Field Notes
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January 26, 2026
‘Regenerative Ag Can’t Scale’ is a Fallacy!
Farmer Adam
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Though I was not born and raised on a commercial farm, I have been involved in agriculture in one way or another for my entire life. From raising sheep for 4-H as a youngster, to a 13 year long career in precision agriculture and technology, I have always been fulfilled by a life dedicated to the pursuit of feeding humanity. While most of my career has been dedicated to supporting conventional row crop farming, about five years ago I began taking a critical look at how we grow food in the modern world, wondering if there was a better way. This sent me down the rabbit hole of what is commonly referred to as ‘regenerative agriculture’ - a term with as many definitions as there are proponents and critics.
Here is my definition. Regenerative agriculture aims to work in conjunction with the cycles of mother nature rather than trying to domesticate her to our own ends. It seeks to create an ethical framework that integrates plants, animals, fungi, and microbes on the same acre to not only diversify the ecology of the farm, but the economics of the farmer. Soil health is the foundation, and real soil health cannot be achieved unless we steward mutually beneficial cooperation between all organisms.
This essay is written firmly from the proponent camp, focusing on a singular argument that I hear echoed from critics time and time again. That argument boils down to something like, “regenerative agriculture sounds good and all, but it isn’t scalable and therefore can’t feed the world”. This argument is a fallacy, because the truth is, regenerative agriculture doesn’t need to produce at the level of our current industrialized system in order to feed the world.
​Nearly half of the global population is now overweight or obese. 1 In western nations like the US, this figure is closer to 75% of its citizens.2 For the first time in human history, we are at a point where a massive proportion of people would be healthier if they ate less food. What is even more mind boggling is that poor and working class people disproportionately represent those who are overweight and obese.3 These facts point to the simple conclusion that we have been massively successful in producing an abundance of cheap calories to feed a growing planet. This outcome was not guaranteed, so I celebrate this accomplishment along with everyone in the conventional agriculture industry. But this reality fundamentally undercuts the argument that regenerative agriculture needs to maintain the same levels of productivity to feed humanity. It clearly does not.
Piggy-backing off this topic, I would like to touch on another often repeated refrain from my career in conventional agriculture. The idea that we need to constantly improve yields to feed a growing population. Mind you I have worked for the largest ag retailers in the world, so this narrative fit our sales goals hand in glove. While it is true that the global population is increasing, the annual rate of growth has been declining for over 60 years.4 The UN currently predicts that the human population will peak later this century (2080s) at 10 billion people, but in recent years it has been consistently revising its prediction for an earlier peak with a lower total as fertility rates fall faster than expected.5 In other words, the narrative that we must keep improving yields to feed a population that will be growing indefinitely is simply false.
At least one-third of all food produced ends up wasted for one reason or another.6 There are a myriad of causes for this all along the agricultural supply chain from the farm to the table. Poor harvesting, transportation, storage, and simply scraping food off the plate all play a significant role in this problem. One of the more depressing facts here is knowing that while we waste one-third of our food, one-third of humanity deals with at least moderate, if not severe, food insecurity.7 The vast majority of this insecurity is driven by conflict and politics such as what we have seen in Gaza over the past two years.8 Again, this issue has nothing to do with our agricultural production capacity whatsoever, we produce significantly more than enough food to feed everyone.
My last point rests on an idea that is still being fully fleshed out by science, but my gut says this may turn out to be the biggest variable of all. The more nutrient dense a given calorie of food is, the less overall calories one must consume to maintain health.9 The most compelling fact about this idea is that we can expect this effect to compound through all levels of the production chain. The more nutrient dense the soil is, the more nutrient dense the plants and fungi growing on it will be. The more nutrient dense the plants and fungi are, the more nutrient dense the animals foraging them will be. The more nutrient dense plants, fungi, and animals are, the more nutrient dense all the food stuffs derived from them for human consumption will be resulting in less consumption needed. There is mounting evidence pointing to this fact as a major distinguishable difference between genuine regenerative production (not the greenwashers who use it as a marketing term) and conventional agriculture.10 Every acre that converts to regenerative agriculture will result in a more nutrient dense and satiating ecosystem for all organisms within it, resulting in every organism achieving optimal health with less input – the dream of precision agronomists the world over will be realized.
In conclusion, the argument that “regenerative agriculture can’t scale to feed the world” is false at every level. It simply doesn’t need to as we already massively overproduce food for the global population in our current industrialized system. I also want to be clear that I am in no way, shape, or form conceding the point that regenerative agriculture is less productive per acre than conventional. This is only true if you are using a simplistic “bushels/acre” argument which leaves out the vast majority of the story. Once all the variables are accounted for, there is no doubt that regenerative agriculture will be more bountiful per acre as the goal of nutrient dense multi-species production and enterprise stacking is realized with less inputs where conventional agriculture focuses on the maximization of a single commodity. I do not begrudge any person or farmer involved in the conventional system as I still am myself, but my hope with this essay is to remove this critique from the conversation so we can move on to a more constructive dialogue as we all seek to improve the ethics, ecology, and economy of our food system.
References
1. https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/obesity-and-overweight
2. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2843225
4. https://ourworldindata.org/data-insights/global-population-growth-peaked-six-decades-ago
