CLSU Sustainability Summit On Agriculture – A Much-Welcome Event, Also A First, If I Know My History!

My congratulations to Central Luzon State University (CLSU) for having identified the need for “Charting The Path For Sustainable Agriculture In The Philippines,” which is the theme/title of its 17 June 2024 “Sustainability Summit” that invites “all sustainability enthusiasts.” The Summit is CLSU’s pre-celebration event of its Universityhood and will be held at the CLSU Auditorium from 9:00 AM to 11:30 AM. All that is from the Facebook post of the CLSU Research & Extension Program of 07 June 2024. The keynote speaker was not mentioned.

The Summit is historic, if not the very first in the Philippines. I mean, why did not my alma mater University of the Philippines Los Baños come up with it first? What this tells me is that CLSU has “graduated” from pushing 100% Chemical Agriculure (CA) to pushing 100% Regenerative Agriculture (RA). Multiple congrats to CLSU think tank from this UPLB alumnus!

During the Summit, I expect the following topics to be thoroughly tackled, in any order:

What is Sustainability?
How could Sustainability be attained?
What would “Sustainable Agriculture” comprise or consist of in the Philippines?
What is “Regenerative Agriculture” and how is it related, if so, to “Sustainable Agriculture”?

Since I know that it is not popular in the Philippines, I hereby present for discussion in the CLSU Sustainability Summit (and elsewhere) the following, my numbering:

Wikipedia’s List Of Principles & Practices Of Regenerative Agriculture
1. Alternative food networks, such as the spatial proximity between farmers and consumers.
2. Aquaculture
3. Ecological aquaculture
4. Regenerative ocean farming
5. Agroecology
6. Agroforestry
7. Biochar/terra preta
8. Borders planted for pollinator habitat and other beneficial insects
9. Compost, compost tea, animal manures and thermal compost
10. Conservation farming, no-till farming, minimum tillage, and pasture cropping
11. Cover crops & multi-species cover crops
12. Grass-fed cattle
13. Home gardens
14. Keyline subsoiling
15. Livestock: well-managed grazing, animal integration
16. Natural farming
17. Natural sequence farming
18. Organic annual cropping and crop rotations
19. Perennial crops
20. Ponding banks, also known as “grading banks”
21. Permaculture design
22. Polyculture and full-time succession planting of multiple and inter-crop plantings
23. Regrowing vegetables
24. Silvopasture
25. Soil food web.
– Extract by Frank A Hilario, Filipino agriculturist, 06 June 2024, from Wikipedia, en.wikipedia.org (Communication For Development Of Vibrant Villages, blogspot.com).@157

I do not know if the organizers realize it, but CLSU’s Sustainability Summit will be held in the midst of a major confusion between the concepts of “Sustainable” and “Regenerative.” I suggest that this be tackled and cleared first during the Summit.

There is another point: How do you chart the path for regenerative and/or sustainable agriculture in these islands?

Meanwhile, I hope some members of the Philippine Association of Career Scientists (PACS) will attend and participate actively in the discussions/deliberations during the CLSU summit. The PACS scientists should prove to be of immense help in clearing up any technical confusion. That is, I hope PACS scientists themselves have distinguished between what is “Sustainable” and what is “Regenerative.” (That’s a clue!)@517