September 11, 2024 • 49 mins
I present nine reasons why you should support small-scale regenerative farmers and why South African indigenous Sanga cattle could be the best animal for regenerating large tracts of poor quality grazing land found in places like Australia.
This talk was recorded live at the Eastwell Farms HEART Summit in Kin Kin, QLD in March 2024, a weekend promoting regenerative farming, nutritious food and optimal human health.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
All right, welcome everyone.
My name is Dr Max Colhane, andtoday I'm going to be speaking
about nine reasons why youshould consider supporting
regenerative animal agriculture,and then I'll talk a little bit
about why I think Nguni cattleare a very important piece of
this puzzle.
So you might be wondering whyand what is a medical doctor
(00:31):
doing standing at a farm fieldday?
Well, I have a interest inholistic health and I believe
that farming, specificallyregenerative animal agriculture,
is a critical part of humanhealth and societal health.
So I'm a general practiceregistrar and I have a podcast
(00:53):
called Regenerative Health thatdiscusses these similar topics,
and I have delved into andinterested in how all these
different factors overlap andinteract to get us closer to
optimal health individually andas a society.
So a key concept that I alwayscome back to is that human
(01:19):
health is not able to beseparated from the health of the
environment and of animalhealth.
So what I mean by that is thatwe can't be thought of as an
independent or disconnected fromthe land that grows our food
and the animals that we consume.
If the animals that we'reconsuming are sick, if the land
(01:42):
that they animals are grazing onis sick, then we are going to
become sick and we can't keepthinking about us as separate
from this system.
And if we consider or look atone of the key reasons why
certain people are overweight,metabolically ill and diabetic,
(02:04):
the processed food that theyconsume is so disconnected from
this natural cycle, from thisnatural process, and I believe
that that is one of the keyunderlying things that we need
to fix if we want to get peoplehealthier and better.
So what this means in practiceis that we need to be eating our
(02:27):
species.
Appropriate diet, we need to beeating animals that are eating
their species.
Appropriate diet and theecosystem needs to be grazed or
used in a way that is in harmonyor consistent with the animals
and appropriate human management.
(02:47):
So what that means is thathumans, we need to be eating
ruminant meat and, although notthe topic of today's talk, it's
something that I've spoken atlength about both in previous
talks and on my podcast withvarious podcast guests.
But it is undeniable andinarguable that eating and
(03:10):
consuming ruminant herbivoreswas a essential part of human
diet and human evolution.
So the value that we get fromconsuming an animal that
provides us with bioavailableprotein, fat-soluble vitamins,
(03:30):
water-soluble vitamins, traceminerals and all these other
nutrients can't really beoverstated, especially when
we're looking back at theanthropological data, the
paleoanthropological data.
It's quite unequivocal.
So we need to be eatingruminant meat, but if our
animals are going to be healthy,they need to be eating their
(03:52):
species appropriate diet.
They have a rumen.
That means they need to beeating grass.
That means they're not supposedto be eating grains that are
contaminated with herbicide oranything else or other products
of industrial agriculture.
So ruminant herbivores eat grassand we eat ruminant herbivores,
and the ecosystem requiresruminant grazing to be managed
(04:17):
appropriately.
And there was no better exampleof this in the American west
where, when it was colonized,the depth of the soil in certain
places was, um, you know,meters deep, and this was a
byproduct of intensive grazingand followed by long periods of
rest.
So the the act of having theseanimals on the land was building
(04:43):
the nutrients of that soil, itwas building carbon, it was
fixing all these essential,important nutrients into the
soil.
So that is what I inviteeveryone to think about, which
is for this cycle to workharmoniously and for the
ecosystem to work harmoniously,harmoniously, and for the
(05:07):
ecosystem to work harmoniously,we need to be, everyone needs to
be engaging in the mostancestrally appropriate niche,
and inevitably that includes, orthat involves, as less amount
of human intervention fromthings like synthetic herbicides
and pesticides as possible.
So what I want to talk to youtoday about and is give you nine
(05:30):
points that I have come up withthat are, in my mind,
compelling reasons to sourceregeneratively raised animal
meat and why consumers mightconsider this type of food as
opposed to grain fed beef oropposed to meat raised under
(05:52):
confined fed conditions or anyother conditions.
And I really think that thismight be useful, especially for
those of you doing direct toconsumer or paddock to plate
operations, to think about yourmarketing and how you can help
to communicate the value of whatyou are offering to society and
communicate that more clearly.
(06:14):
So I'm going to talk throughnine points.
The first one is animal welfare.
The reason why I've put this asnumber one is because the
mainstream narratives that arecollectively attacking animal
agriculture and meat consumptionfrom various angles, one of the
most common ones is this ideathat these animals are
(06:37):
mistreated, and anyone who hasvisited Bryant's farm or visited
any other regenerativelyregenerative operation will
attest to the fact that thatthese cattle are cared for
immensely well and incrediblywell.
The what I like to say is thatthey have one bad day in their
(06:57):
whole life and that is the daythat that they get processed.
But every other day they arehappily grazing on lush pasture,
moved around regularly, able toexpress their natural
tendencies as cattle interactwith their, with their children,
(07:18):
their calves.
They all exist in a mobtogether.
So animal welfare is a criticalpart of this picture because we
need to help to communicate topeople that this is a highest
form of welfare, considered food, and I like to say that I agree
(07:40):
with many, with the veganmovement, in that I don't like
to consume and I discouragepeople from consuming animals
that are raised under confined,fed operations like pork and
chicken and that are, as aresult of that environment,
necessitated to be injected withor provided with antibiotics,
(08:01):
growth promotants, all kinds ofother chemical inputs.
So animal welfare is key in mymind, and this process of
regenerative grazing respectsanimal welfare, I believe, as
one of the highest principles.
And these are two photos of oneof Clyde Biggs of Nandi and
(08:22):
Goonies in South Africa with oneof his beasts, and Bryant with
one of his Brahmin cows.
So the next point is inenvironmentalism and again I'm
emphasizing this is the secondpoint, because these are the
most common talking points inthe mainstream about why we
(08:45):
shouldn't be eating red meat,why we shouldn't be eating
ruminant animals, and I believethis image and this diagram
really encompasses what Ibelieve is this blanket approach
to environmental thinking, andwhat it illustrates is that
everyone is having theirattention directed to this
(09:09):
extremely reductionist measureof, or proxy of, environmental
health, which is carbon dioxideemissions and, you know, which
is, incidentally, a byproduct ofof human and animal respiration
.
So, but that's another wholetopic that we won't go into
today.
But amongst this preoccupation,this myopia, this narrow-minded
(09:31):
thinking, it's to the detrimentor the ignorance of these other
critical environmental impactsand considerations that we need
to be thinking about and thatare relevant to our local
communities.
And these are things like watercycles, like our soil health,
like the biodiversity of ourpasture and our land, like
(09:54):
ecotoxicity and the overuse ofherbicides and glyphosate, like
atrazine, that are having realimpacts on the ecosystem, that
are having real impacts on theecosystem and, obviously, human
health and all these other morehuman impacts of
(10:14):
environmentalism.
So what I believe is thatregenerative animal agriculture
is the real environmentalism andit is doing the most important
environmental work because theprinciples of regenerative
agriculture, as it's implementedby Bryant and others, is that
it doesn't involve chemical use,which is what is occurring in
(10:35):
these broad acre croppingoperations, which is producing
the food that is supposedlyenvironmentally friendly, which,
again, if you've visited one ofthese farms and you've seen the
alternatives, it's so obviousthat which one is
(10:57):
environmentally considered andwhich one isn't.
And it's the approach thatinvolves the large grain
harvester, the massive spray rigand acres and acres and
hectares and hectares ofmonoculture.
That is not environmentallyconsidered, that is not
environmentally sustainable.
That is what we need to bemoving away from and we need to
be moving towards regenerativeanimal agriculture as the real
(11:22):
environmentalism.
And I like to really againinvite people to visit one of
these farms, visit EastwellFarms, and really see these
happy cattle grazing in thismodel.
And it becomes a real absurdityto think that that is somehow
damaging the planet.
(11:43):
And I think a lot has gonewrong in the thought process if
these natural herbivores eatingtheir natural diet is somehow
being thought of as somethingthat needs to be reduced or
eliminated.
So regenerative animalagriculture is the real
environmentalism and until morepeople understand that, um,
(12:07):
we're going to get confused.
We're going to be eating, ummore products of monocrop
agriculture and we're going tobe getting more obesity,
diabetes and metabolic disease.
So that is a really importantpoint that I hope people can can
think about it.
And and look, I'm not the firstperson to say this.
There's amazing talks bypioneers, especially like Alan
(12:30):
Savory, who's done an amazingvideo on this that when we turn
our view from this abstracted,globalized view to a local view
and we consider the health ofour soil, the health of our
local area and environment, thenthis all makes so much more
sense.
(12:50):
All right, so the third point ismeat taste, and it is something
that is quite subjective, buteveryone that I know who has
tasted meat that has beensourced from a regenerative farm
and believes that that isamongst the best meat they've
ever had, and I think there's acouple of reasons behind this,
(13:10):
and it it actually speaks towhat stacy talked about
yesterday with this idea of, um,you know, secondary metabolites
, but truly the, the quality ofthe, the taste of the meat, is
reflecting the, the polycultureof grass that these these
animals are eating, um, as, andthe degree of freshness of that
(13:32):
that grass that these animalsare eating, and it translates to
an amazing depth of flavour,and farmers like Jake Walke have
made the point about how theindustrial food system has,
especially with regard tochicken, has selected for
blandness and moisture as kindof an end point that they want
(13:54):
to create, a product that theywant to create, whereas the beef
that is raised regenerativelyis the exact opposite.
It is uniquely tasty in its ownspecial way, and that is going
to reflect the fact that thesecows are all eating slightly
different diets depending onwhich farm they are, depending
on the location that they're at.
(14:15):
But I like to think of it as alike cheese, like fine cheeses.
Each one is slightly different.
Each one is a little bit uniqueand tasty in its own way.
So, so, just like you know, youcan have aged cheese, aged wine
.
(14:35):
Um, I find that the taste ofregenerative beef is, uh is, you
know, is delicious in,especially depending on on where
you buy it.
So what?
Why that's important is becausewe, you know, so many people
are used to eating beef that hasbeen raised, um, or they might
have just bought from, uh,woolworths, where they might
(14:58):
have bought from the main, thesupermarket, um, and maybe
people are used to a genericflavor, but I didn't don't think
that that is the norm and andback when, um, when animals were
all fully grass-fed, then thenbeef had a more beefy flavor and
regenerative farming bringsthat characteristic flavor back,
(15:19):
and that's again something thatI prefer and I really encourage
people to try.
And maybe, if you've nevereaten a lot of fully grass-fed
beef and you're not used to thatflavor, it is something that
you can definitely come to enjoyand come to appreciate
particularly so and again,that's my subjective opinion,
(15:40):
but I know a lot of you herehighly prefer, or would
definitely prefer, eating fullygrass-fed beef for their taste.
And that was some somebeautiful, uh, just some photos
of.
On the left is what was cookedfor us yesterday by the very
skillful chef matt, and that issome eastwell sirloin, and on
(16:03):
the right is some walkie beeffrom, uh, I think, cooked by ann
walkie.
So yes, it's a, it's definitelya culinary experience.
So the fourth point is meatnutritional quality and this
(16:24):
idea that when the animal hasbeen eating its natural diet,
its ancestral diet, a fullygrass-fed diet, that the quality
of that meat is going toreflect a higher quality.
And there's many ways oflooking at this, and the most
commonly talked about is anincrease of the ratio of omega-3
(16:44):
to 6 polyunsaturated fattyacids, and particularly the, the
enrichment of these omega-3sthat we get when the animal has
been fully grass-fed, comparedto omega-6 fatty acids, which is
going to happen when animalsare fed grain in feedlots to
finish them in their life.
(17:05):
So the obviously seafood isgoing to be the most abundant
source of things like dha andepa, those omega-3, but when
we're eating fully grass-fedbeef, we're also getting more
than we would from feedlot beef.
The deuterium is something thatI spoke yesterday about, and
(17:27):
the researcher, dr Laszlo Boros,has written an amazing paper
that investigated the ability ofthat animal to of dairy cattle
particularly, to concentrate ordeplete its, its products, its
milk, its meat, of deuterium.
And so they found that thatfully grass-fed beef is going to
(17:50):
be more lower in deuterium andthat is going to potentially
have implications for humanhealth compared to fully
grain-fed beef.
And look, it's a very complexway of really looking at an
obvious point, which is the cowwas not supposed to be eating
grain.
The cow did not ancestrally eatgrain.
(18:11):
The the nutrient quality ofthat meat is simply going to
reflect the fact that if it hasbeen eating an inappropriate
diet, it's it's not going to beas as high.
So there's also been a lot ofother work on this topic.
I believe Stefan van Gilt isone of the the leaders in this
to to really make the case of ofthe nutritional superiority of
(18:36):
fully grass-fed beef.
But, um, I think it is anotherreason, or it's another.
It's intimately tied to thenutritional quality.
So taste is they're bothintimately linked.
So when we have a piece of meator a piece of fish or that
tastes better, it is our body'sway of recognizing and
(18:59):
understanding that this has gota higher nutritional density and
nutritional quality.
So, cost, now, cost is a topicthat is one of the most common
protestations of people whenthey're thinking about fully
grass-fed beef.
And, again, like I mentionedyesterday, it is simply a matter
(19:23):
of financial priorities and Ibelieve that people who care
about their health, they careabout the health of their family
, their children they are goingto make a priority to buy fully,
fully grass-fed beef.
And the beauty of meetingsomeone like bryant, then, and
(19:44):
getting to know them and havingaccess to to them, is that you
can buy in bulk and you can buya whole cow, half cow, quarter
cow and fill your freezer withthat meat and the benefits of
the costing, benefits of buyingmore meat means that it makes
(20:05):
this type of diet and this typeof food sourcing that much more
affordable.
So you typically get a cost perkilogram for a half carcass or
a whole carcass and obviouslythe more you buy, the cheaper it
gets.
But that simply reflects thefact that you're taking the
whole product.
(20:25):
You're not necessarily justwanting the ribeyes, you're not
just wanting the porterhouses,and you get a cheaper rate
because you're taking everything.
And again, it's a skill that Ithink has been lost,
particularly in the sport age,is to be able to use all those
cuts.
But it's, it's fun toexperiment with recipes to use
(20:48):
the slow cooker, to use thebarbecue and to make stews, to
basically make use of the wholeanimal and the.
Again, the nutritional contentof those secondary cuts is not
diminished compared to theribeye and the, the porterhouse.
So it just takes a bit moreskill and a little bit more time
and effort to to learn aboutthat.
(21:09):
But it it allows you, itunlocks this new cost
effectiveness of, of eating thistype of of of food, this
nutritious, um, high, highquality food.
So, um, again, cost issomething that you can play into
your favor when you buy, buy inbulk.
So transparency and purity.
(21:32):
Now, this is a topic that Ithink is becoming more and more
of interest to people who wantto know exactly what they are
eating.
And this is it's a legitimateconcern because, as the
industrial food system has takenoff and continues to expand,
under the scientificinvestigation of food scientists
(21:56):
and other form of agriculturalscientists, who are essentially
finding new ways of influencingor adulterating I'm using the
word adulterating in a way thatmeans, not necessarily
intentionally, but to facilitatesome form of animal
agricultural industrial outcome,like you know, reducing disease
(22:19):
or whatever else.
But all this, all that to say,is that things like chemical use
, vaccine use and other forms ofintervention that didn't exist
for the duration of our humanconsumption of these animals,
that's only going to increaseand it has unknown consequences.
(22:42):
And I think this idea of, youknow, using gene technology on
cattle to specifically vaccinateagainst certain diseases.
And what are the consequencesof consuming meat like that?
It's an unknown, unknown.
So many people are interested inpreserving access to meat that
(23:07):
they know doesn't have thosetype of contaminants in it.
And look, another aspect tothis is the the consumption of
meat that has been grazed or aconsumed grain with glyphosate
and other kind of herbicides.
I mean, I'm not sure to whatdegree that is being
bioaccumulated and then passeddown through the meat.
(23:29):
So if we don't want to find outand um, I do believe that the
animal is probablybiotransforming a significant
degree of the these herbicides,but um, suffice to say, if we
can prefer, if we prefer not toum, have any chance of consuming
these types of, you know,compounds that are toxic to
(23:52):
human health, then it makessense to source your food from a
farmer who, you know for a fact, hasn't been engaging in or
using the any kind ofagricultural chemical in in the
raising of their animals, andthat is, uh, you know, that's
very reassuring to a lot ofpeople.
(24:13):
And I think if you wantcomplete control over what
you're feeding your wife, who'spregnant, or your you know,
infant son, it's to me it's ano-brainer that we want to be
100% sure that it's the same cowthat our you know, great, great
, great grandparents, ateparentsate, that we have always eaten,
(24:34):
and it's free from these novelcompounds that are having known
adverse effects on human healthor just generally unknown, and
we don't want to be the guineapigs.
So transparency and purity is akey reason to meet your farmer
and buy directly off them.
A key reason to meet yourfarmer and buy directly off them
(24:57):
.
Extending that idea is this ideaof food security.
Particularly during COVID, welearnt again maybe in the US
more so than here in Australiathat the consequences of a
centralised supply chain andprocessing food supply apparatus
is that when there is abottleneck, like a massive
(25:20):
processing centre that can getshut down for biosecurity or
infection control reasons, thenthat threatens your access or
can threaten your access to meatand to the food you need to
nourish yourself.
So you can secure food securityby buying a freezer, by filling
(25:40):
that freezer with a half cow ora whole cow, and so that is
something that's reassuring to alot of people to be to be able
to know that they're not at thewhims or the vagaries of what is
happening and perhaps in theeconomy or in the area at that
time, and have a buffer of youknow, three months, six months
(26:03):
worth of of nutrient-dense foodthat they can rely on.
So food security is again,depending on what happens
geopolitically, it is anotherattractive reason to buy fully
grass-fed beef in bulk.
So economic empowerment andthis is zooming out and really
(26:30):
focusing on the humanimplications and the economic
implications of what happenswhen we focus in on small
community production of food.
I've, particularly I've usedthis photo and it's it's the
White Oak Pastures store andWhite Oak Pastures is a fully
grass fed regenerative farmingoperation run by this
(26:52):
de-agriculturalization,de-industrialization of the USA.
Again, it's happened more therethan it has here, but the
(27:17):
offshoring of many economic whatwas previously economic
powerhouses and agriculturalpower, and they suffered because
these towns lost people to thecities and the town suffered
massively because it wasessentially an economic drain
from these centres.
So what?
(27:38):
This?
Bringing back regenerativeagriculture that uses more human
labour, back regenerativeagriculture that uses more human
labor, it uses more skilledlabor.
It in in bluffton particularly,but not not only that.
In other places too, it isacted as a draw card or a
economic lifeline to the, totowns, because people have to be
(28:01):
employed and people have tolive there and work there.
And this regenerative farminghas acted as a anchor back to
the society to attract peopleinto these rural communities and
empower them in a way that theymight not have been at all
before.
So I mean the economicempowerment message is also
(28:22):
happening on an individual scaleand it's also about financially
supporting the change that youwant to see in the world.
And what you can do by buyingyour meat from Bryant, and
regularly, is that you arevoting with your dollar for the
world that you want to see.
And taking it back to thatsecond point about
(28:42):
environmentalism, if you want tolive in a more sustainable but
regenerated world, then there'sno good, you know, tapping on
your keyboard.
Uh, you know, while you drinkyour starbucks coffee about it,
you, you should go out and spendyour money, um, and empower the
, the people who are doing this,this work themselves, you know,
(29:03):
doing the hard yards.
So it's all a part of what Ibelieve the direction we need to
go to, collectively andindividually, which is
decentralising this agriculturalsystem and reversing the trend
of centralisation towardsmonocropping agriculture that
has occurred over the past 50years agriculture that has
(29:28):
occurred over the past 50 years.
So walking that process back ishow we empower these farmers,
how we get access to thisnutrient-dense food and
collectively move towards a morehealthy society.
So don't underestimate thepower as a consumer and as an
individual, in in inpotentiating and driving and
(29:49):
incentivizing the rollout or thedevelopment of regenerative
operations.
And maybe you buy your meatonce a week and then, or once a
month, and then you buy it oncea week and then you know your
family does that.
But if enough people do, thenregenerative farming becomes
incredibly attractive and thatallows them to buy more cattle.
(30:10):
It allows Brian to regeneratemore grass to expand his
operation into surrounding leaseblocks, surrounding farms, and
that organic demand is reallyhow we change things.
So it starts with a drop butthere's reverberations and
there's ripples across the wholepool when we empower and make
(30:32):
these economic votes with ourdollars.
So the final point is animalhusbandry, and I make this point
because often there are specialbreeds that regenerative
farmers are cultivating orstewarding as a part of their
operation.
So one of the breeds,particularly in that I'm
(30:55):
interested in and that I'm goingto talk about soon, is the,
this ingoony cattle, a form ofsangar um, african cattle, but
in places like the usa there'sthere's bison, and people,
regeneratively, are raisingbison, and when you buy the
regeneratively raised bison meat, it's again promoting and
helping facilitate thepreservation of these breeds,
(31:17):
which is important for culturalreasons as well as environmental
and agricultural reasons.
So let let me talk about I'mgoing to talk about nanguni now
and the.
I'm going to explain to you whyI'm so interested and
passionate about this breed.
And and again it's like well,why?
Why is a doctor, uh, havingchoosing to talk about or
(31:41):
advocate for one cattle breedover over another?
And let me explain to you why Ibelieve it's so interesting and
so important.
So these cattle, this Sangarbreed of cattle, are essentially
descended from cattle thatmigrated down from Northern
Africa, ethiopiaopia over aperiod of of 3 000 years.
(32:04):
They traversed down throughincredibly difficult and harsh
environment, and the process ofmigration with these tribal
people, the zulu people and andother tribal people before them,
was that it acted as aselection and it acted to select
(32:26):
specific traits in theseanimals that I believe are
incredibly valuable, and theywere valuable to the Zulus in
Africa, but they're actuallyalso valuable to us as modern
day people in Australia andother countries across the world
.
So the types of trials orselection presses that these
(32:48):
cattle had to go throughincluded predation so imagine
the weak or the slow cow gottaken out, it got eaten by
jackals, lions or other forms ofdiseases, rinderpest or
biological selective pressurethat was made sure that only the
(33:11):
most robust cattle were able tosurvive, and it also included
temperature and climate and thefact that in various parts of
Africa that it's incredibly dryand alternative're, it's
incredibly dry and in,alternatively, it's incredibly
wet and and humid.
But all of these requiredspecific, again, adaptations to
(33:34):
select for traits that um couldallow these, these creatures, to
survive.
So, in addition to thesenatural selective pressures by
mother nature, there was alsohuman selective pressures, and
and I say when I describe this,I talk, talk about the harsh
hand of nature, but the gentlehand of the zulus, and what I
mean by that is they wereselecting for specific traits,
(33:57):
things like um, docileness,their ability to exist in their
community group, in their camp,without, you know, bucking or
goring anyone, so and they wouldhave been eaten, simply eaten
any animals that were having adifficult temperament or weren't
conducive to this tribal,harmonious, tribal life.
(34:18):
So those, those twin pressuresof natural selection from mother
nature, and this tribalselection has kind of given us a
creature that is incredibly fitfor purpose and incredibly
suitable as as a, an animal andwhat, the way I think about it
is, this is technology, and itis the most advanced technology
(34:42):
that we have, for both humanfood but also for for land
regeneration.
And again, just because it's uh, it wasn't synthesized in a lab
.
It's not, um, you know, made ofsilicon chips and metal.
It is the most advancedtechnology that mother nature
has come up with for um, forthis, this purpose.
(35:04):
So let me explain some of thecharacteristics of these cattle
and why I think they're relevantto Australia and to, again,
regenerative farming,particularly Because what I like
to do and I do this in clinicalmedicine I do this when I'm
thinking about a health problemor solving for disease and
(35:24):
preventing diseases.
How can we attack this from afirst principles point of view
and not reason by analogy?
And just because it's been donea certain way, then that isn't
necessarily why we shouldcontinue to do it.
And an example or what I liketo say is that there were no
ruminant, large ruminantherbivores on the arrival of the
(35:45):
colonizers of Australia.
There's no reason why we needto be biased towards Angus or
Hereford or any other form ofBritish breed.
We really need to be, I believe, looking at what is the most
suitable breed for theenvironment.
(36:09):
And when we choose a breed thatis most suitable for the
environment, we are going to bedoing the highest amount or
highest degree of animal ethics,because there's nothing more
unethical other than, you know,obviously directly harming the
animal.
There's not a lot more harmfulthan simply choosing an animal
that is unfit for the land inwhich you're raised because it's
(36:29):
simply, um, you know, it's likeputting a child and and in an
environment not feeding them.
If you put a cow that doesn'thave tick resistance in an area
of endemic that's endemic withticks, then they're going to
suffer.
And they're not going to suffer, um, they're going to suffer
because they don't have thenatural attributes to resist or
deal with that environment.
(36:49):
So let me talk about I'll talkabout now the attributes of
Nguni, particularly so tickresistance is a massive thing
attribute that they have.
And they have this tickresistance because they've
developed certain sebum orexcretory glands that is toxic
(37:09):
to ticks.
They've developed specific haircomposition that again makes it
very difficult for ticks to tosettle on their their skin.
They've adapted very, verymovable or ability to move their
skin so they can flick offthings like ticks.
So so that makes them very,very again suitable to humid
(37:30):
areas or areas with high tickburden.
The fertility of these animalsis unprecedented, and the
ability of Nguni cattle toessentially calf year on year,
every year, for 17, 18 years upto, in some cases, is is, again,
is unprecedented.
(37:50):
The, the reliability of um, ofboth, that that early maturing
cow and then having a cow everyevery year means that, um, it's
the value that you'repotentially getting is enormous.
The other implication, or theobstetric advantage of these
(38:11):
cattle is that they don't getstuck, they don't have
obstructed labour, they don'tneed pulling and, again, it's a
byproduct of that environmentthat they were selected in, and
very quickly, any cattle thathad obstructed labour would have
died along with their offspring.
So the need to pull cattle isalmost non-existent in Goonie
(38:39):
and I'm told that that featureor that attribute is preserved
in cattle who are in crossbreds.
So even if you're breeding adifferent bull over an Nguni cow
, I'm told that the offspringthat cow will maintain a very
easy calving.
So easy calving, fertility andconsistency of reproduction,
(39:01):
when we think about that.
For for the males, um, again, Italked to clive biggs, who's
one of the expert breeders in insouth africa and he has
incredibly mountainous, rockyterrain and his bulls, um, his,
his one bull is servicing 90females and he's walking up and
down this, uh, this incrediblysteep land over a period of of
(39:24):
of months and, without losingcondition, is able to service
that number of females.
So it's truly remarkable whenwe, you know, again, I've heard
stories of other breeds, of thegentleman getting puffed out and
kind of walking behind thefemales after maybe servicing
only 20.
So that's something to thinkabout is how prodigiously
(39:46):
fertile these animals are.
The other points that I thinkare going to be relevant is the
fact that they have a smallerframe size, and what that means
is that you can potentially geta large amount of animals in a
given area and therefore aid inthe land regeneration, the.
(40:08):
The land regeneration is alsoimproved by the fact that you
don't have to drench them or youdon't have to use chemical,
because their dung that they use, that they're going to deposit
on the land.
If that's free from chemical,then its ability to aid in this
land regeneration and buildingof the soil microbes is going to
be improved.
(40:28):
So I think that's a littleappreciated point, which is if
the least amount of chemicalthat you can use, which is
afforded by the animal'sinherent characteristics, is
actually going to accelerate theyour grass growing ability as a
farmer, and accelerate thegoals of regenerative grazing,
which is to grow grass and tobuild soil carbon.
(40:49):
So that is another perspectiveon the attributes of the
creature as, again, it's a toolof land regeneration.
I'm also told that, in terms ofthe return, in terms of the
amount of beef per hectare,can't beat in goonie and the.
That is a function of theirfeed efficiency.
(41:10):
So how much feed that they'reconsuming per body weight is is
amazing, so that they're notmaintaining or they're not
consuming a lot of food tomaintain a whole bunch of of
tissue.
That again means that you canpotentially make a whole, make
more money for, you know, forthe less amount of of animals.
(41:31):
The other point, in terms of the, the benefits of these, the in
guni specifically, are that theyhave and maybe, depending on
your perspective, it is eitherdisadvantage or an advantage is
things like their, their hidecolor.
So the hide color is a productof their, their tribal breeding,
(41:57):
and it became desirable from atribal point of view to have a
wide range of colors.
But what it essentially meansis that they are unique and you,
instead of, or whereas, uh, youknow all black cattle you might
have to brand or um, you knowyou can't identify them in
(42:18):
africa.
They're specifically that.
It's a natural defense againsttheft, because each one of these
coats is completely unique andit's very, very difficult to you
know.
Steal one and try and tellsomeone that you know it's not
their cow because, again,they're so unique.
What that means is that as youguys, as farmers, you guys have
(42:38):
you got a couple of choicesabout how to benefit from a
goonie in your herds.
And again, this is this is notan area of specialty, but just
from talking to differentfarmers people have found
benefit from adding an Ngunibull or Nguni genetics into
their herd and simply benefitingfrom those traits.
(43:00):
But others have maintained afull-blooded Nguni backbone of
their herd and then crossedanimals with a more like an
Angus or other kind of Britishbreed and then sold those
terminal size into the commoditymarket.
But doing things like paddockto plate to me in a regenerative
way seems to be the most idealto benefit from this Nguni.
(43:22):
Because talking, talking to tocustomers and um, that if they
they know, they understand thevalues, then they're going to
pay that and they don't mindthat these traits are, um, you
know about these unique traitsand it gets to maybe the final
point, which is the meat qualityand fully grass-fed in.
Goonie tastes amazing.
(43:42):
It doesn doesn't taste worse,it tastes better and that is
something that you know, is acommon misconception, I think.
So I've tasted Nguni from uphere at Eastwell and then down
in Albury and it's an amazinglytasty meat.
So fully grass-feeding it andhanging the carcass is always
going to help, no matter whatbreed you're raising.
(44:06):
But I really think that theingoony does have a unique
flavor.
So I hope, I hope, that uh givesyou an idea about the, the
different reasons why you mightconsider this breed.
And and again, let's, let's uhput biases or reasoning by
analogy aside.
And if we purely look at thisfrom a first principles point of
(44:26):
view, I think it makes sense.
It makes sense from an economicpoint of view, from an animal
welfare point of view, from asovereignty point of view and
being sovereign or independentfrom reliance on chemical inputs
because you're running thecorrect fit-for-purpose cattle
for your environment.
And finally, I really thinkthis is uh there's a case for
(44:50):
nguni as a genetic endowment,and what I mean by that is, if
this truly is this most advancedtechnology for raising human
food and for regenerating theland, um, then, which I believe
it is, that has been honed overthousands of years of natural
selection and cultural and Zuluselection, then you know there
is some degree of obligation topreserve these incredible
(45:13):
genetics and that's why Irespect the work of, you know,
edward Rouse, who has broughtthese embryos over from Africa,
and he's doing amazing work andmaintaining the purity of a herd
.
So all these reasons to loveNguni and, yeah, consider adding
that to your operation.
(45:35):
So if you want to learn moreabout Nguni, I've done five
episodes now on the RegenerativeHealth Podcast with Jake Wolke,
with conservationist andphotographer Ed Schroeder, with
Clyde Biggs, who of NandiNguni's who have featured a
couple of those photos before.
With Brian, who's my fifth,fifth episode and that was a
(45:56):
great episode and story aboutBrian's past and his journey,
and with Edwin.
So I'd really encourage you tocheck those episodes out if
you're interested in learningmore about Nguni and potentially
adding Nguni to your herd.
And I'll also make mention ofthe Health Summit.
So Regenerate is the first onewe hosted last year in August in
(46:17):
Albury and we had a Q&A panelwith Edwin Rouse, with GT
Ferreira, who's anotherexperienced in guni breeder from
africa, and it's a provides agood another good question
answer or um information aboutabout the breed we.
I'll let you know that our nextevent is happening on the 21st
of april in melbourne.
So if anyone is in melbourne ortrying or flying to melbourne,
(46:40):
then it would be great to seeyou there.
And we will be again coveringthese pillars of circadian and
quantum health, carnivore andancestral diets and regenerative
farming.
So check out the youtube, checkout the youtube of, of my, my
channel, and of um, of theregenerate channel, to, to learn
(47:02):
more.
So that is all that's what I'vegot to say about nangooni.
Hopefully it's made you think alittle bit about other breeds
and maybe why or how we canoptimize or our operations using
something that is a breed that,like nangooni, that is so fit,
fit for purpose.
So that's my youtube channel,my podcast links, instagram and
(47:23):
twitter, and then, yes, my emailaddress is here if you want to
contact me.
So thank you very much.
All right, welcome everyone.
My name is Dr Max Colhane, andtoday I'm going to be speaking
about nine reasons why youshould consider supporting
regenerative animal agriculture,and then I'll talk a little bit
about why I think Nguni cattleare a very important piece of
this puzzle.
So you might be wondering whyand what is a medical doctor
(00:31):
doing standing at a farm fieldday?
Well, I have a interest inholistic health and I believe
that farming, specificallyregenerative animal agriculture,
is a critical part of humanhealth and societal health.
So I'm a general practiceregistrar and I have a podcast
(00:53):
called Regenerative Health thatdiscusses these similar topics,
and I have delved into andinterested in how all these
different factors overlap andinteract to get us closer to
optimal health individually andas a society.
So a key concept that I alwayscome back to is that human
(01:19):
health is not able to beseparated from the health of the
environment and of animalhealth.
So what I mean by that is thatwe can't be thought of as an
independent or disconnected fromthe land that grows our food
and the animals that we consume.
If the animals that we'reconsuming are sick, if the land
(01:42):
that they animals are grazing onis sick, then we are going to
become sick and we can't keepthinking about us as separate
from this system.
And if we consider or look atone of the key reasons why
certain people are overweight,metabolically ill and diabetic,
(02:04):
the processed food that theyconsume is so disconnected from
this natural cycle, from thisnatural process, and I believe
that that is one of the keyunderlying things that we need
to fix if we want to get peoplehealthier and better.
So what this means in practiceis that we need to be eating our
(02:27):
species.
Appropriate diet, we need to beeating animals that are eating
their species.
Appropriate diet and theecosystem needs to be grazed or
used in a way that is in harmonyor consistent with the animals
and appropriate human management.
(02:47):
So what that means is thathumans, we need to be eating
ruminant meat and, although notthe topic of today's talk, it's
something that I've spoken atlength about both in previous
talks and on my podcast withvarious podcast guests.
But it is undeniable andinarguable that eating and
(03:10):
consuming ruminant herbivoreswas a essential part of human
diet and human evolution.
So the value that we get fromconsuming an animal that
provides us with bioavailableprotein, fat-soluble vitamins,
(03:30):
water-soluble vitamins, traceminerals and all these other
nutrients can't really beoverstated, especially when
we're looking back at theanthropological data, the
paleoanthropological data.
It's quite unequivocal.
So we need to be eatingruminant meat, but if our
animals are going to be healthy,they need to be eating their
(03:52):
species appropriate diet.
They have a rumen.
That means they need to beeating grass.
That means they're not supposedto be eating grains that are
contaminated with herbicide oranything else or other products
of industrial agriculture.
So ruminant herbivores eat grassand we eat ruminant herbivores,
and the ecosystem requiresruminant grazing to be managed
(04:17):
appropriately.
And there was no better exampleof this in the American west
where, when it was colonized,the depth of the soil in certain
places was, um, you know,meters deep, and this was a
byproduct of intensive grazingand followed by long periods of
rest.
So the the act of having theseanimals on the land was building
(04:43):
the nutrients of that soil, itwas building carbon, it was
fixing all these essential,important nutrients into the
soil.
So that is what I inviteeveryone to think about, which
is for this cycle to workharmoniously and for the
ecosystem to work harmoniously,harmoniously, and for the
(05:07):
ecosystem to work harmoniously,we need to be, everyone needs to
be engaging in the mostancestrally appropriate niche,
and inevitably that includes, orthat involves, as less amount
of human intervention fromthings like synthetic herbicides
and pesticides as possible.
So what I want to talk to youtoday about and is give you nine
(05:30):
points that I have come up withthat are, in my mind,
compelling reasons to sourceregeneratively raised animal
meat and why consumers mightconsider this type of food as
opposed to grain fed beef oropposed to meat raised under
(05:52):
confined fed conditions or anyother conditions.
And I really think that thismight be useful, especially for
those of you doing direct toconsumer or paddock to plate
operations, to think about yourmarketing and how you can help
to communicate the value of whatyou are offering to society and
communicate that more clearly.
(06:14):
So I'm going to talk throughnine points.
The first one is animal welfare.
The reason why I've put this asnumber one is because the
mainstream narratives that arecollectively attacking animal
agriculture and meat consumptionfrom various angles, one of the
most common ones is this ideathat these animals are
(06:37):
mistreated, and anyone who hasvisited Bryant's farm or visited
any other regenerativelyregenerative operation will
attest to the fact that thatthese cattle are cared for
immensely well and incrediblywell.
The what I like to say is thatthey have one bad day in their
(06:57):
whole life and that is the daythat that they get processed.
But every other day they arehappily grazing on lush pasture,
moved around regularly, able toexpress their natural
tendencies as cattle interactwith their, with their children,
(07:18):
their calves.
They all exist in a mobtogether.
So animal welfare is a criticalpart of this picture because we
need to help to communicate topeople that this is a highest
form of welfare, considered food, and I like to say that I agree
(07:40):
with many, with the veganmovement, in that I don't like
to consume and I discouragepeople from consuming animals
that are raised under confined,fed operations like pork and
chicken and that are, as aresult of that environment,
necessitated to be injected withor provided with antibiotics,
(08:01):
growth promotants, all kinds ofother chemical inputs.
So animal welfare is key in mymind, and this process of
regenerative grazing respectsanimal welfare, I believe, as
one of the highest principles.
And these are two photos of oneof Clyde Biggs of Nandi and
(08:22):
Goonies in South Africa with oneof his beasts, and Bryant with
one of his Brahmin cows.
So the next point is inenvironmentalism and again I'm
emphasizing this is the secondpoint, because these are the
most common talking points inthe mainstream about why we
(08:45):
shouldn't be eating red meat,why we shouldn't be eating
ruminant animals, and I believethis image and this diagram
really encompasses what Ibelieve is this blanket approach
to environmental thinking, andwhat it illustrates is that
everyone is having theirattention directed to this
(09:09):
extremely reductionist measureof, or proxy of, environmental
health, which is carbon dioxideemissions and, you know, which
is, incidentally, a byproduct ofof human and animal respiration
.
So, but that's another wholetopic that we won't go into
today.
But amongst this preoccupation,this myopia, this narrow-minded
(09:31):
thinking, it's to the detrimentor the ignorance of these other
critical environmental impactsand considerations that we need
to be thinking about and thatare relevant to our local
communities.
And these are things like watercycles, like our soil health,
like the biodiversity of ourpasture and our land, like
(09:54):
ecotoxicity and the overuse ofherbicides and glyphosate, like
atrazine, that are having realimpacts on the ecosystem, that
are having real impacts on theecosystem and, obviously, human
health and all these other morehuman impacts of
(10:14):
environmentalism.
So what I believe is thatregenerative animal agriculture
is the real environmentalism andit is doing the most important
environmental work because theprinciples of regenerative
agriculture, as it's implementedby Bryant and others, is that
it doesn't involve chemical use,which is what is occurring in
(10:35):
these broad acre croppingoperations, which is producing
the food that is supposedlyenvironmentally friendly, which,
again, if you've visited one ofthese farms and you've seen the
alternatives, it's so obviousthat which one is
(10:57):
environmentally considered andwhich one isn't.
And it's the approach thatinvolves the large grain
harvester, the massive spray rigand acres and acres and
hectares and hectares ofmonoculture.
That is not environmentallyconsidered, that is not
environmentally sustainable.
That is what we need to bemoving away from and we need to
be moving towards regenerativeanimal agriculture as the real
(11:22):
environmentalism.
And I like to really againinvite people to visit one of
these farms, visit EastwellFarms, and really see these
happy cattle grazing in thismodel.
And it becomes a real absurdityto think that that is somehow
damaging the planet.
(11:43):
And I think a lot has gonewrong in the thought process if
these natural herbivores eatingtheir natural diet is somehow
being thought of as somethingthat needs to be reduced or
eliminated.
So regenerative animalagriculture is the real
environmentalism and until morepeople understand that, um,
(12:07):
we're going to get confused.
We're going to be eating, ummore products of monocrop
agriculture and we're going tobe getting more obesity,
diabetes and metabolic disease.
So that is a really importantpoint that I hope people can can
think about it.
And and look, I'm not the firstperson to say this.
There's amazing talks bypioneers, especially like Alan
(12:30):
Savory, who's done an amazingvideo on this that when we turn
our view from this abstracted,globalized view to a local view
and we consider the health ofour soil, the health of our
local area and environment, thenthis all makes so much more
sense.
(12:50):
All right, so the third point ismeat taste, and it is something
that is quite subjective, buteveryone that I know who has
tasted meat that has beensourced from a regenerative farm
and believes that that isamongst the best meat they've
ever had, and I think there's acouple of reasons behind this,
(13:10):
and it it actually speaks towhat stacy talked about
yesterday with this idea of, um,you know, secondary metabolites
, but truly the, the quality ofthe, the taste of the meat, is
reflecting the, the polycultureof grass that these these
animals are eating, um, as, andthe degree of freshness of that
(13:32):
that grass that these animalsare eating, and it translates to
an amazing depth of flavour,and farmers like Jake Walke have
made the point about how theindustrial food system has,
especially with regard tochicken, has selected for
blandness and moisture as kindof an end point that they want
(13:54):
to create, a product that theywant to create, whereas the beef
that is raised regenerativelyis the exact opposite.
It is uniquely tasty in its ownspecial way, and that is going
to reflect the fact that thesecows are all eating slightly
different diets depending onwhich farm they are, depending
on the location that they're at.
(14:15):
But I like to think of it as alike cheese, like fine cheeses.
Each one is slightly different.
Each one is a little bit uniqueand tasty in its own way.
So, so, just like you know, youcan have aged cheese, aged wine
.
(14:35):
Um, I find that the taste ofregenerative beef is, uh is, you
know, is delicious in,especially depending on on where
you buy it.
So what?
Why that's important is becausewe, you know, so many people
are used to eating beef that hasbeen raised, um, or they might
have just bought from, uh,woolworths, where they might
(14:58):
have bought from the main, thesupermarket, um, and maybe
people are used to a genericflavor, but I didn't don't think
that that is the norm and andback when, um, when animals were
all fully grass-fed, then thenbeef had a more beefy flavor and
regenerative farming bringsthat characteristic flavor back,
(15:19):
and that's again something thatI prefer and I really encourage
people to try.
And maybe, if you've nevereaten a lot of fully grass-fed
beef and you're not used to thatflavor, it is something that
you can definitely come to enjoyand come to appreciate
particularly so and again,that's my subjective opinion,
(15:40):
but I know a lot of you herehighly prefer, or would
definitely prefer, eating fullygrass-fed beef for their taste.
And that was some somebeautiful, uh, just some photos
of.
On the left is what was cookedfor us yesterday by the very
skillful chef matt, and that issome eastwell sirloin, and on
(16:03):
the right is some walkie beeffrom, uh, I think, cooked by ann
walkie.
So yes, it's a, it's definitelya culinary experience.
So the fourth point is meatnutritional quality and this
(16:24):
idea that when the animal hasbeen eating its natural diet,
its ancestral diet, a fullygrass-fed diet, that the quality
of that meat is going toreflect a higher quality.
And there's many ways oflooking at this, and the most
commonly talked about is anincrease of the ratio of omega-3
(16:44):
to 6 polyunsaturated fattyacids, and particularly the, the
enrichment of these omega-3sthat we get when the animal has
been fully grass-fed, comparedto omega-6 fatty acids, which is
going to happen when animalsare fed grain in feedlots to
finish them in their life.
(17:05):
So the obviously seafood isgoing to be the most abundant
source of things like dha andepa, those omega-3, but when
we're eating fully grass-fedbeef, we're also getting more
than we would from feedlot beef.
The deuterium is something thatI spoke yesterday about, and
(17:27):
the researcher, dr Laszlo Boros,has written an amazing paper
that investigated the ability ofthat animal to of dairy cattle
particularly, to concentrate ordeplete its, its products, its
milk, its meat, of deuterium.
And so they found that thatfully grass-fed beef is going to
(17:50):
be more lower in deuterium andthat is going to potentially
have implications for humanhealth compared to fully
grain-fed beef.
And look, it's a very complexway of really looking at an
obvious point, which is the cowwas not supposed to be eating
grain.
The cow did not ancestrally eatgrain.
(18:11):
The the nutrient quality ofthat meat is simply going to
reflect the fact that if it hasbeen eating an inappropriate
diet, it's it's not going to beas as high.
So there's also been a lot ofother work on this topic.
I believe Stefan van Gilt isone of the the leaders in this
to to really make the case of ofthe nutritional superiority of
(18:36):
fully grass-fed beef.
But, um, I think it is anotherreason, or it's another.
It's intimately tied to thenutritional quality.
So taste is they're bothintimately linked.
So when we have a piece of meator a piece of fish or that
tastes better, it is our body'sway of recognizing and
(18:59):
understanding that this has gota higher nutritional density and
nutritional quality.
So, cost, now, cost is a topicthat is one of the most common
protestations of people whenthey're thinking about fully
grass-fed beef.
And, again, like I mentionedyesterday, it is simply a matter
(19:23):
of financial priorities and Ibelieve that people who care
about their health, they careabout the health of their family
, their children they are goingto make a priority to buy fully,
fully grass-fed beef.
And the beauty of meetingsomeone like bryant, then, and
(19:44):
getting to know them and havingaccess to to them, is that you
can buy in bulk and you can buya whole cow, half cow, quarter
cow and fill your freezer withthat meat and the benefits of
the costing, benefits of buyingmore meat means that it makes
(20:05):
this type of diet and this typeof food sourcing that much more
affordable.
So you typically get a cost perkilogram for a half carcass or
a whole carcass and obviouslythe more you buy, the cheaper it
gets.
But that simply reflects thefact that you're taking the
whole product.
(20:25):
You're not necessarily justwanting the ribeyes, you're not
just wanting the porterhouses,and you get a cheaper rate
because you're taking everything.
And again, it's a skill that Ithink has been lost,
particularly in the sport age,is to be able to use all those
cuts.
But it's, it's fun toexperiment with recipes to use
(20:48):
the slow cooker, to use thebarbecue and to make stews, to
basically make use of the wholeanimal and the.
Again, the nutritional contentof those secondary cuts is not
diminished compared to theribeye and the, the porterhouse.
So it just takes a bit moreskill and a little bit more time
and effort to to learn aboutthat.
(21:09):
But it it allows you, itunlocks this new cost
effectiveness of, of eating thistype of of of food, this
nutritious, um, high, highquality food.
So, um, again, cost issomething that you can play into
your favor when you buy, buy inbulk.
So transparency and purity.
(21:32):
Now, this is a topic that Ithink is becoming more and more
of interest to people who wantto know exactly what they are
eating.
And this is it's a legitimateconcern because, as the
industrial food system has takenoff and continues to expand,
under the scientificinvestigation of food scientists
(21:56):
and other form of agriculturalscientists, who are essentially
finding new ways of influencingor adulterating I'm using the
word adulterating in a way thatmeans, not necessarily
intentionally, but to facilitatesome form of animal
agricultural industrial outcome,like you know, reducing disease
(22:19):
or whatever else.
But all this, all that to say,is that things like chemical use
, vaccine use and other forms ofintervention that didn't exist
for the duration of our humanconsumption of these animals,
that's only going to increaseand it has unknown consequences.
(22:42):
And I think this idea of, youknow, using gene technology on
cattle to specifically vaccinateagainst certain diseases.
And what are the consequencesof consuming meat like that?
It's an unknown, unknown.
So many people are interested inpreserving access to meat that
(23:07):
they know doesn't have thosetype of contaminants in it.
And look, another aspect tothis is the the consumption of
meat that has been grazed or aconsumed grain with glyphosate
and other kind of herbicides.
I mean, I'm not sure to whatdegree that is being
bioaccumulated and then passeddown through the meat.
(23:29):
So if we don't want to find outand um, I do believe that the
animal is probablybiotransforming a significant
degree of the these herbicides,but um, suffice to say, if we
can prefer, if we prefer not toum, have any chance of consuming
these types of, you know,compounds that are toxic to
(23:52):
human health, then it makessense to source your food from a
farmer who, you know for a fact, hasn't been engaging in or
using the any kind ofagricultural chemical in in the
raising of their animals, andthat is, uh, you know, that's
very reassuring to a lot ofpeople.
(24:13):
And I think if you wantcomplete control over what
you're feeding your wife, who'spregnant, or your you know,
infant son, it's to me it's ano-brainer that we want to be
100% sure that it's the same cowthat our you know, great, great
, great grandparents, ateparentsate, that we have always eaten,
(24:34):
and it's free from these novelcompounds that are having known
adverse effects on human healthor just generally unknown, and
we don't want to be the guineapigs.
So transparency and purity is akey reason to meet your farmer
and buy directly off them.
A key reason to meet yourfarmer and buy directly off them
(24:57):
.
Extending that idea is this ideaof food security.
Particularly during COVID, welearnt again maybe in the US
more so than here in Australiathat the consequences of a
centralised supply chain andprocessing food supply apparatus
is that when there is abottleneck, like a massive
(25:20):
processing centre that can getshut down for biosecurity or
infection control reasons, thenthat threatens your access or
can threaten your access to meatand to the food you need to
nourish yourself.
So you can secure food securityby buying a freezer, by filling
(25:40):
that freezer with a half cow ora whole cow, and so that is
something that's reassuring to alot of people to be to be able
to know that they're not at thewhims or the vagaries of what is
happening and perhaps in theeconomy or in the area at that
time, and have a buffer of youknow, three months, six months
(26:03):
worth of of nutrient-dense foodthat they can rely on.
So food security is again,depending on what happens
geopolitically, it is anotherattractive reason to buy fully
grass-fed beef in bulk.
So economic empowerment andthis is zooming out and really
(26:30):
focusing on the humanimplications and the economic
implications of what happenswhen we focus in on small
community production of food.
I've, particularly I've usedthis photo and it's it's the
White Oak Pastures store andWhite Oak Pastures is a fully
grass fed regenerative farmingoperation run by this
(26:52):
de-agriculturalization,de-industrialization of the USA.
Again, it's happened more therethan it has here, but the
(27:17):
offshoring of many economic whatwas previously economic
powerhouses and agriculturalpower, and they suffered because
these towns lost people to thecities and the town suffered
massively because it wasessentially an economic drain
from these centres.
So what?
(27:38):
This?
Bringing back regenerativeagriculture that uses more human
labour, back regenerativeagriculture that uses more human
labor, it uses more skilledlabor.
It in in bluffton particularly,but not not only that.
In other places too, it isacted as a draw card or a
economic lifeline to the, totowns, because people have to be
(28:01):
employed and people have tolive there and work there.
And this regenerative farminghas acted as a anchor back to
the society to attract peopleinto these rural communities and
empower them in a way that theymight not have been at all
before.
So I mean the economicempowerment message is also
(28:22):
happening on an individual scaleand it's also about financially
supporting the change that youwant to see in the world.
And what you can do by buyingyour meat from Bryant, and
regularly, is that you arevoting with your dollar for the
world that you want to see.
And taking it back to thatsecond point about
(28:42):
environmentalism, if you want tolive in a more sustainable but
regenerated world, then there'sno good, you know, tapping on
your keyboard.
Uh, you know, while you drinkyour starbucks coffee about it,
you, you should go out and spendyour money, um, and empower the
, the people who are doing this,this work themselves, you know,
(29:03):
doing the hard yards.
So it's all a part of what Ibelieve the direction we need to
go to, collectively andindividually, which is
decentralising this agriculturalsystem and reversing the trend
of centralisation towardsmonocropping agriculture that
has occurred over the past 50years agriculture that has
(29:28):
occurred over the past 50 years.
So walking that process back ishow we empower these farmers,
how we get access to thisnutrient-dense food and
collectively move towards a morehealthy society.
So don't underestimate thepower as a consumer and as an
individual, in in inpotentiating and driving and
(29:49):
incentivizing the rollout or thedevelopment of regenerative
operations.
And maybe you buy your meatonce a week and then, or once a
month, and then you buy it oncea week and then you know your
family does that.
But if enough people do, thenregenerative farming becomes
incredibly attractive and thatallows them to buy more cattle.
(30:10):
It allows Brian to regeneratemore grass to expand his
operation into surrounding leaseblocks, surrounding farms, and
that organic demand is reallyhow we change things.
So it starts with a drop butthere's reverberations and
there's ripples across the wholepool when we empower and make
(30:32):
these economic votes with ourdollars.
So the final point is animalhusbandry, and I make this point
because often there are specialbreeds that regenerative
farmers are cultivating orstewarding as a part of their
operation.
So one of the breeds,particularly in that I'm
(30:55):
interested in and that I'm goingto talk about soon, is the,
this ingoony cattle, a form ofsangar um, african cattle, but
in places like the usa there'sthere's bison, and people,
regeneratively, are raisingbison, and when you buy the
regeneratively raised bison meat, it's again promoting and
helping facilitate thepreservation of these breeds,
(31:17):
which is important for culturalreasons as well as environmental
and agricultural reasons.
So let let me talk about I'mgoing to talk about nanguni now
and the.
I'm going to explain to you whyI'm so interested and
passionate about this breed.
And and again it's like well,why?
Why is a doctor, uh, havingchoosing to talk about or
(31:41):
advocate for one cattle breedover over another?
And let me explain to you why Ibelieve it's so interesting and
so important.
So these cattle, this Sangarbreed of cattle, are essentially
descended from cattle thatmigrated down from Northern
Africa, ethiopiaopia over aperiod of of 3 000 years.
(32:04):
They traversed down throughincredibly difficult and harsh
environment, and the process ofmigration with these tribal
people, the zulu people and andother tribal people before them,
was that it acted as aselection and it acted to select
(32:26):
specific traits in theseanimals that I believe are
incredibly valuable, and theywere valuable to the Zulus in
Africa, but they're actuallyalso valuable to us as modern
day people in Australia andother countries across the world
.
So the types of trials orselection presses that these
(32:48):
cattle had to go throughincluded predation so imagine
the weak or the slow cow gottaken out, it got eaten by
jackals, lions or other forms ofdiseases, rinderpest or
biological selective pressurethat was made sure that only the
(33:11):
most robust cattle were able tosurvive, and it also included
temperature and climate and thefact that in various parts of
Africa that it's incredibly dryand alternative're, it's
incredibly dry and in,alternatively, it's incredibly
wet and and humid.
But all of these requiredspecific, again, adaptations to
(33:34):
select for traits that um couldallow these, these creatures, to
survive.
So, in addition to thesenatural selective pressures by
mother nature, there was alsohuman selective pressures, and
and I say when I describe this,I talk, talk about the harsh
hand of nature, but the gentlehand of the zulus, and what I
mean by that is they wereselecting for specific traits,
(33:57):
things like um, docileness,their ability to exist in their
community group, in their camp,without, you know, bucking or
goring anyone, so and they wouldhave been eaten, simply eaten
any animals that were having adifficult temperament or weren't
conducive to this tribal,harmonious, tribal life.
(34:18):
So those, those twin pressuresof natural selection from mother
nature, and this tribalselection has kind of given us a
creature that is incredibly fitfor purpose and incredibly
suitable as as a, an animal andwhat, the way I think about it
is, this is technology, and itis the most advanced technology
(34:42):
that we have, for both humanfood but also for for land
regeneration.
And again, just because it's uh, it wasn't synthesized in a lab
.
It's not, um, you know, made ofsilicon chips and metal.
It is the most advancedtechnology that mother nature
has come up with for um, forthis, this purpose.
(35:04):
So let me explain some of thecharacteristics of these cattle
and why I think they're relevantto Australia and to, again,
regenerative farming,particularly Because what I like
to do and I do this in clinicalmedicine I do this when I'm
thinking about a health problemor solving for disease and
(35:24):
preventing diseases.
How can we attack this from afirst principles point of view
and not reason by analogy?
And just because it's been donea certain way, then that isn't
necessarily why we shouldcontinue to do it.
And an example or what I liketo say is that there were no
ruminant, large ruminantherbivores on the arrival of the
(35:45):
colonizers of Australia.
There's no reason why we needto be biased towards Angus or
Hereford or any other form ofBritish breed.
We really need to be, I believe, looking at what is the most
suitable breed for theenvironment.
(36:09):
And when we choose a breed thatis most suitable for the
environment, we are going to bedoing the highest amount or
highest degree of animal ethics,because there's nothing more
unethical other than, you know,obviously directly harming the
animal.
There's not a lot more harmfulthan simply choosing an animal
that is unfit for the land inwhich you're raised because it's
(36:29):
simply, um, you know, it's likeputting a child and and in an
environment not feeding them.
If you put a cow that doesn'thave tick resistance in an area
of endemic that's endemic withticks, then they're going to
suffer.
And they're not going to suffer, um, they're going to suffer
because they don't have thenatural attributes to resist or
deal with that environment.
(36:49):
So let me talk about I'll talkabout now the attributes of
Nguni, particularly so tickresistance is a massive thing
attribute that they have.
And they have this tickresistance because they've
developed certain sebum orexcretory glands that is toxic
(37:09):
to ticks.
They've developed specific haircomposition that again makes it
very difficult for ticks to tosettle on their their skin.
They've adapted very, verymovable or ability to move their
skin so they can flick offthings like ticks.
So so that makes them very,very again suitable to humid
(37:30):
areas or areas with high tickburden.
The fertility of these animalsis unprecedented, and the
ability of Nguni cattle toessentially calf year on year,
every year, for 17, 18 years upto, in some cases, is is, again,
is unprecedented.
(37:50):
The, the reliability of um, ofboth, that that early maturing
cow and then having a cow everyevery year means that, um, it's
the value that you'repotentially getting is enormous.
The other implication, or theobstetric advantage of these
(38:11):
cattle is that they don't getstuck, they don't have
obstructed labour, they don'tneed pulling and, again, it's a
byproduct of that environmentthat they were selected in, and
very quickly, any cattle thathad obstructed labour would have
died along with their offspring.
So the need to pull cattle isalmost non-existent in Goonie
(38:39):
and I'm told that that featureor that attribute is preserved
in cattle who are in crossbreds.
So even if you're breeding adifferent bull over an Nguni cow
, I'm told that the offspringthat cow will maintain a very
easy calving.
So easy calving, fertility andconsistency of reproduction,
(39:01):
when we think about that.
For for the males, um, again, Italked to clive biggs, who's
one of the expert breeders in insouth africa and he has
incredibly mountainous, rockyterrain and his bulls, um, his,
his one bull is servicing 90females and he's walking up and
down this, uh, this incrediblysteep land over a period of of
(39:24):
of months and, without losingcondition, is able to service
that number of females.
So it's truly remarkable whenwe, you know, again, I've heard
stories of other breeds, of thegentleman getting puffed out and
kind of walking behind thefemales after maybe servicing
only 20.
So that's something to thinkabout is how prodigiously
(39:46):
fertile these animals are.
The other points that I thinkare going to be relevant is the
fact that they have a smallerframe size, and what that means
is that you can potentially geta large amount of animals in a
given area and therefore aid inthe land regeneration, the.
(40:08):
The land regeneration is alsoimproved by the fact that you
don't have to drench them or youdon't have to use chemical,
because their dung that they use, that they're going to deposit
on the land.
If that's free from chemical,then its ability to aid in this
land regeneration and buildingof the soil microbes is going to
be improved.
(40:28):
So I think that's a littleappreciated point, which is if
the least amount of chemicalthat you can use, which is
afforded by the animal'sinherent characteristics, is
actually going to accelerate theyour grass growing ability as a
farmer, and accelerate thegoals of regenerative grazing,
which is to grow grass and tobuild soil carbon.
(40:49):
So that is another perspectiveon the attributes of the
creature as, again, it's a toolof land regeneration.
I'm also told that, in terms ofthe return, in terms of the
amount of beef per hectare,can't beat in goonie and the.
That is a function of theirfeed efficiency.
(41:10):
So how much feed that they'reconsuming per body weight is is
amazing, so that they're notmaintaining or they're not
consuming a lot of food tomaintain a whole bunch of of
tissue.
That again means that you canpotentially make a whole, make
more money for, you know, forthe less amount of of animals.
(41:31):
The other point, in terms of the, the benefits of these, the in
guni specifically, are that theyhave and maybe, depending on
your perspective, it is eitherdisadvantage or an advantage is
things like their, their hidecolor.
So the hide color is a productof their, their tribal breeding,
(41:57):
and it became desirable from atribal point of view to have a
wide range of colors.
But what it essentially meansis that they are unique and you,
instead of, or whereas, uh, youknow all black cattle you might
have to brand or um, you knowyou can't identify them in
(42:18):
africa.
They're specifically that.
It's a natural defense againsttheft, because each one of these
coats is completely unique andit's very, very difficult to you
know.
Steal one and try and tellsomeone that you know it's not
their cow because, again,they're so unique.
What that means is that as youguys, as farmers, you guys have
(42:38):
you got a couple of choicesabout how to benefit from a
goonie in your herds.
And again, this is this is notan area of specialty, but just
from talking to differentfarmers people have found
benefit from adding an Ngunibull or Nguni genetics into
their herd and simply benefitingfrom those traits.
(43:00):
But others have maintained afull-blooded Nguni backbone of
their herd and then crossedanimals with a more like an
Angus or other kind of Britishbreed and then sold those
terminal size into the commoditymarket.
But doing things like paddockto plate to me in a regenerative
way seems to be the most idealto benefit from this Nguni.
(43:22):
Because talking, talking to tocustomers and um, that if they
they know, they understand thevalues, then they're going to
pay that and they don't mindthat these traits are, um, you
know about these unique traitsand it gets to maybe the final
point, which is the meat qualityand fully grass-fed in.
Goonie tastes amazing.
(43:42):
It doesn doesn't taste worse,it tastes better and that is
something that you know, is acommon misconception, I think.
So I've tasted Nguni from uphere at Eastwell and then down
in Albury and it's an amazinglytasty meat.
So fully grass-feeding it andhanging the carcass is always
going to help, no matter whatbreed you're raising.
(44:06):
But I really think that theingoony does have a unique
flavor.
So I hope, I hope, that uh givesyou an idea about the, the
different reasons why you mightconsider this breed.
And and again, let's, let's uhput biases or reasoning by
analogy aside.
And if we purely look at thisfrom a first principles point of
(44:26):
view, I think it makes sense.
It makes sense from an economicpoint of view, from an animal
welfare point of view, from asovereignty point of view and
being sovereign or independentfrom reliance on chemical inputs
because you're running thecorrect fit-for-purpose cattle
for your environment.
And finally, I really thinkthis is uh there's a case for
(44:50):
nguni as a genetic endowment,and what I mean by that is, if
this truly is this most advancedtechnology for raising human
food and for regenerating theland, um, then, which I believe
it is, that has been honed overthousands of years of natural
selection and cultural and Zuluselection, then you know there
is some degree of obligation topreserve these incredible
(45:13):
genetics and that's why Irespect the work of, you know,
edward Rouse, who has broughtthese embryos over from Africa,
and he's doing amazing work andmaintaining the purity of a herd
.
So all these reasons to loveNguni and, yeah, consider adding
that to your operation.
(45:35):
So if you want to learn moreabout Nguni, I've done five
episodes now on the RegenerativeHealth Podcast with Jake Wolke,
with conservationist andphotographer Ed Schroeder, with
Clyde Biggs, who of NandiNguni's who have featured a
couple of those photos before.
With Brian, who's my fifth,fifth episode and that was a
(45:56):
great episode and story aboutBrian's past and his journey,
and with Edwin.
So I'd really encourage you tocheck those episodes out if
you're interested in learningmore about Nguni and potentially
adding Nguni to your herd.
And I'll also make mention ofthe Health Summit.
So Regenerate is the first onewe hosted last year in August in
(46:17):
Albury and we had a Q&A panelwith Edwin Rouse, with GT
Ferreira, who's anotherexperienced in guni breeder from
africa, and it's a provides agood another good question
answer or um information aboutabout the breed we.
I'll let you know that our nextevent is happening on the 21st
of april in melbourne.
So if anyone is in melbourne ortrying or flying to melbourne,
(46:40):
then it would be great to seeyou there.
And we will be again coveringthese pillars of circadian and
quantum health, carnivore andancestral diets and regenerative
farming.
So check out the youtube, checkout the youtube of, of my, my
channel, and of um, of theregenerate channel, to, to learn
(47:02):
more.
So that is all that's what I'vegot to say about nangooni.
Hopefully it's made you think alittle bit about other breeds
and maybe why or how we canoptimize or our operations using
something that is a breed that,like nangooni, that is so fit,
fit for purpose.
So that's my youtube channel,my podcast links, instagram and
(47:23):
twitter, and then, yes, my emailaddress is here if you want to
contact me.
So thank you very much.
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