SACRAMENTO, California — Indigenous farming practices are the trendy new agricultural craze sweeping both sides of the political aisle. The fight is over how to define them.
California farming regulators like “regenerative agriculture” for its potential to boost soil health, biodiversity and carbon sequestration. President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has name-checked it as part of his argument that conventional production methods are making Americans sick. Former California Rep. and Democratic firebrand Katie Porter has also said she’s a fan.
But as California contemplates steering more state funding toward it, a definition has proved elusive. The state Board of Food and Agriculture voted Tuesday to postpone adopting a draft definition until its next meeting Jan. 7.
“We want to be careful of what we’re setting out in the first definition,” California Department of Food and Agriculture Secretary Karen Ross said at the meeting.
