Is Syntropic Agriculture Profitable?

Now this is a bit of a hot topic! Syntropic Agriculture, like many new things that came before it is subject to all sorts of scrutiny, this is quite natural and healthy. 

There has been a lot of debate as to whether Syntropic Agriculture is profitable or not, here I will first examine the premise:

Syntropic Agriculture is a powerful form of ecologically driven agroforestry, incorporating all aspects of ecology. It's amazing, BUT! It is simply a way to grow, nothing more and nothing less.

What we must do to make it profitable comes down to how you use it, how you, as a farmer, apply this amazing dynamic in your context.

You can't just expect to open a box and send it out to make money for you - the onus is on you, all responsibility for its success or failure lies squarely upon the one implementing it. I firmly believe that if you fail and walk away and say that Syntropic Agriculture doesn’t work - for any reason, you are avoiding this responsibility - you are blame shifting. 

There are endless ways that you can apply this framework, no two ever need to be the same, in fact it is a problem if this is the case. The basis of this fact opens up endless possibilities on how Syntropic Agriculture can manifest, but, it all comes down to the one doing it.

I believe that 80% or even more of the determining factor of success in any farming enterprise lies in not the methodology, but in the skill and competency of the the person doing it - it comes down to how good of a farmer you are, how well you can develop and employ strategy, using all of the resources given to you by nature, the tools that you have and your creativity to navigate a path to achieving your desired outcomes through an ever changing dynamic space, which is nature, human nature, markets and much more.

Around 20% of your success may lie in what ways you choose to farm, but don’t get me wrong, this is powerful, it’s just that how you manage this part has more consequence. 

So with this premise addressed, what are we looking at now?

Well, we are looking at a fantastic and extremely exciting range of options, all given to us by this remarkable framework for planting and managing the power of life force - the true power of nature. From here it is all up to us, and this is the best part! 

I found Holistic Management to be a very good place to start my planning and build strategy around how to move forward with Agroforestry, this allowed me to take the holistic view so I didn’t go into this with a fixed idea on how things should be, it allowed me to balance all things, and recognise resources that I may not have recognised before. It allowed me to “think outside the square”. When I do a consultation, I also use this approach. I spend most of the time listening to my client, asking lots of questions and making sure that everything that I can come up with is perfectly suited to them so they enjoy doing it and get back what they want. After this it is very easy to come up with an agroforestry system for them, one that suits their context and something that they can best apply their own unique skills as a farmer to. There’s that word again - farmer, the one who is responsible for the whole thing!

In the next blog post I will outline some methods and strategies to consider when looking into how to use Syntropic Agroforestry for successful outcomes - I will suggest some examples which may work for you.

If you want to know more about this, particularly how to learn the principles completely so you can make a detailed strategy, or you want to learn how to apply this as a farmer using all of your creativity and unique skills, I invite you to my dedicated platform: The Syntropic Workshop, here you will learn all of the details and also be able to put it all into perspective, plus be part of a community of other dedicated learners and practitioners, all giving it a serious go and dedicated to making change.

All the best to you and your journey,

Scott