Stefan Erasmus has shifted the practices on his sheep farm in a bid to meet sustainable standards. For Erasmus, one of about 8,000 sheep farmers in the country, it’s a step in the right direction.

Middelburg

A sheep farm in Middelburg, South Africa, led by Stefan Erasmus, has shifted to sustainable farming practices aimed at maximizing production while protecting the environment. Erasmus employs techniques such as rotational grazing, herd size management, and returning sheep dung to the soil to rebuild biomass, restore overgrazed land, and sequester carbon, with the goal of eventually earning carbon credits.

The move comes as global livestock production accounts for a significant share of greenhouse gas emissions, and regenerative farming gains traction among South Africa's wool producers. Experts note that while carbon credits can support ecological restoration, their effectiveness has been questioned due to past scandals. Financial support and education are seen as key to helping more farmers adopt these sustainable methods.

South African sheep farmer aims for sustainable standards

This sheep farm in South Africa has shifted its practices in a bid to meet sustainable standards. For Stefan Erasmus, it's a step in the right direction in ensuring that he maximizes production while protecting the environment. All the things that we are now doing and changing are beneficial to the health of the animals, to our soil, to our plants, to this entire ecosystem. Erasmus' family has been farming sheep in South Africa for five generations, but producing certified sustainable wool or meat requires a shift to farming practices. On his 19,000-acre farm, Erasmus aims to rebuild biomass, restore overgrazed land and capture soil carbon, eventually earning carbon credits. For Erasmus, the process is something farmers should embrace. We can't graze grass. We can't. So we need animals to do it for us, to provide us with protein. A lot of the plants evolved to be grazed. Once they're grazed, they get stimulated, and that's the way you put carbon back into the soil. Erasmus also manages his herd sizes, rotates them between patches of land, and puts sheep dung back into the soil to fertilize it. The main techniques that we use is we use the animals to use the biomass created by the plants to create dung to put onto the soil, so that that dung that is full of living organisms can go back into the soil and put the carbon that's in that dung into the soil and sequestrate it there. Global livestock production generates around a fifth of all anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. Some scientists do acknowledge the significance of carbon credits as a sustainable tool to allow ecological restoration. However, the reputation of the credits has been dented by a string of scandals in which credit-generating projects failed to deliver the climate benefits they claimed. Joanne Bester, a consultant for the International Wool and Textile Organization, says farmers need to be better educated and financially supported to fund the process. There is normally a capital expense that they have to take on, and they are often unable to do so. The carbon market is well positioned to help us get some of the wealth from business back to the people on the land who can actually make a difference. South Africa is one of the world's largest wool producers, and regenerative farming is a growing movement, although there is currently no data on how many of about 8,000 sheep farmers in the country follow the practice. It's amazing to care for them, and when you've developed a passion for them, you also develop a love, and with that love comes higher productivity. Animals that are cared for produce better.

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