Looking Back to Grow Ahead: Regenerative California is Redefining Farming

A new wave of California farmers and food leaders are reviving ancient practices to heal the soil, nourish communities and reshape agriculture.

In a spot between Monterey and Salinas — an area affectionately known as the “Salad Bowl of the World” — the regenerative organic farming initiative, Regenerative California (RC), is driving a shift in industry practices. 

This nonprofit initiative, co-founded by former longtime Marin resident Kristin Coates, launched in 2023. It is designed to create the first regenerative economy in the US, and focuses on agriculture, marine resources and healthy affordable housing, while moving away from extractive practices. 

Last spring, Regenerative California launched its agricultural initiative with its first regenerative farm known as Regenerate 68 Farm. The 68 acre farm, located just off of Highway 68 in Monterey County, is located on the Ferini Ranch.

What’s Old is New Again 

According to the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA), California is the largest agricultural exporting state in the country to date: it supplies over a third of the nation’s vegetables and three-quarters of its fruits and nuts. To keep up with the growing demands of food production over the last hundred years, farmers moved away from indigenous agricultural practices — known today as “regenerative farming” — and relied more on modern farming techniques to yield larger crops of single items. This has resulted in more food, but it also had serious drawbacks to the health of the soil, the nutritional value of the food and quality of life for the farmers. 

These indigenous practices looked at how to work within the surrounding ecosystem, rather than against it, explains Jennifer O’Connor, the director of Funders for Regenerative Agriculture, who provided input on RC’s plan and lives in Corte Madera.

“For centuries, farmers tended their crops in concert with nature, asking, ‘How do you mimic an ecosystem in a working landscape?’ They just didn’t call it ‘regenerative,’’” O’Connor says. 

“Regenerative practices encourage biodiversity on the land, farming in a way that builds your water capacity and health of ecology, healthy food economies and equitable food and clean water access.”

For RC advisory board member and Marin resident, Mike Freed, regenerative farming practices “help farmers support a healthier economy for future generations.”

Freed is the Managing Partner of hotel company Passport Resorts, which oversees both the Post Ranch Inn, situated in Big Sur, and the Cavallo Point Lodge, based in Sausalito. In 2008, Cavallo Point was the first National Park lodge that was allowed to work directly with small local organic farmers.

A Wealth of Opportunities

For Coates, the opening of Regenerate 68 Farm represents not a short-term solution, but a long-term vision.

“This isn’t an insta-farm,” Coates says. “We’re invested in this for the long run, and in demonstrating the impact regenerative farming can have. The land steward improves ecological health and provides healthier local food. So supporting these farmers is a brilliant investment in economic resilience, ecological health and social equity.”

“The food we eat, when grown by farmers using regenerative practices, is more than nourishment — it is our most powerful ecological solution,” she adds.

It also offers local farmers opportunities that they may not have otherwise had due to financial constraints. 

“Getting affordable land into the hands of small- to mid-size regenerative organic farmers generates measurable returns with dollars recirculating through local businesses and supply chains,” Coates says. 

For farmers like Maria Aguilar, who sub-leases several organic acres at Regenerate 68, RC’s below-market leases for qualifying small farms allows her to tend to her own crops, without the typical steep entry costs.

“This would be impossible otherwise,” Aguilar says. 

She also pulls inspiration from various parts of the regenerative process. 

“I love preventing health problems caused by pesticides, and the opportunity to change the environmental climate for good,” she says. “And I love when my vegetables are growing — they are beautiful to look at, and here the soil is rich.”

Farm manager Armando Ramirez helps Aguilar and her fellow farmers, including her sister Veronica, with things like field prep and irrigation management, while tending his own organic strawberries.

“It’s as simple as learning how to increase healthy soil, healthy farms and a healthy environment for workers, and sharing what we discover,” he says. 

The Future of Farming

Currently, the Regenerate 68 Farm team is gathering data from different metrics — water use, beneficial microbe counts, produce yield, supply chain synergies, fertilizer savings and diversity of species, among many. The team’s hope is to catch the attention of growers across California and beyond.

“We’re very open-source on what works and what doesn’t,” Coates says, emphasizing the multiplier effect of principles like plant multiplicity, habitat-ag harmony, continual ground coverage and worker empowerment. “This is meant to be a stage where we can practice and make mistakes and transmit what we’re learning. We’re constantly asking, ‘How can we help small and mid-sized farms?’” 

For Freed, he sees RC expanding beyond Monterey County and into other areas of the state, especially Marin. “It makes a lot of sense to take Regenerative California to Marin,” he says, pointing to the similarities between the two counties.

“Monterey and Marin have so much in common: large amounts of open space, a long coastline and enormous need for affordable housing. And both communities have forward thinking residents, with a lot of great small farms.”

Agricultural Institute of Marin’s New Farmers Market

This past September, Agricultural Institute of Marin (AIM) launched its new farmers market at the Center for Food and Agriculture. 

The Marin County Board of Supervisors green-lit this two-part project with phase one seizing upon a new 40-year lease to make its sizable San Rafael farmers market permanent.

After that, phase two will assemble a “food innovation hub” in Marin County Civic Center. The space will comprise classrooms and demo kitchens, all designed to strengthen links between produce and its providence, and farmers and their followers, schools included.

“The idea is much more than a farmers market,” AIM CEO Andy Naja-Riese says. “It’s a place to create connections between people in the food system, helping us take care of people and the planet.”