A BOLD RETURN TO GIVING A DAMN

A farmer revitalizes his family’s farm.

Livestock farmer Harris, owner of White Oak Pastures in southwest Georgia, makes his book debut with an impassioned plea for regenerative agriculture and resilient food production—i.e., farming in harmony with nature. Now comprising thousands of acres, and tens of thousands of animals and employing nearly 200 people, the farm was started by his great-grandfather in 1866 and continued as “a highly local, producer-to-consumer food system” through the next generation. The author’s father, though, heading the farm at a time when “manufactured” seemed better than homemade, and “sterile better than living,” began industrializing the farm, applying chemical fertilizer, treating cattle with hormones and antibiotics, and selling his calves to the commodity beef industry. In 1990, Harris took over, and in a few years had a sudden epiphany. Certain that what he was doing wasn’t right for the animals, he decided to walk away “from the altar of technology,” heal the land that chemicals had harmed, and reverse “the downhill plummet” of environmental damage. From being a cattle rancher, he evolved into raising 10 species of livestock, providing them with a “natural diet, natural environment, constant movement, little stress.” Harris recounts the “very steep and expensive learning curve” involved in regenerative agriculture. “Switching [your] system,” he admits, requires “sheer grit” and determination. He encountered unforeseen risks (and costs) to raising poultry, for example, and he faced the challenge of finding grocery chains willing to stock his products—no easy task in the rural South. Still, he discovered that the changes benefited the larger community when he hired local labor and brought in new people who spent money on the town’s goods and services. The author provides an appendix of resources for consumers who want to rethink the quality of the food they eat and question the impact of their food choices.

A compelling argument for real food.