The Nature Conservancy (TNC) provides technical support for the Soil Health Partnership (SHP), and it’s something that fits in well with the organization’s mission “to conserve the lands and waters on which all life depends.”
“The Nature Conservancy has been working in agriculture for several decades,” says Larry Clemens, TNC North American Agriculture Program Director. “We’ve been wanted to scale up our partnerships and our collaborations, so when the Soil Health Partnership was forming it was a great opportunity … to get good information and good science out to growers in the Midwest about soil health practices.”
Clemens adds that soil health is a global priority for TNC. “We really see in the future that soil health is going to be key to increasing our production and feeding the world,” he said during an interview at the second Soil Health Summit this week in Indianapolis.
The SHP is a true partnership between environmental interests like TNC, farmers through the National Corn Growers Association, and industry with funding from Monsanto and The Walton Family Foundation, and Clemens says it has long term implications for the future. “As we think about feeding our world, soil is truly the foundation and when it’s not healthy, the rest of our ecosystem is likely not going to be healthy,” he said.
Listen to Chuck’s interview with Larry here: [wpaudio url=”http://traffic.libsyn.com/zimmcomm/shs16-clemens.mp3″ text=”Interview with Larry Clemens, The Nature Conservancy”]
2 Comments on “Soil Health A Priority For The Nature Conservancy”
It is good to see many sectors collaborating to ensure soil health; it is so critical to food, water and landscape sustainability. As a farmer and as a businessman involved in several multi-stakeholder sustainability efforts during the last decade, I have come to appreciate the crucial role “governance” has played in the success of these projects. “Governance” – an awkward term can be described as how organizations “get things done” – the business culture piece of an organization.
For decades it was ignored because society was not very interconnected. Now, most every effort is multi-stakeholder and a “governance strategy” becomes a vital component. Here is a primer: http://bit.ly/1l5SHoS on how governance can be dissected, understood, and put together to create the ideal governance framework. Governance happens…make sure it happens right.
It is good to see many sectors collaborating to ensure soil health; it is so critical to food, water and landscape sustainability. As a farmer and as a businessman involved in several multi-stakeholder sustainability efforts during the last decade, I have come to appreciate the crucial role “governance” has played in the success of these projects. “Governance” – an awkward term can be described as how organizations “get things done” – the business culture piece of an organization.
For decades it was ignored because society was not very interconnected. Now, most every effort is multi-stakeholder and a “governance strategy” becomes a vital component. Here is a primer: http://bit.ly/1l5SHoS on how governance can be dissected, understood, and put together to create the ideal governance framework. Governance happens…make sure it happens right.