Pasticultores del Desierto

Juarez, Mexique

An Overview Of Our Solution

“Built it and they will come”. We are building a home for wildlife, and for life of all forms above and below ground. As ranchers, we are committed to restore the former grasslands in the largest desert of North America, the Chihuahuan desert. How come? Using planned grazing management. We mimic the bison migrations that used to fertilize and break the soil for grasses to germinate. We do the same but with cattle, water points, and electric fences. And it is working! We have restored more than 100,000 hectares, and are looking to reach 1 million hectares by 2030. We want more biodiversity; we want to produce sustainable and healthy beef; we want to work in sync with Nature.

Who is this solution impacting?

Community Type

Rural

Organization type

À but non lucratif

Ecosystem (select all that apply)

Deserts

Grasslands

Population impacted

Hundreds of thousands local people

Size of agricultural area

100,000 ha

Production quantity

1 million kilos

People employed

Describe your solution

Our solution is not new. It has been done for millennia to keep grasslands healthy. We mimic what the bison used to do on this land: moving, grazing, and fertilizing the land. Then leaving the land to rest until the next season. As we do this, we reduce our external inputs to zero or minimum, thus creating a resilient operation. We also restore grasslands that house plenty of wildlife. We are able to capture plenty of rainfall as we have the ground covered and store carbon in the soil with a network of roots.

Describe your implementation

The first activity for ranchers interested on implementing a planned grazing management approach is to talk and visit ranchers that are already doing this kind of management. Then to educate themselves with seminars, training, and books. Then to plan the water infrastructure and fencing. While at the same time work on selecting the proper genetics. If we do well, we will see biomass increasing, wildlife increasing, cow’s pregnancy rates increasing, and more calves in the ground. We will see at the end of the day more money on the ranchers’ pocket. We will produce more kilograms of beef per hectare at lower cost. Common issues are lack of planning, cost of water infrastructure, lack of knowledge and breaking traditional models.

External connections

ProNatura, Rocky Mountain Bird Observatory, American Bird Conservancy, Audubon, United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification, Regeneration International, Fondo Mexicano para la Conservacion de la Naturaleza We worked intensively with bird conservation organizations as the populations of migratory birds have drastically decrease due to the loss of grasslands. We also work with the UNCCD to neutralize land degradation. As we restore grasslands, we prevent soil erosion. We also work with the French government on the “4 per 1000 initiative”. We are able to put carbon in the soil as we grow more perennial grasses (more roots is more carbon in the soil).

What is the environmental or ecological challenge you are targeting with your solution?

What used to be grasslands in the Chihuahuan desert supporting golden eagle, bison, pronghorn, sheep, deer, praire dogs, cougar and wolves, is now desolated, barren soil due to overgrazing and overresting. We strive to retore former grasslands thru proper planned grazing management. We have done it in more than 100,000 hectares right in the middle of the Chihuahuan desert, and are working toward getting to 1 million hectares buy 2030.

Describe the context in which you are operating

We operate as cow-calf ranching operation. We do ranch in the middle of the desert. Most of the area we ranch is degrading rapidly due to traditional farming, overgrazing and over-resting. Country people are migrating to the cities as their properties are not producing anymore. The soil is lifeless, the water cycle is broken, the ground is bare. There is not life, there is no hope.

But thanks to planned grazing management we are bringing back life and hope to people in the country. We are fixing the water cycle. We are covering the ground with grasslands and diversity. We also produce nutritional-dense, healthy food.

How did you impact natural resource use and greenhouse gas emissions?

As we restore grasslands in the desert, we provide more food for the microorganisms in the soil, for the insects, for the hervibores, and for the predators. We are able to do this using planned grazing management, which in few words is mimicking the migration patterns of bison, but with cattle and electric fence.

Language(s)

Spanish

Water

As we increase biomass with more perennial grasses per square meter, we are able to capture more water and release it slowly thru transpiration, thus creating the conditions for more rain and more temperate climate.

Food Security/Nutrition

We produce 10x more kilograms of beef per hectare at lower cost in the desert than the conventional model.

Economic/Sustainable Development

Our solution works in sync with Nature, thus does not depend on external inputs. The more perennial grasses we have, the more robust the model is, as it is a carbon based economy.

Climate

As we work to increase the biomass over and under the soil, we are able to decrease the temperature up to 10 degrees compared to bare ground. Also, perennial grasses promote more mist which regulates the climate.

Sustainability

Our economic benchmark is the number of kilograms produced per hectare at what cost. We have been able to increase the number of kilograms of beef per hectare at a lower cost.

We estimate an investment of one US cent per square meter to regenerate the soil. Once the water infrastructure and fencing is in place, the solution is self-sustainable as it produces more at lower cost.

Return on investment

The cost to implement these activities is one cent per square meter. We have been able to: Increase the number of perennial grasses per square meter (+ biomass) Increase the number of kilograms of beef produced per hectare (+ food) Increase the number of birds, reptiles & mammal (+ biodiversity)

How could we successfully replicate this solution elsewhere?

It has been done on more than 100,000 hectares in the Chihuahuan desert. We need one US cent per square meter to regenerate the soil. We are looking for partners to get funding. We need four elements to regenerate the soil: Education and on-going training and advice for ranchers Water distribution and fencing Adaptive genetics that thrive on existing resources Wildlife, including key species missing from the environment such as antelope, bighorn sheep, praire dogs, etc.

Overview