Regenerative. Agroecological. Climate-Smart. Sustainable. Organic.

The world of agriculture is bursting with alternatives to the modern industrial model. As farmers and consumers recognize the negative environmental and community impacts of large, resource-intensive monocultures, there is a growing shift towards models that aim to restore soil health, conserve ecosystems, and reestablish balance with nature. But what do these terms really mean, where do they come from, and how do they truly differ?

On the surface, these agricultural movements can appear very similar. Most adhere to soil health principles like building organic matter and maximizing biodiversity. They promote practices like cover cropping, reduced tillage, intercropping, compost application, and rotational grazing — techniques often rooted in Indigenous land management predating colonization. However, they differ in their unique histories and nuanced beliefs, attitudes, and goals for building a better food system.

“Each of these terms has a history with a particular group of people that saw a particular challenge and then imagined a specific alternative that would help to overcome that challenge,” says Liz Carlisle, an Associate Professor of Environmental Studies at UC Santa Barbara who specializes in regenerative farming and agroecology. “The language is a really good indicator of the larger values that are driving the practices.”

The Dawn of Organic

The first to emerge was the organic agriculture movement, which arose in the 1960s and ‘70s in response to Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring exposé on the hazards of industrial chemicals and pesticides. The movement aimed to replace synthetic chemicals with biological fertility and pest control methods.

Thanks to the efforts of organic farmers and advocates, Congress passed the Organic Foods Production Act in 1990, authorizing USDA to develop the National Organic Program. To become certified and use the USDA Organic Seal, producers must adhere to a strict set of standards, including prohibitions on genetically engineered organisms and certain synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, and must undergo an accreditation process with a certifying agent.

Today, organic agriculture in the U.S. is a multi-billion-dollar industry. In 2021, some 17,000 farms were certified organic, accounting for 3.6 million acres of U.S. cropland and 1.3 million acres of pasture/rangeland. These farms vary in character from small, diversified farms to mechanized operations thousands of acres in size.

The organic definition’s legal enforceability and clear focus on chemicals make it easy to understand. But it has limitations. A 2022 Cornell study found that while smaller organic farms tend to adopt practices that conserve resources and benefit the whole farm ecosystem, larger organic farms often operate much like conventional ones, with low crop diversity and a high degree of automation. Additionally, USDA Organic doesn’t fully address labor rights, animal welfare, or holistic environmental protection. Meanwhile, the organic certification process can present administrative hurdles that some small and beginning farmers consider too burdensome to be worth the effort. Thus, the policy debate about what can and should qualify as organic remains ongoing.

An Ecological Approach

Many producers seek frameworks that go “beyond organic” to advance a broader range of ecological and social values. These systems differ in their underlying values and the scope of their objectives, ultimately influencing which practices are implemented and how outcomes are measured.

In 1987, the UN Commission on Environment and Development introduced the modern definition of “sustainable development” as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” Sustainable agriculture seeks to fulfill this principle while advancing a “triple bottom line” of economic profitability, environmental quality, and social equity.

The U.S. adopted a legal definition for sustainable agriculture as a system that satisfies human food and fiber needs, enhances environmental quality and natural resources, maintains economic viability, and improves quality of life for farmers and society. Definitions of sustainable agriculture practices abound, yet “true” sustainability varies widely with the local environment. In the 21st century, heightened concerns about global climate change have led to the evolution of new climate-oriented subsets of sustainable agriculture. Climate-smart agriculture aims to sustainably increase farm productivity, adapt or build resilience to climate change impacts, and reduce or remove greenhouse gas emissions where possible. Carbon farming focuses more narrowly on removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and storing it in soils or plant matter.

In recent years, the USDA has increased its support for climate-smart farming. Its $3.1 billion Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities program launched in 2022 defines a climate-smart commodity as “produced using farming, ranching, or forestry practices that reduce greenhouse gas emissions or sequester carbon.”

Enthusiasm for carbon farming has grown with carbon markets, which boost farmer incomes by compensating them to sequester carbon that offsets external emissions. However, both models have also been met with skepticism, including from Antonio Tovar, a senior policy analyst at the National Family Farm Coalition (NFFC). Tovar’s concerns about carbon farming include scientific uncertainties surrounding soil carbon sequestration and measurement, the impermanence of carbon storage in soil and plant matter, and the fact that carbon offsets don’t translate into needed reductions in fossil fuel consumption.

A Regenerative Revolution?

In the late 1980s and 1990s, the regenerative agriculture framework emerged, with the central goal of restoring soil health through practices like reduced tillage, cover cropping, and grazing for natural fertilization and weed control.

Defining “regenerative” remains one of agriculture’s most hotly debated topics. A 2020 survey of over 250 sources found conflicting, often contradictory, definitions. This ambiguity allows corporations to use the term as a marketing ploy while influencers make sweeping claims about its benefits, creating confusion for consumers and producers alike.

According to Carlisle, the heart of the debate is a distinction between “deep” and “shallow” definitions. Shallow regenerative, she says, acts as a checklist of practices, like cover cropping, that can be easily layered onto existing conventional models piecemeal without transforming the agroecosystem or human-land relationships. Deep regenerative, on the other hand, asks, “How can we fix the problems that industrial agriculture has brought to land and community and not only rebuild soil health but rebuild the whole food system in a way that’s based on reciprocal relationships between people and land, plants, and animals?” This means including considerations like farmworker rights, land access, and animal welfare. It also means honoring the origins of many regenerative practices in Indigenous and African traditions and seeking to rectify the ways that agricultural policies in the U.S. have dispossessed and disenfranchised Indigenous peoples, Black Americans, farmers of color, and migrant farmers — issues that white advocates within the regenerative movement have been slow to address.

Fortunately, there are many active efforts to ensure a deeper version of regenerative takes root, including the development of certifications such as the Regenerative Organic Certification, the Real Organic certification, and Certified Regenerative by A Greener World (AGW). [Disclosure: RAFI is a partner on AGW’s Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities project, which includes technical and financial support for farmers working towards AGW’s Certified Regenerative certification.]

Legal definitions for regenerative agriculture are being developed, as they were for organic and sustainable agriculture. California has begun a public process to define regenerative agriculture for state funding programs, and advocates are closely watching the debate and its potential national impact.

These efforts have highlighted ongoing conflicts between and within different agricultural movements. A critical debate is over agrochemicals. Some advocates worry that “regenerative” might be used as a greenwashing tactic for chemical-intensive practices, arguing that the final definition should adhere to organic standards to be truly chemical-free. Others believe that reduced tillage, central to regenerative practices, may require some agrochemical use. They advocate for allowing strategic, targeted chemical application in combination with ecological pest control.

Standardization also risks excluding traditional Indigenous agricultural practices, which are often community-based and deeply attuned to hyper-local environments and ecosystems. According to A-dae Romero-Briones, Director of Programs for the Native Agriculture and Food Systems Initiative at the First Nations Development Institute, “There are 574 different tribes in this country that have food production systems that predate American agriculture and regenerative agriculture. Some of them are growing corn, some are wildcrafting, some are ocean-based, and all of these have implications for this landmass that we call America now.” Narrow definitions too focused on specific approaches for soil health or carbon sequestration, she says, could close the door to more inclusive interpretations of ecologically adapted foodways.

Towards Transformation

Some advocates believe that terms like regenerative are ill-equipped to prevent attempts at corporate greenwashing and co-optation, nor can they address broader systemic challenges in the food system beyond the farm gate. Others prefer terms with social and political considerations naturally embedded in their definitions. Agroecology describes both the science and practice of managing farms as ecosystems as well as a grassroots political movement for systemic transformation towards an equitable food system. According to Tovar of NFFC, agroecology goes hand in hand with food sovereignty, the concept that people have a right to healthy, sustainable, and culturally appropriate food and that those who produce, distribute, and consume food should drive agricultural decision-making, not corporations. These frameworks, championed by global movements like La Via Campesina, have a broad following in Latin America and Africa but have struggled to gain traction in the United States’ corporate-dominated agricultural policy sphere.

For Romero-Briones, none of these broad frameworks can truly capture the specificity of locally adapted Indigenous food systems. “When I think about these descriptors of agriculture, to me, it’s somebody interpreting what they’re witnessing and observing instead of somebody from a localized food system describing their own system,” she says. A better way, she suggests, might be to focus on naming and describing specific practices and allowing communities to define their agricultural models on their own terms.

Sarah Hackney, Coalition Director at the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC), describes the push and pull between frameworks as part of an eternal cycle. “As a term gains influence, popularity, and attention, people are drawn to it because it seems compelling, and power moves to it. If a corporate entity thinks it’s going to give them market power, they’re going to try to use it. And then folks doing the really hard work of doing it right can, I think rightfully, feel that it’s being watered down.” Terms cycle in and out of favor as new groups seek to recapture previous movements’ transformative values and meanings.

“There is no one magic term that if we just picked the right word, it won’t be co-optable, and there won’t be that pressure,” Hackney says. But fortunately, farmers can still find ways to cut through the noise. For farmers seeking to move beyond extractive paradigms of production and benefit from the added market value of ecologically aligned practices, Hackney recommends starting by examining their values and the values of their community and customer base. From there, they can identify practices that align with those values and see if they correspond to a specific certification that can help build trust in the marketplace.

For Romero-Briones, these alternative models are ultimately “imperfect descriptors of something better than what exists in the mainstream.” The true goal is achieving a healthy relationship between people and the land. “I think English words often fail to describe the power of that relationship. I’ve talked to farmers who love their land and who may not be able to describe it but feel it. And to me, that’s the heart of everything we’re trying to describe.”

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Kara Hoving is a writer and policy advocate specializing in sustainable food systems and climate change communication. She helps nonprofits tell solutions-based stories that build momentum for positive change.