59. Reintegration of Humans in Nature

Ben Frition is the Founder of The REED Center which is a Maryland-based nonprofit that seeks to repair the holistic connection of humans and their environment through research, engaging communities in farm programming, developing self-perpetuating ecosystems, and designing natural landscapes on residential and commercial scales. They strive to inspire and empower humanity to reconnect with Nature and co-create a more resilient, equitable, and abundant future for all communities on the planet. They also have a Food Forest, that seeks to develop scalable diversified agro-ecosystems to produce both the maximized productively of land in both volume of food, as well as the more important bionutrient density of said food. Ben's work spawned from seeing the failures of reforestation projects that get cut down as the needs of people are unmet. He's been developing agricultural models that meet both the environmental imperative of biodiversity & resilience AND the acute needs of humans.Transitioning from almost three centuries of conventional agriculture into a diverse nature mimicking polyculture, the food forest offers a unique opportunity to study, document, and record the rejuvenation of this land over time. They intend to use this relatively standard agricultural canvas to collect key data, iterate on best practices, and pioneer novel methodologies for regenerative land management. Contact and connect with Ben: [email protected]  REED Center: https://thereedcenter.org/