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Fabián Vargas's farm looks more like a laboratory than a cattle ranch.
In a sealed blue bucket, 100 liters of forest microorganisms rest
which are activated with rice bran, buttermilk and honey to nourish livestock;
several clumps of tall grasses grow in the shade of his porch;
dozens of worms break down and oxygenate the areas trampled by the cows and different worms transform the manure from their 60 heads
of cattle in one of the most sought-after fertilizers in Caquetá, in southern Colombia.
The result?
Save millions of pesos in antibiotics, pesticides and insecticides and triple the milk you produce without sacrificing the green of your farm.
“The cow is not bad for not giving as much milk or polluting.
"It's the owner who doesn't know how to get the most out of it," he says proudly in one of the 42 plots into which he divided the milking cow farm.
In this pasture, which has not been stepped on by any animal for 40 days, rose apples, berries and phonos never stopped growing.
That is one of the first differences that separate the livestock farming practiced by Vargas and that of his colleagues in Caquetá, one of the six Amazonian departments, one of the most affected by deforestation.
The division
of the plot, he says, has been key to not turning the space into vacant and useless land in a few years, since the constant trampling of the cows generates a soil compaction process, which prevents air and water from entering.
Vargas carried out the division process into small percentages, respecting the local watersheds and tree planting.
In this way, when he lets the trees grow in the pastures—which provide shade and comfort to the cows—he is implementing very important passive restoration work with native species.
“It also happens that in secondary forests they become incubators for microorganisms and mesofauna [worms or cockroaches] that come day and night to feed in the pastures.
Having greater biodiversity also benefits my cows,” he says.
Livestock tour of the Jordan farm in the La Pradera village. NATHALIA ANGARITA
It all started in a study classroom.
13 years ago, Vargas had hardly heard about regenerative livestock farming, much less about the benefits of stopping cutting down the forest.
This broke all the logic that he had learned from his father and uncles, self-taught ranchers.
But a professor in a technical course began to reveal one by one the secrets of the countryside that a large majority of ranchers do not know: the correct use of the soil, the most efficient pastures, the use of watersheds... On the farms of Caquetá, There is one cow for every two hectares, while on Vargas' farm, the average is five cows per hectare.
According to the Colombian Federation of Livestock Farmers (Fedegán), the land is so poorly used that the country would have the capacity to return 10 million hectares to nature without this having a negative impact on meat and milk production.
Vargas' soil efficiency is vital to not affect more territory than necessary without his animals being overcrowded.
This improvement and the increase in organic nutrients tripled daily milk production.
“I went from four liters to 12”, explains this man with a kind expression and a shy smile.
Thanks to his work, Nestlé, its main buyer, increased its rate by 70 more pesos per liter (20 for practicing regenerative livestock farming and 50 for soil restoration).
Although this small incentive also serves as a quality guarantee seal, for Vargas it is not enough.
“I would like to do it officially.
There should be national certificates, but those are not available here.
They only give them to the big ones,” he laments.
For Jacobo Arango, senior scientist in the tropical forage program at the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT), this is one of the pending issues for the sector.
“In Colombia there is still a need for professional, technical and efficient livestock farming.
And, for this, a certificate is needed that shows that it is truly regenerative and not just a handful of good intentions or pseudoscience,” he says by phone.
“There have to be ways to evaluate soil health, the richness of water resources and the use of pastures.
And until now there is no regenerative seal as such,” he adds.
Fabián Vargas milks a cow on his farm in Jordan.NATHALIA ANGARITA
And the need is urgent.
In 2022, deforestation in the country will erase some 123,517 hectares from the map, a large part of which is due to extensive livestock farming.
Although it is difficult not to be skeptical about this economic activity, removing the livestock culture from departments like Caquetá is practically impossible.
A little over a century ago the Colombian State called to populate this department.
Most settlers arrived with a couple of clothes, a machete and one or two cows.
“That was the peasant's savings,” explains Julie Hernández, co-founder of the organization Amazonía Emprende.
“Caquetá is like a teenager who does not define himself between livestock history and the discourse from outside that tells him to take advantage of the Amazon in another way.”
But regenerative, experts say, can be the bridge between both worlds, inside and outside Colombia, since livestock farming occupies approximately 30% of the ice-free land surface.
In Latin America, the livestock population has doubled in the last 50 years, going from 201 to 418 million heads and from 461 to 560 million hectares for pastures.
For Carlos Gustavo Cano, director of the Agribusiness and Food Industry and Nature Tourism (Aneia) research group at the University of Los Andes and former Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development of Colombia, livestock farming is “wrongly stigmatized”: “You have to understand it.” as value-added agriculture, because the work begins in the soil.
And what this man [Vargas] and many others do are solutions based on nature.
Regenerative livestock farming exists, it is vibrant and has promise if done well, but it requires permanent knowledge of technology.
If it is intensive in anything, it is knowledge.”
In a corner of the farm, Vargas carefully uncovers some cloth that contains manure from his cows, banana and other fruit peels, and a handful of new worms that are breaking it down.
He looks at him like someone looking to see if the seeds he planted have already germinated and explains that for a few days he has been implementing a new fertilizer technique that he read in one of the 50 books on sustainable livestock that rest in the library of he.
“There's a lot to do, so I keep testing and testing,” he says.
“It is a great joy when you see the results that the forest and livestock together work better.”
Preparation of forest microorganisms that are activated with rice bran, whey and honey to feed livestock.NATHALIA ANGARITA