regenerative trials

carbon capture farming

Our goal is to increase soil carbon and decrease tractor field tillage to ultimately reduce our overall C02 emissions and start rebuilding our soil health for the long term.

2024 Braga Fresh Regenerative Farming Trials Progress Report

regen trials: progress

We are capturing and sharing our journey with our regenerative farming trails as learn from our progress and failures.

Learnings and ChallengesRegen Trial Goals

buy regen

On every bunch of regenerative grown product, the carbon capture farming mark emphasizes “healthy soil, clean air to save our earth.” Those are all things we at Braga stand behind.

By paying the premium price associated with our regeneratively grown product you are helping us offset the failures, the research development and collaboration efforts with academia and industry peers.

agrology

We partnered with predictive agriculture company, Agrology, to install a regenerative agriculture technology platform to track and quantify soil carbon in real time.

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science & technology

Joint recipient of Science & Technology Circle of Excellence Award for contributions & accomplishments that advance the industry through innovation, collaboration & leadership.

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regen: a farmers story

At Braga Fresh our efforts to educate all audiences on our regenerative carbon capture farming trials, is an ongoing effort.

The below infographic is our CEO, Rod Braga’s vision to visually explain the difference between traditional farming and regenerative farming.

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The Why

Braga Fresh, home of Josie’s Organics made a commitment to harvest and take to market regeneratively grown trial crops; to improve the carbon content in soil.

The History

In 2021, Braga Fresh planted its first regenerative trial crop, harvesting and taking it to market in April 2022. The third year of regen trialing was completed in 2023.

our trial approach

Cover crops, data management, companion plantings, crop rotation, intercropping, water management technology, and soil testing are all the tools and metrics utilized for the regen farming trials.

POTENTIAL IMPACT

Tillage operations currently employed by our industry weakens soil aggregate stability that leads to reductions of soil microorganisms that populate the soil microbiome. We also believe that most common tillage practices utilized by the industry inadvertently increases crop water consumption and creates a need for excess fertilizer. Our overall intent with these regenerative crop trials is to confirm our hypothesis and feasibly shift/change these farming challenges. The objective of our regenerative farming trials is to increase soil carbon and a decrease consumption of diesel fuel that powers the tractors conducting the tillage operation. Those changes would reduce our overall CO2 emissions.

BACKGROUND ON CARBON

Carbon Dioxide (CO2) is a greenhouse gas that in part originates from the combustion of fossil fuels. Fossil fuels provide fuel for farm vehicles including tractors. CO2 is utilized by plants as part of the process of photosynthesis. The plant keeps the Carbon component of CO2 and releases oxygen (O2). In agriculture where tillage is employed in, soil aggregate stability is destroyed eventually releasing the Carbon sequestered in plant matter as CO2 back to the atmosphere.

 

WHAT IS REGENERATIVE FARMING AND ITS IMPACT?

Regenerative agriculture is a variety of sustainable farming principles and practices that seek to reverse climate change by increasing carbon containing soil organic matter and biodiversity above and below ground.