Animal welfare implications of regenerative agriculture

In light of urgent sustainability challenges faced by the global and Dutch agriculture sector, including environmental degradation, biodiversity loss, greenhouse gas emissions, and nitrogen deposition, regenerative agriculture is increasingly promoted as a potential solution. However, regenerative agriculture is loosely defined, highly context-dependent and needs to be better understood. Specifically, this research will approach regenerative livestock systems and bridge some of the knowledge gaps that remain in this field. The research proposed here will tackle these knowledge gaps specifically: the effects of regenerative practices on the animals’ welfare and production, the understanding of how farmer discourse on animal mind feeds back into their management and vice versa, and the implications of increased farm diversity, associated with regenerative agriculture, for the animals’ lives. This observational research will be conducted within the ReGeNL transition programme. Gathering data from various participating farms within the Netherlands, whereby a primary focus will be on the practices of holistic grazing and herb-rich grasslands, but as regenerative agriculture is often regarded as a community of practice, additional practices will be considered for inclusion when they are encountered. The approach proposed here makes use of mixed methods, including various types of animal observations, chemical analysis of milk and potentially other samples, standardised farm data collection, interviews and discourse analysis. The novelty of this research lies in linking regenerative practices with both tangible animal-level outcomes and farmers’ perceptions, providing a unique interdisciplinary perspective on regenerative agriculture's potential, limitations and trade-offs.