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How livestock can "green" global deserts and restore degraded land | Alejandro Carrillo | TEDxBoston

What does it take to restore our degraded soils? To stop desertification? We need biology to create the conditions needed to awaken dormant native seeds and rebalance ecosystems. Livestock grazing in sync with Nature can bring that much needed biology to our thirsty, unproductive, lifeless soils. This is being demonstrated by ranchers in the Chihuahuan Desert that want to do things differently. See what a decade of holistic grazing and regenerative livestock management can do. Once desertified unproductive land, stretched with bare soil that did little to retain the scarce rain, is now something beautiful. Lush perennial grasslands have returned, and with them the biodiversity, the soil's water retention and carbon sequestration capacity, and the natural evotranspiration cycles that bring even more restorative rainfall. Alejandro Carrillo is a fourth-generation rancher in the Chihuahuan desert. Rarely his precipitation goes beyond 8” per year (over 200mm). Alejandro’s ranch, Las Damas, has been part of multiple documentaries and studies focused on regenerative ranching such as Common Ground, Sacred Cow, To Which We Belong, and Water in Plain Sight. Alejandro’s Grasslands Regeneration Project company assists ranchers and organizations on regenerative grazing practices in North America, South America, Africa, Australia, and the Middle East. He also participates as a delegate to the UNCCD in multiple countries. Alejandro holds a MS in Technical Management from The Johns Hopkins University and BS in Computer Science from Monterrey Tech. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx

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