Our International Affairs team hosted an event to promote regenerative farming and sustainable nitrogen use during a United Nations (UN) conference in New York City.

Review on Sustainable Development Goals progress

The event was held as part of the ten-day High-Level Political Forum – a platform for reviewing international progress towards the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

These Goals, adopted by all UN Member States, recognise that ending poverty and other deprivations must go hand-in-hand with strategies that improve health and education, reduce inequality, and spur economic growth – all while tackling climate change and working to preserve our oceans and forests.

Our focus was on raising awareness of the importance of reducing nitrogen waste and pollution by adopting nature-friendly farming practices, in order to better achieve the SDGs.

The Forum revealed that only 17% of the SDG targets are on track for completion by 2030, highlighting the urgency to scale up ambition and policies addressing interconnected issues like nitrogen waste and pollution.

Exploring nitrogen waste and use

Our event brought together representatives from the governments of Romania and Madagascar, the UN Environment Programme, the International Nitrogen Initiative, the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology as well as a regenerative farming education centre operating near New York City.

Synthetic nitrogen fertilisers are often overused in industrial animal agriculture, particularly in monocultures, where one species of crop is grown for use in animal feed. Poorly managed animal manure and heavily intensive farming conditions can lead to it polluting waterways.

Speakers at the event stressed the urgent need to reduce nitrogen waste and pollution as it can lead to air and water pollution, degrade ecosystems, contribute to biodiversity loss, and exacerbate climate change.

Regenerative and nature-positive practices needed

During the event, our Senior International Affairs Advisor Zachary Cole noted that by reducing demand for animal-sourced protein, our agri-food systems can more easily implement regenerative and nature-positive practices which work with, not against, the natural nitrogen cycle.

He commented: 

“For millennia, farmers have known how to work within the natural nitrogen cycle. Only recently have we begun to work against it. If we change what we eat, and how much of it we eat, we could significantly reduce the number of animals in agricultural systems, thereby decreasing demand for nitrogen-intensive feed crops. We can return animals to the land to graze naturally and deposit nitrogen-rich manure back onto the soil.”