Paula and Valter on the mission to break the monoculture paradigm

Agribusiness is always praised as the great engine of the Brazilian trade balance. Its environmental impacts, however, motivate entrepreneurs to engage in promoting alternative models for working in the field.

The couple Paula Costa and Valter Ziantoni believe that the agroforestry system (AFS) can solve the sector's dilemmas, such as climate change and the use of chemical inputs that degrade the soil. With that in mind, they undertook the Pretaterra in 2016.

Based in Timburi (a city in the state of São Paulo, 360 kilometers from the capital, along the border with Paraná), the company plans and implements agroforestry systems, in addition to training and training farmers and offering online or in-person courses.

Agribusiness is always praised as the great engine of the Brazilian trade balance. Its environmental impacts, however, motivate entrepreneurs to engage in promoting alternative models for working in the field.

The couple Paula Costa and Valter Ziantoni believe that the agroforestry system (AFS) can solve the sector's dilemmas, such as climate change and the use of chemical inputs that degrade the soil. With that in mind, they undertook the Pretaterra in 2016.

Based in Timburi (a city in the state of São Paulo, 360 kilometers from the capital, along the border with Paraná), the company plans and implements agroforestry systems, in addition to training and training farmers and offering online or in-person courses.

“We want to make all production systems in Brazil, and perhaps in the world, agroforestry, that is, have some arboreal component. And this is absolutely possible and necessary. That's what we're working for.”

Paula Costa

Inserting trees into the production system brings environmental benefits. The challenge is to make these systems also economically viable at scale—with fair pricing, inclusive labor, and a pesticide-free, life-enhancing end product.

Each project foresees aspects such as harvest volume and financial return to the farmer. The idea is that agroforestry can be tools not only of environmental sustainability, but also economic and social.

But what exactly are agroforestry?

Agroforests are systems created by human beings that add trees (perennial plants) to productive arrangements, whether pastoral or agricultural.

Agroforestry systems mimic how nature behaves, both in the arrangement of trees and plants in space and in their strata or floors — and thus create richer, more biodiverse and also productive landscapes.

Unlike monoculture, in which the focus is the production of a single item, agroforestry works with polyculture: from a single productive unit it is possible to extract a great diversity of products.

Trees, for example, are a source of wood products (such as sawn wood, firewood, charcoal and cellulose) and non-wood products: fruits, nuts, fodder, latex, fibers, oils, resins…

This diversity of species also transforms the countryside into a place rich in environmental and ecosystem services, such as soil protection, water conservation, microclimate maintenance, pollinator attraction and carbon fixation.

BEFORE STARTING THE BUSINESS, THE COUPLE WORKED AT FAZENDA DA TOCA, IN SP

Forest engineers, Paula and Valter have been working with agroforestry for a decade. For two years, for example, they headed the Research and Development area of Toca Farm, a project by Pedro Paulo Diniz in Itirapina, in the interior of São Paulo.

Known mainly for the production of organic eggs sold in supermarkets in the capital, Fazenda da Toca also maintains an operation of agroforestry systems.

“We worked very closely with the field and research teams and helped to redesign all agroforestry for the large scale. We were able to prototype a lot, understand mistakes and successes, do financial modeling, test, put the proof in the field…”

— VALTER CONTAS ABOUT EXPERIENCE ON THE PROPERTY:

It was from this experience and the accumulated technical knowledge, says Valter, that they coined the concept of large-scale agroforestry.

The idea was to take the logic of monoculture to polyculture and, thus, allow agroforestry to gain scale and not just be restricted (as it has been in the last 70 years, according to them) to backyards and subsistence plantations.

Putting this approach into practice required a new methodology. "We created a method of planning the production system in a modular, replicable and elastic way so that the farmer can see it as a business”, says Paula.

PLANNING ALLOWS TO MAKE PROJECTS FEASIBLE AT ANY SCALE

With a project in hand, Pretaterra plans modules for one hectare (area equivalent to 10,000 m²) that can be replicated both in areas of half a hectare and 1 million hectares.

“With this planning, the project becomes viable on any scale. And when we talk about large scale, it's not necessarily about large estates, but with several farmers spreading it across the landscape. Each replicates that design in multiple contexts, across multiple properties — and ends up taking up a large area.”

— PAULA COSTA

For the projects to be “elastic”, the partner couple uses the concept of “functional niches”, grouping species by function (and not by type).

This allows the arrangement to be made according to the region and the species available at the time of implantation.

A project designed for Rio Grande do Sul, for example, can be transferred to the Amazon by exchanging araucaria for kapok without changing the design, only the species within that niche.

THEY HAVE ALREADY CARRIED OUT 100 PROJECTS (AND COVID-19 HAS GROWN DEMAND)

Valter and Paula say they started Pretaterra without investment: with the money from the first project, they developed the second and so on.

To date, around 100 systems have been implemented, from Minas Gerais to the Amazon, including countries such as Peru, India and Indonesia. Farmers, NGOs and government institutions are among the clients. No matter how much technical knowledge they have, there is almost always something new to learn from local communities.

“When we arrive in a new context, we make a real immersion: we talk to farmers, observe, collect data in the field, learn from them to systematize the important information we need for our planning”

— PAULA COSTA

At this moment, they are finalizing the planning to implement a system in the Costa Rica with vanilla, cocoa, palm oil, as well as other wood and fruit species. “It's a very complex system,” says Paula. "We hadn't worked with vanilla yet."

According to the partners, demand grew with Covid-19, leveraged even by the so-called “neo-rural”, people who left the city, acquired a piece of land and now want to learn to produce in an environmentally responsible way.

HOW MUCH DOES IT COST TO IMPLEMENT AN AGROFORESTRY PROJECT?

It is difficult to set a value, but, on average, the planning and implementation of an agroforestry costs between 20 and 25 thousand reais per hectare.

There are ways to reduce the cost, such as the use of collective efforts to plant or produce the inputs themselves. This type of action is feasible in some contexts with which Pretaterra also works.

“With the support of indigenous communities, we have already managed to implement an entire hectare for less than 3,000 reais. This was possible because the Indians produced the seedlings and the compost itself — and the labor used was from the community, which drastically reduced the cost”

— VALTER ZIANTONI

The truth is that the value of the project can be very variable: it depends on the complexity of the system, the species chosen, the spacing that will be used, among other factors.

In an area of 4 m², for example, 1,200 seedlings are used if the spacing between them is 2×2, 10 thousand if it is 1×1 and 100 if it is 10×10.

Another factor is the cost of each species. A eucalyptus seedling costs about R$ 0.60. A macadamia seedling can reach 30 reais.

CAN AGRIFORESTRY ONE DAY REPLACE AGRIBUSINESS FOREVER?

The big question is: if agroforestry is so good, why does it seem so difficult for them to become the predominant form of production?

The answer is complex, ranging from technological and market bottlenecks to the political situation. Today, within the agro, there is a lot of innovation. For Paula, however, almost everything is designed for the logic of monoculture or forests. “Technological innovations need to be brought to the polyculture bias. This is one of the points that can take agroforestry to another level. In addition, it is necessary to build more complex production chains, connect with industry, logistics and retail”

By encouraging farmers and ranchers to specialize in a single product, monoculture funneled markets. It is therefore necessary to diversify them. To advance this agenda, Pretaterra insists that it is important to produce content, enlightening people about agroforestry systems and products.

Our job is to build a new paradigm based on agroforestry systems”, says Paula. “And what would this new paradigm be? Simple: that we don't need monocultural systems. We can produce abundantly in polyculture.

Original Subject: https://www.projetodraft.com/um-casal-com-uma-missao-quebrar-o-paradigma-da-monocultura-e-tornar-o-agronegocio-mais-saudavel-para-o-planeta/

Source: Draft Project

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