Yields vs Environment? Farmers Shouldn’t Have to Choose (And They Don’t Have To)

“You’re asking farmers to switch to regenerative practices, but this often means a decline in yields. How can you expect farmers to make this choice?”

I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve heard this question. On this occasion, the point came up as I was speaking at the Sintercafé coffee conference in Costa Rica last month. The exporter who asked this question was sitting at the back of the conference room surrounded by a panoply of peers—from local producers to global coffee traders. And absolutely everyone in the room was seeking an answer to the same question: We know what regenerative coffee looks like, but how do we get there?

My presentation at Sintercafé was on the Rainforest Alliance Regenerative Coffee Scorecard that we co-developed with Nespresso. My goal going into this conference was to explore what we can all do to further incentivize farmers to make the switch to regenerative agriculture. The concern expressed by the exporter is one that I have come across multiple times: Does transitioning to regenerative agriculture require a trade-off between environmental performance and yields?

Fortunately, that is not the case. Research shows that—when managed correctly—regenerative agriculture does not mean a trade-off is inevitable. For example, recent and emerging research in both cocoa and coffee find that carefully managed regenerative systems can compete with conventional agriculture.?

But, as many fellow researchers and scientists know, sometimes paper-based evidence is not enough to dispel the doubt—especially when livelihoods are on the line. For many, seeing is believing.

Just a few days later, and a few thousand meters higher, I was fortunate enough to see for myself just how effective regenerative farming can be.?

Standing on Roberto Ure?a Ceciliano’s farm in Western Costa Rica, it’s hard to tell where the farm begins and the forest ends. Shade trees towering twenty to thirty feet loomed above us, and below our feet a variety of legumes and flowers sprawled across the forest floor, fixing nitrogen into the soil and providing nutrients across the six-hectare farm.

Roberto, the proud farm owner, has been Rainforest Alliance Certified since 2007, and with the help of his local cooperative and our regional field teams, he has transformed his farm into a model agroforestry system.

As my team immersed ourselves in the dense vegetation of Roberto’s farm, we could not help but ask if he felt he needed to sacrifice profit for biodiversity? For Roberto, the two are not mutually exclusive.

“Day to day, and year to year, the shade has resulted in a number of environmental benefits, as well as economically favorable ones. We use less manual labor, less agrochemicals, and overall, it’s a more environmentally friendly form of management.” And when asked about his productivity, he told us that last year he harvested about 30 fanegas per hectare, well surpassing the national average of 20. (For reference, 1 fanega is about 46 kg of green coffee.)

Farms like Roberto’s prove that regenerative agriculture can be done and done well. But building a profitable, regenerative farm requires support: support from cooperatives, traders, and coffee sourcing companies alike. What Roberto achieved would not have been possible without the support of his local cooperative, and when I think back to the number of producers who attended the Sintercafé workshop I remember both their eagerness to transition to regenerative agriculture, and their call for support.

Transitioning to regenerative agriculture requires farmers to make upfront investments and take on potential risks. Inputs, like organic fertilizers, can be more expensive than synthetic ones, and while the productivity of regenerative farms can compete with conventional farms in the long run, farmers may experience a drop in production during the first year or two of transitioning. For the regenerative transition to happen, producers need to be supported and compensated fairly.?

Whether through investments and/or technical guidance, supply chain actors have a significant role to play in catalyzing the regenerative transition. Farmers are eager to make the switch, they just need the tools to do so.

That’s why the Rainforest Alliance designed a Regenerative Coffee Scorecard—to guide farmers and companies on their journey through monitoring and evaluation, field training, and comms guidance. To learn more, check out our article How Your Company Can Support Regenerative Agriculture.?