The Loess Plateau restoration in China is the largest scale regenerative land restoration project to date, restoring over 35,000 square kilometers (an area the size of Belgium) between 1995 and 2007. This land was barren for thousands of years prior to restoration, showing an incredible case example of the power of regenerative practices to restore degraded ecosystems.
What is regeneration?
“Regeneration means putting life at the center of every action and decision. It’s an inclusive and effective strategy to end the climate crisis in one generation.”
Paul Hawken, Author of “Regeneration: Ending the climate crisis in one generation”
Regenerative solutions support life by creating the conditions for both nature and humans to thrive. This is accomplished by restoring, renewing or revitalizing our own sources of materials and energy.
“Regenerative design uses whole systems thinking to create resilient and equitable systems that integrate the needs of society with maintaining healthy ecologies. Regenerative designers use systems thinking, applied permaculture design principles, and community development processes to design human and ecological systems.
This approach can be applied to agriculture, architecture, community planning, cities, enterprises, economics and ecosystems." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regenerative_design
A regenerative business might offer a product that heals nature and helps humans, and in addition might use renewable energy, reduce waste, use green suppliers, focus on its local community, take good care of its employees, and give back to the community. Regenerative practice and design goes beyond sustainability to heal and improve ecological systems and our own lives. This approach, achieved through a holistic approach that anybody can learn to do, is creating solutions that help both the earth and us, creating health and abundance.
So how is regeneration different from sustainability?
Sustainability means to make things last, to maintain things as they are. For most people, this implies continuing to conduct business as usual, but reducing or eliminating the damage done in the process. One problem with this approach is that it is often not feasible to continue doing things the way we have because some of the things our society is doing are destructive, or “degenerative,” at their core. For instance, there is likely no way to make fossil fuels sustainable. The extraction, processing and use of them all create multiple forms of damage that cannot be repaired at the pace it is created.
An example of practices considered sustainable would be solar panels. The mining, creation, delivery and discard of them all have degenerative elements, though using solar can prevent even worse damage from fossil fuels, and is thus more sustainable. It can even allow regeneration of damaged landscapes and health by reducing use of fossil fuels.
Degenerative practices result in the active destruction of resources, species, human health and well-being, etc, and can destroy the ability of these systems to recover without considerable aid. Examples include mountaintop removal for coal, clear cutting jungles that result in desertification, or using agricultural practices that destroy water quality, topsoil and fertility.
Regeneration actively improves systems, heals damage, and creates more potential and abundance than what is used up. This is done through processes that restore, renew or revitalize their own sources of energy and materials. Regenerative design uses whole systems thinking to create systems that provide for the needs of both humans and nature while healing both.
Regenerative solutions are often very creative, innovative and outside of the box of “business as usual.” They usually offer multiple benefits across sectors. For instance, regenerative agriculture builds soil, increases infiltration of rainwater, promotes healthy vegetation and wildlife habitat, creates more nutrient-dense food, doesn’t release poisons into the water and soil, and captures carbon, among other benefits. It heals both nature and people.
Regenerative solutions can appear more challenging than “business as usual.” As we continue to degrade our environment, there will be a point where business as usual is obviously more challenging than regenerative solutions. When taking into consideration the full costs of degenerative practices, regenerative solutions are less expensive, more successful and easier to implement than degenerative ones, but few people are aware of the extent of this.
A major purpose of this website is to increase and accelerate access to those solutions in a number of different ways. Because climate change is a major concern for many of us, and because many of the best solutions to this are not broadly communicated or known, we are especially interested in supporting solutions that address this issue.
More information: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regenerative_design
Courtesy of WeRegenerate