Natural Farming Through a Wide-Angle Lens

Andhra Pradesh Community-Managed Natural Farming (APCNF) is a state-wide agroecological transformation of the farming practices of its 6 million farmers over 6 million hectares and 50 million consumers. It is the largest transition to agroecology in the world, with 630,000 farmers already addressing multiple development challenges: rural livelihoods, access to nutritious food, biodiversity loss, climate change, water scarcity, and pollution. This research into the APCNF program, led by GIST Impact and supported by the Global Alliance for the Future of Food, started in 2020. The study is the first of its kind to assess the true costs and benefits of natural farming against other counterfactual farming methods by measuring all major economic, social, and health impacts.

The research used The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity for Agriculture and Food Systems (TEEBAgriFood) framework: a holistic approach to comprehensively examine food systems and systematically identify links between agricultural practices and human well-being so that appropriate policy responses can be developed and adapted globally.

The results show strong evidence that APCNF offers a better alternative to the existing farming systems. Adopting APCNF led to greater crop diversity, similar or higher yields, higher incomes for farmers, lower input costs, improved local economies, improved social networks, improved health, and reduced health costs. Overall, APCNF gave highly positive returns on public investment, suggesting APCNF to be the food production system with better economic, environmental, and social outcomes.