The rising movement of regenerative agriculture—a holistic approach to growing food that restores soil and biodiversity and could even reverse global warming—holds great promise for transforming our food system while reclaiming planetary and human health. Yet there is a little-known fact that could amplify the call for change: Within a decade, nearly half of all farmland in America will change hands as the older generation of farmers steps aside.
Meanwhile, the groundswell of new growers eager to steward that land are up against seemingly every obstacle: rising land costs, insufficient income, a Goliath industrial food system, and the billionaires and corporations grabbing farmland at a staggering pace. So, how can we mobilize this potential "greatest generation" of sustainable small farmers at this crucial tipping point? How could resilient local agriculture transform our country, heal the earth, and ensure that healthy, fresh food is accessible to all?
To answer those questions, award-winning journalist Jennifer Grayson embedded herself in a groundbreaking beginning farmer training program, then embarked on this investigative travelogue about the new, diverse farmers, graziers, and food activists working toward a stirring vision of the future. From a one-acre "market garden" in Oregon to the activists reviving food sovereignty in South Carolina—A CALL TO FARMS is the captivating story of these new adventurous farmers finding hope and purpose in an uncertain and imperiled age.
16 pages of color photos
