for both local and global markets, and backing in the next generation of regenerative farmers.

Ian and Di currently run around 65,000 acres of farmland, each on the regenerative path with staggering speed and success. And that’s recasting all sorts of possibilities – for human health and prosperity, animal welfare, regional communities, and a regenerative economy and culture more broadly. With the UN forecasting we have less than 60 harvests left in our degrading soils, this has global relevance.

I got around a couple of the farms with Di and Ian – in some brilliant rare rain – for this conversation (recorded on 17 and 18 July 2020).

Title slide: Ian and Dianne Haggerty (pic: Anthony James).

Find more:
Tune into the extra to this episode with Di & Ian, coming later this week.

And catch Di & Ian (along with Charles Massy) on Australian Story, screening on the ABC in September 2020.

Ground Cover, a short film featuring Di & Ian Haggerty by Smart Soil Media.

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In this special extra to episode 67, we talk about some of the key changes that Terry’s observed over the decades, and how to keep them coming. We also elaborate on the vision he articulated in the main episode, including some major shifts in supply chains and some of the positive politics currently unfolding around carbon and biodiversity credits. And we delve more deeply into his stock in trade – what regenerative education looks like!

Terry tells the story of the teacher who triggered his growth from high school drop-out to where he’s at today. And another moving story anchors our closing conversation on the vital issues of drought and flood, fire and First Nations people, and trust, in the regeneration of country.

Title slide: from the RCS website.

Music:
Gone Clear, by William Tyler off his album Modern Country.

Find more:
You can hear the rest of this conversation with Terry for episode 67, ‘Behind the Greatest Regenerative Agriculture Movement in Australia’. (You’ll find a series of links in the show notes too.) 

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Terry McCosker is a formidable store of experience and wisdom, born of a love of the land and an acute sense of humanity, and forged through suffering unimaginable tragedy. And that’s alongside the trials and tribulations that come from simply being at the vanguard of significant change.

Terry is a farmer, self-described transient part-owner of the National Estate, and co-founder of RCS Australia. Charles Massy has called RCS this country’s leading broad-scale grazing and farming education company. And he says, “When I look back over the rise of regenerative agriculture in Australia, I see at the forefront Terry and Pam McCosker and their RCS organisation. Today it remains a world leader in the field.”

Terry is credited with bringing holistic grazing to Australia, having connected with global pioneers Stan Parsons and Allan Savory. But let it be known, he thought it was “the greatest pile of shit he’d ever seen”. He ended up embarking on extensive research testing the theories and practices for himself. When he became convinced of Parsons' and Savory’s work, “Thus began”, Massy says, “arguably the single greatest broad-acre regenerative agriculture movement to turn around land degradation and profitability in farming in this country.” Now there are almost 10,000 producers around Australia, and the world, that have been involved in RCS’ programs.

Whatever your walk of life, and whatever angle you’re taking, or thinking of taking, in the regenerative movement, this conversation resonates on a deeply human level. It was recorded last Thursday, 30 July 2020.

Title slide: Terry McCosker (supplied).

Music:
By Jeremiah Johnson.

Find more:
Tune into the extra to this episode, ‘Recarbonising the Economy, Regenerative Education & the Fire in the Belly of Reconciliation, with Terry McCosker'.

RCS Australia’s International Conference – Convergence: Agriculture | Human and Planetary Health, featuring Zach Bush MD and many more, with Anthony James as MC.

RCS Australia’s website.

Project Pioneer, RCS' brilliant work on improving the health of the Great Barrier Reef.

Listen to current RCS Chairman, David McLean, in conversation for episode 39 ‘Stop Riding the Unicorn: Empowering the regenerative agriculture movement’. 

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The RegenNarration is independent and ad-free, with hundreds of episodes freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. If you're enjoying the podcast, I hope you'll consider becoming a paid subscriber, from as little as around $1 a week, to gain access to a great community, subscriber events and giveaways, and to help keep the show going, on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find some writing, photography and tunes too).

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I hope to see you at an event soon, even the shop. Thanks so much for your support!

David Pollock is one of Australia’s most prominent regenerative pastoralists. You may have seen David and his wife Frances on ABC TV’s Australian Story. You may also have heard my previous conversations with them on this podcast. The most recent of those was when David’s brilliant book was released, almost a year ago. It’s called ‘The Wooleen Way: Renewing an Australian Resource’, and it’s been described as ‘The astonishing story of reviving the oldest land on Earth’.

Well, a lot has happened in a year, so I’m back at Wooleen Station to see how David and Frances have been experiencing it. David’s book has been shortlisted for the Premier’s Prize for an Emerging Writer, carbon trading has been formally introduced on pastoral lands in Western Australia, and of course COVID-19 has happened.

We also talk about one of David’s key proposals in his book, that we didn’t cover last time – how mining could be harnessed towards the regeneration of country. There are a few other updates on our chat from last year too. And while it’s barely rained here in the last year, unfortunately, this meant we got a look at how the enduring health of the landscape was holding up.

David and I took a walked around the Station museum and workshop on a cool afternoon a little over a week ago, for this conversation.

Title slide: The Wooleen Station Homestead (pic: Anthony James).

You'll find a range of photos from this visit to Wooleen Station on the episode web page.

Find more:
David’s book ‘The Wooleen Way: Renewing an Australian Resource’.

Wooleen Station.

You can hear the detailed conversation David and I shared on the release of his book ‘The Wooleen Way’ in episode 44. 

You can also hear David and his wife Frances in conversation with Charles Massy in episode 16 ‘Grassroots Revolution’.

And my conversation with Frances back at Wooleen Station in episode 9 ‘Regenerating Land & Food Systems’.

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I hope to see you at an event soon, even the shop. Thanks so much for your support!

This is an extract from our conversation on Jansz Beach overlooking Ningaloo Reef, for episode 65. It features the first 15 minutes of our chat on the Resilient Reefs Initiative – the vision, the successful model it’s based on, and what’s happened so far. That includes some brilliant recent developments bringing people together, including some breaking news regarding the Traditional Custodians and now Native Title holders.

The last 5 minutes or so is drawn from the end of the episode. It includes how we can help, an epiphany that sparked some of the work, and a closing story that encapsulates some of the power and meaning of coral reefs. Some great Australian music we could licence for the podcast sends us home (thanks to Adam Gibson) – and even a little bloopers reel. Oops!

Title slide: Ningaloo Reef, by Joel Johnsson.

Music:
On the Punt, by Adam Gibson and The Aerial Maps.

Find more:
You can listen to the full conversation in the main episode 65 – Keeping Coral: Regenerating coral reef communities & livelihoods, with Dr Peter Barnes & Joel Johnsson.

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Please share this episode or the trailer with a friend, follow the podcast, and subscribe if you can.

The RegenNarration is independent and ad-free, with hundreds of episodes freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. If you're enjoying the podcast, I hope you'll consider becoming a paid subscriber, from as little as around $1 a week, to gain access to a great community, subscriber events and giveaways, and to help keep the show going, on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find some writing, photography and tunes too).

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I hope to see you at an event soon, even the shop. Thanks so much for your support!

We're back at the magnificent Ningaloo Reef for a couple of firsts - the first conversation in person for the year, and a world first collaboration aiming for the survival of the world’s coral reefs, and the communities that depend on them.

Dr Peter Barnes is the Marine Park Coordinator at Ningaloo Reef – one of five World Heritage listed coral reefs. Australia is blessed with the responsibility for two of these – the other being the Great Barrier Reef – which only serves to heighten the importance of the work Peter and co. are doing here. One of Peter’s newest colleagues is Joel Johnsson. Joel is the Chief Resilience Officer recently appointed at Ningaloo for the global Resilient Reefs Initiative.

Of course, coral reefs have been resilient systems for ages – inter-woven with traditional cultures. But the scale of damaging human impact is now jeopardising their existence. Even at 1.5 degrees global warming, the IPCC expects the coral reefs of the world would be largely wiped out. In other words, even the best-case target set by the Paris agreement would risk the annihilation of some of the world’s greatest wonders. And one of its greatest generators of human wellbeing, prosperity and meaning.

In that context, the Resilient Reefs Initiative is taking a holistic approach – with people at its heart. How can human communities and agencies recreate the way we live with coral reefs, to enhance the resilience of the whole? We’ll need greenhouse gas emission targets met in accordance with the Paris agreement, for a start. And in all likelihood the carbon drawdown efforts we’ve been talking about on this podcast, with regenerative agriculture and other holistic management practices.

Alongside these efforts, the timing and delivery of Resilient Reefs is seen as critical to the survival of the world’s coral reefs, and the enormous variety of human and other life that thrives with them. And you’ll hear some breaking news on how the traditional custodians remain central to it.

To talk about it, Pete, Joel and I sat down at Jansz Beach, overlooking Ningaloo.

Title slide pic: Ningaloo Reef, by Joel Johnsson. You’ll find some other brilliant pics of the Reef by Joel on the episode website.

With thanks to the Western Australian Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions for enabling this conversation.

Music:
The System, by the Public Opinion Afro Orchestra

On the Punt, by Adam Gibson and The Aerial Maps.

 Find more:
The global Resilient Reefs Initiative. 

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Please share this episode or the trailer with a friend, follow the podcast, and subscribe if you can.

The RegenNarration is independent and ad-free, with hundreds of episodes freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. If you're enjoying the podcast, I hope you'll consider becoming a paid subscriber, from as little as around $1 a week, to gain access to a great community, subscriber events and giveaways, and to help keep the show going, on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find some writing, photography and tunes too).

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I hope to see you at an event soon, even the shop. Thanks so much for your support!

This is an extract from the end of my conversation with Tony Rinaudo, the award-winning Senior Climate Action Advisor for World Vision, aka The Forest Maker. We talk about his global vision, how societies can come to read the land again, and how the extraordinary summer bushfires triggered a major new global collaboration recently launched in Australia. But it was the story Tony told of a truth and reconciliation process in Africa that perhaps holds the key to all of it.

Title slide: the moment of Tony’s epiphany, in the early 1980’s (credit unknown).

Find more:
You can listen to the full conversation with Tony in the main episode 64 - The Forest Maker: And the largest positive environmental transformation in Africa, with Tony Rinaudo AM.

You’ll find a link there to a 5 minute special extra too, featuring a short story from the time of Tony’s departure from Niger: ‘We Were Nothing (the trees were almost a side-event)’.

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Please share this episode or the trailer with a friend, follow the podcast, and subscribe if you can.

The RegenNarration is independent and ad-free, with hundreds of episodes freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. If you're enjoying the podcast, I hope you'll consider becoming a paid subscriber, from as little as around $1 a week, to gain access to a great community, subscriber events and giveaways, and to help keep the show going, on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find some writing, photography and tunes too).

You can also donate directly via the website (avoiding fees) or PayPal.

I hope to see you at an event soon, even the shop. Thanks so much for your support!

After we’d signed off on our conversation for the podcast, Tony and I kept talking. Thankfully I hadn’t stopped recording, because what followed could have been the first thing we talked about. In some ways, it sums up everything. So here it is. A little of our parting exchange. Starting with a story from the time of Tony's leaving Niger.

If you’ve come to this extra first, head over to the main episode 64 to hear the rest of my conversation with Tony Rinaudo AM (link below).

Title slide: Halidou, from the village of Gangara, sitting among the trees (pic: Tony Rinaudo).

Find more:
You can listen to the full conversation with Tony in the main episode 64 - The Forest Maker: And the largest positive environmental transformation in Africa, with Tony Rinaudo AM.

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Support the show

Please share this episode or the trailer with a friend, follow the podcast, and subscribe if you can.

The RegenNarration is independent and ad-free, with hundreds of episodes freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. If you're enjoying the podcast, I hope you'll consider becoming a paid subscriber, from as little as around $1 a week, to gain access to a great community, subscriber events and giveaways, and to help keep the show going, on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find some writing, photography and tunes too).

You can also donate directly via the website (avoiding fees) or PayPal.

I hope to see you at an event soon, even the shop. Thanks so much for your support!

Tony Rinaudo AM is the award winning Senior Climate Action Advisor for World Vision, also known as The Forest Maker. This Australian agronomist revolutionized reforestation in Africa, alongside the communities in which he worked, with a system called Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration (FMNR). In Niger alone, where the desert was still expanding 20 years ago, around six million hectares of land have been restored. Having spread to 24 countries in Africa, Tony’s vision is for it to reach 100 countries around the world this decade, and he’s not alone. The movement is fast spreading globally.

The transformation in Niger has been called "probably the largest positive environmental transformation in the Sahel and perhaps in all of Africa," by internationally acclaimed environmental specialist Chris Reij. Though Tony will tell you the transformation was in the people first, starting with himself. He’ll also tell you that the solutions found in Africa worked because they were low-cost, rapid and scalable. And that the lessons he learnt living on the edge of the Sahara Desert relate to so much of what the rest of the world needs today.

Recognition for Tony’s decades of pioneering work has come in the form of multiple awards including the Commandeur de Merite, Agricole, Rep. du Niger, and the Right Livelihood Award. The latter was “for demonstrating on a large scale how drylands can be greened at minimal cost, improving the livelihoods of millions of people.” The Award went on to say, “What Rinaudo has created is much more than an agricultural technique, he has inspired a farmer-led movement.”

So “what would be possible if all stakeholders—donors, scientists, governments, policy makers, business, NGOs, traditional and religious leaders and farmers—partnered and were serious about land restoration? Technically, there is no reason why simultaneously 5 million hectares of land could not be restored in multiple countries within five years.”

Title slide: Tony Rinaudo (pic: Silas Kosh). You’ll find some other photos on the website, including the very moment Tony had his epiphany.

Music:
The System, by the Public Opinion Afro Orchestra.

Find more:
FMNR Hub.

The Forest Maker book.

A special 5 minute Extra.

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Please share this episode or the trailer with a friend, follow the podcast, and subscribe if you can.

The RegenNarration is independent and ad-free, with hundreds of episodes freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. If you're enjoying the podcast, I hope you'll consider becoming a paid subscriber, from as little as around $1 a week, to gain access to a great community, subscriber events and giveaways, and to help keep the show going, on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find some writing, photography and tunes too).

You can also donate directly via the website (avoiding fees) or PayPal.

I hope to see you at an event soon, even the shop. Thanks so much for your support!

This is an extract from the end of my conversation with Open Food Network co-founder, Kirsten Larsen, featuring the story of her personal transformation, and how to get more involved with regenerative food systems. It starts, though, with the story supermarkets trade off – the story of efficiency, economies of scale, and cheap food. And increasingly, to their credit, a story of greening – getting better with waste, for example.

But the model is still seeing the costs of cheap food being borne by farmers, landscapes, and public health.  How it works is extremely opaque.  And when crisis hits, supply chains have shown themselves to be highly vulnerable. In the end, this is a price we all pay.  So what’s the new story?  One that doesn’t play off farmers and landscapes against vulnerable eaters reliant on low cost food?  One whose supply chains don't fall in a heap when we need them most?  And one that ultimately generates more equitable, effective and regenerative distribution systems?

Title slide photo: Network co-founders Serenity Hill (left) and Kirsten Larsen (right) with their two children; supplied.

Get more:
You can hear the rest of our conversation in episode 63, Food Unincorporated: How a grass roots system went global, with Open Food Network co-founder Kirsten Larsen - https://www.regennarration.com/episodes/063-food-unincorporated

Thanks to you, our generous supporters, for making this podcast possible. If you too value what you hear, and you have the capacity at this time, please consider joining them, by heading to our website at https://www.regennarration.com/support. Thanks for helping to keep the show going.

Get in touch any time by text or audio at https://www.regennarration.com/story

Thanks for listening!

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Please share this episode or the trailer with a friend, follow the podcast, and subscribe if you can.

The RegenNarration is independent and ad-free, with hundreds of episodes freely available, thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. If you're enjoying the podcast, I hope you'll consider becoming a paid subscriber, from as little as around $1 a week, to gain access to a great community, subscriber events and giveaways, and to help keep the show going, on Patreon or Substack (where you'll find some writing, photography and tunes too).

You can also donate directly via the website (avoiding fees) or PayPal.

I hope to see you at an event soon, even the shop. Thanks so much for your support!