In the previous article, we explored the rules Mother Nature adopts to grow plants and their products.

In summary, the keywords are many and include:

• – Polyculture,
• – synergy with animals,
• – soil preservation,
• – humus development,
• – Absence of waste (everything is resource),
• – Dynamic balance between growth and decay,
• – fertility reserves,
• – No to the compactness of soils,
• – Maximum predisposition of the soil in absorbing rainfall,
• – Dynamic disease defense,
• – self-sufficiency.

“Okay, John,” you will say, “so many fine words, but how can they be put into practice in an agricultural system that starts from such different assumptions than a natural ecosystem?”

It is true: there is an inherent balance in nature that ensures the recycling of resources, the stability of ecosystems, and a continuous capacity for adaptation and evolution. In contrast, traditional agriculture often disrupts these cycles, causing serious damage.

For example, intensive monoculture has profoundly altered biodiversity, eliminating many plant and animal species that are essential to maintaining the natural balance. In addition, the overuse of chemical fertilizers and pesticides has depleted the soil, reducing its ability to regenerate and encouraging the accumulation of harmful substances.

Paradoxically, today, despite access to advanced technologies, we are seeing increasing fragility of plants, an increase in diseases and a significant reduction in their longevity. Added to this are the impacts of climate change, with extreme events becoming more frequent, while conventional agriculture contributes to the problem through deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions, altering the balance between growth and decay.

In recent years, there has been increasing talk of practices such as regenerative agriculture, which seeks to mimic natural processes by promoting organic matter recycling and diversification, but some times these regenerative approaches are not so decisive.

Toward an agricultural method inspired by nature

Realizing that a perfectly natural agricultural method is impossible, I have worked to develop an approach that comes as close as possible to Mother Nature’s. The goal is to restore the balance between growth and decay, restore soil fertility, improve biodiversity and ensure long-term sustainable production.

The Natural Sustainable Agricultural Method (MANS) applied to viticulture is based on eight essential principles:

1. Soil care and thus organic matter
Increasing or preserving fertility in a natural way, favoring the use of organic matter and promoting the formation of fertile humus.

2. Permanent Weeding
Keep the soil covered at all times to protect it from erosion, improve water retention capacity and reduce weed proliferation.

3. Farm organism and self-sufficiency
Integrate the different components of the farm into an interconnected and resilient system, reducing dependence on external resources.

4. Crop diversification, complementary plants and polyculture
Promote polyculture and complementary plants to increase biodiversity and reduce disease risk.

5. Promoting biodiversity
Foster rich and stable ecosystems in which species interactions improve nutrient cycling and overall resilience.

6. Integration with animals and sustainable animal husbandry
Integrate animals on the farm to close the nutrient cycle and enrich the soil with their natural contribution.

7. Water management and waste reduction
Optimize the use of water resources and enhance agricultural wastes as resources.

8. Adaptation to climate change
Develop flexible strategies to cope with changing climatic conditions and improve pest management.

It is not a completely original method (you will see in this many key points of the other methods as well), but it has the advantage of being extremely practical and feasible; it gives much importance to the awareness of the farmer, the prime mover and first connoisseur of his agricultural organism.

It is a method that is strictly unpatentable (you cannot patent nature itself!), it will still have to comply with EU legislative regulations (a condition that is very easy to obtain since cultivating according to nature requires even more demanding practices than those allowed by the Bio specification).

In future articles we will delve into each of these principles, exploring their practical application and benefits for truly sustainable agriculture.

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