Food Brands Partner on Healthy Soil Initiative

I just received this box of Annie’s Honey Bunny Grahams—the first time I have ever seen a food package showing a bunch of dirt on the front. It also shows the name of the farmer and the location where he grows the wheat and oats, and there's more about Casey on the back of the package. 

There is no question that we have put our agricultural resources under significant pressures, which is why this new program, a partnership with The Carbon Underground and Green America, is so important.  

The participating brands, including Ben & Jerry’s, Annie’s/General Mills and MegaFood, have begun development of a global verification standard for food grown in a regenerative manner. The new standard encourages farmers to restore the carbon cycle, bolster crop resilience and improve nutrient density of soils used to grow foods.   

“The goal of this new standard is not simply to restore soil, but to do it quickly,” said Larry Kopald, president and co-founder of The Carbon Underground. “The windows for avoiding catastrophic climate change and complete topsoil loss are projected to close in decades, not centuries.”   

As more brands and customers add social and environmental responsibility to their list of must-haves, this initiative with several major food brands can improve the health of agricultural soils and help fend off climate change.

Related:Plastic-Free Aisles in Supermarkets on the Horizon

If our government won’t do it, our food brands will.