Caring for the land
is caring for ourselves

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Imagine rural landscapes
that provide for all of us.

Profitable farms cultivating healthy people; thriving, diverse communities; clean water, flood reduction, stable climate, and biodiversity are possible.

Cows in a grass pasture

Photo Credit © Finn Ryan

A farmer leading his cows up a dirt path through a grass pasture

Photo Credit © Jacob Grace

Realizing these landscapes requires everyone.

We must come together to intentionally re-design and transform our agricultural system to achieve these outcomes. Adjustments and tweaks to our current system — which is founded on disturbing soil, sowing shallow-rooted plants, using fossil-fuel inputs, and maximizing yields — are not enough to restore the land that supports us.

Grasslands are the foundations of more sustainable landscapes.

Well-managed grazing on perennial grasslands can support profitable livestock farming of all sizes while restoring many critical functions of the original prairie that are key to our welfare and well-being.

Restorative agriculture and the
movement to make it happen is Grassland 2.0

It starts with innovative farmers producing wholesome milk and meat and other products from grasslands that build soil, clean water, help stabilize the climate, and support wildlife. It builds momentum with consumer demand for products and services from grassland farming, but requires policies incentivizing transformative change and processors, suppliers, and distributors who build-out innovative and profitable value-added supply-chains.

We all have a role to play in Grassland 2.0 and
we cannot leave anyone behind.

We must push and pull our agricultural system to transformative change!

Here’s what you can do:

A woman inspecting wheels of cheese. Photo credit Atheana Zinser

Photo Credit © Atheana Zinser

A woman buying vegetables at a farmers market. Photo credit UW Madison Division of Extension

Photo Credit © UW Madison Division of Extension

The Wisconsin state capitol building
Two men making cheese. Photo credit Uplands Cheese

Photo Credit © Uplands Cheese

A tractor fertilizing a freshly plowed field. Photo credit Sevie Kenyon

Photo Credit © Sevie Kenyon

A woman with a baby on her back in a dairy farm milking barn. Photo credit Finn Ryan

Photo Credit © Finn Ryan

a man checking a vent tube in a tall grass field. Photo credit Eric Booth

Photo Credit © Eric Booth

two men standing in a field with cows in the background. Photo credit Serge Koenig.

Photo Credit © Serge Koenig.

1. Eaters

Stimulate demand for grassland products! We must increase the demand for milk, meat, cheese, and other products that regenerate soils, clean water bodies, slow runoff, reduce greenhouse gases, and create wildlife habitat.

2. Citizens

Demand that policymakers address social and environmental problems with transformative, NOT incremental, change.

3. Policymakers

Develop programs that incentivize transformative, NOT incremental, change. We must have policies that improve food security especially for those with troubles feeding their families and ways for farmers to sell their products to consumers that provide them.

4. Food processors & distributors

Search and develop new markets and profit strategies that reward all supply-chain participants for positive social and environmental outcomes.

5. Farm-input suppliers

Develop and market products that do not degrade the environment and help restore productive grasslands that retain nutrients and build soil health.

6. Farmers

Look for opportunities to convert row crops to perennial pastures in various livestock classes (e.g., grazing heifers) and parts of the landscape (e.g., stream buffers). Push processors and suppliers to promote these practices as part of product marketing.

7. Academics

Listen and respond to communities to develop models of what’s possible in landscapes, supply chains, farm enterprises, and governance.

We are working to bring people together

The Grassland 2.0 project is a result of decades of research showing that our best, and perhaps only, opportunity to build soils, nutrients, and carbon in agricultural production while providing farmers and society with profitable and productive outcomes is with grazed perennial grasslands.

We are working to inspire people to come together to identify how we can achieve these outcomes, create spaces for a process of Collaborative Landscape Design, and grow the Grassland 2.0 movement by engaging with coalitions working toward an agriculture that works for all of us!

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What can grasslands do for us?

A barn and silo with blue sky behind them

Make farms
profitable

Wisconsin lake shore

Improve the
environment

Baraboo Wisconsin downtown buildings

Support healthy people
and communities