51. The Million Acre Challenge: Building Regenerative Systems for Healthy Soil with Amanda Cather

In this week’s episode, Mary and Emma talk with Amanda Cather from The Million Acre Challenge, a nonprofit organization that helps Maryland farmers build soil health, increase farm profitability, and improve water quality – while making farms resilient and active in the face of climate change. Their farmer-focused collaborative uses soil health science, economics, education, and incentives to achieve their mission. Amanda's early training in pre-med led her from an interest in equitable food access to a career path in urban agriculture, and ultimately to running her own farm raising grass-fed livestock. Now, alongside the team at Million Acre, the goal is to achieve one million agricultural acres in Maryland using healthy soil techniques by 2030, while sharing best practices and making healthy soil connections throughout the Chesapeake watershed.   Throughout the episode, Amanda shares her knowledge surrounding the effort. She educates us on the industrial versus ecological models, and introduces us to the multiple factors that affect the way farmers must approach soil improvement. She stresses the importance of listening to farmer’s voices and supporting their journey, as well as, fighting for systems that reward good stewardship and value biodiversity. She explains there are multi-pathways to healthy soil and no one way to achieve the goal. The key to progress in this effort is maintaining curiosity and communication along the way, and remembering that healthy soil (good dirt!) is the foundation of everything.     1:30 - Mary and Emma check in to see how Plastic Free July is going!  4:00 - Amanda Cather of Million Acre Challenge  Let’s get into the episode: 5:45 - Amanda introduces herself  11:00 - What is the Million Acre Challenge?  20:30 - Connecting to the issues  23:30 - Incentivising soil health and funding the transition  27:00 - Nutritional quality of crops  34:00 - Equity  43:00 - Lobbying to change  48:00 - Engaging with farmers  50:00 - What does the Good Dirt mean to you?  Things Mentioned:  Million Acre Challenge  IG: @soilchallenge The Land Institute  Plow and Stars Farm Guidelight / Patagonia Report  Pasa Sustainable Agriculture Soil Health BenchMark Study UMD Organic Grains Transition Project  American Farmland Trust Soil Health Institute   Maryland Department of Agriculture USDA FFAR The Farm’s Project  Regen1 The Real Food Project  The Agriculture Resilience Act Fair Farms Pledge Lady Farmer  The ALMANAC