100 Years of Biodynamic Agriculture
As we celebrate one hundred years of biodynamic farming, world biodynamic day is a moment to look back at the beginnings and have a view towards the next hundred years. From the start, biodynamic farming was about understanding and working with nature in all its aspects: soil, plants, animals, humans, but also insects, birds, and everything that lives and surrounds the farm.
Working with nature
In nature all elements are interconnected, nothing stands in isolation, but works and interacts with each other. Nature is the foundation of everything, and every economic activity finds its source in nature through the soil, the water, the minerals, the forests, etc.
This is true also for the wild elements of nature: for instance, the insects and birds. Not only are they fundamental actors for the pollination of plants, but they also help to spread seeds, control pests, revitalise the soil, and so much more.
Already in 1924 when Steiner gave a series of eight lectures, published later under the title ‘Agriculture Course’, he stressed the importance of biodiversity for farming and the need to integrate wildlife into farming practices.
We must look to those more intimate interactions which take place in Nature when we have to deal with the life together of plant and animal on the farm. We must look with understanding not only upon those animals which undoubtedly stand close to us, such as cattle, horses, sheep, etc., but also, for example, upon the manifold insect world, which during a certain period of the year hovers around the plants. Indeed, we must learn to look with understanding at birdlife too. Humanity today is very far from realising how much farming and forestry are affected by the expulsion from certain districts of certain kinds of birds as a result of modern conditions.
Rudolf Steiner, Agriculture Course, Leture VII, 15 June 2024
For this reason, biodynamic farming works with a holistic and regenerative approach. It is about integrating all the different elements, as much the cultivated as the wild ones, as all of them contribute to making the farm a living organism in which every part reinforces the other.
An agriculture for the future
This is precisely what makes biodynamic farming an agricultural model for the future. For one hundred years biodynamic farming has shown how by working in harmony with nature it is possible to maintain biodiversity, tackle climate change, and preserve our ecosystems while producing healthy food.
Biodynamic agriculture offers the most productive and efficient methods for a sustainable interaction with nature, for the development of people and for a fair economy. It is a development and cultural impulse for a co-creation between humans and nature. At the same time, biodynamic products would be the cheapest on the market if the true costs were taken into account.
Helmy Abouleish, President of the Biodynamic Federation Demeter International President of the Biodynamic Federation Demeter International and CEO of Sekem, 28 May 2024
Biodynamic farming paves the way for a future-proof agriculture that can nourish people and the planet. The production of nutritious food is not the only core of biodynamic farming, it is also about healing our planet through the restoration of nature itself and caring for our connection with nature, precisely what is needed if we want to address the multiple crises we face today. One hundred years of experience shows that farming does not have to be a choice between production and the environment, but that both can work collaboratively together.
Beyond this crucial work with nature, biodynamic farming also considers the fundamental social dimension as part of farming: the importance of placing the farmer at the centre and the role farming plays within our communities. This is why the respect of nature goes hand in hand with the empowerment of farmers and the creation of resilient communities.
Today, we celebrate hundred years of biodynamic farming: one hundred years of working in harmony with nature, producing good food and healing the planet.
