To Which We Belong (2021)
To Which We Belong’ is a documentary that highlights farmers and ranchers leaving behind conventional practices that are no longer profitable or sustainable. These unsung heroes are improving the health of our soil and sea to save their livelihoods — and our planet.
Steps toward Sustainable Ranching: An Emergy Evaluation of Conventional and Holistic Management in Chiapas, Mexico
Members of a holistic ranching ‘‘club” in the Frailesca region of Chiapas, Mexico have moved away from decades of conventional management by eliminating the use of burns and agrochemicals believed to decrease the biodiversity and forest cover of ranch lands, and by implementing sophisticated systems of rotational grazing and diversifying the use of trees. Holistic ranches were found to have double the “emergy” (embodied-energy or “energy memory”) sustainability index values of conventional ranches. The results from this study show that productivity can be maintained as the sustainability of rural dairy ranches is increased, and that local knowledge and understanding of the surrounding ecosystem can drive positive environmental change in production systems.
Rancho de la Inmaculada – Prospering in the Desert
At 2500 feet (820 meters) of elevation, the patch of desert embracing La Inmaculada is blessed with an average of 13 inches (330 mm) of annual precipitation. Since the Aguirres have been practicing Holistic Management, annual totals have ranged from 6 to 25 inches. About 50 percent comes during the summer monsoons in July and August, their main growing season. Because there is an almost total absence of cool-season grasses, winter rains do them little good in terms of grass growth, but they do add to the bank of soil moisture critical to brush green-up in the spring.