Holistic Management (from ''holos'', a Greek word meaning ''all'', ''whole'', ''entire'', ''total'') in agriculture is an approach to managing resources that was originally developed by

Allan Savory Clifford Allan Redin Savory (born 15 September 1935) is a Zimbabwean livestock farmer and president and co-founder of the Savory Institute. He originated holistic management, a systems thinking approach to managing resources. Savory advocate ...

. Holistic Management is a registered

trademark A trademark (also written trade mark or trade-mark) is a type of intellectual property consisting of a recognizable sign, design, or expression that identifies products or services from a particular source and distinguishes them from ot ...

of Holistic Management International (no longer associated with Allan Savory).

Definition

Holistic management describes a

systems thinking Systems thinking is a way of making sense of the complexity of the world by looking at it in terms of wholes and relationships rather than by splitting it down into its parts. It has been used as a way of exploring and developing effective actio ...

approach to managing resources. Holistic management was originally developed by

for grazing management, but is now being adapted for use in managing other systems with complex social, ecological and economic factors. Holistic planned grazing is similar to rotational grazing but differs in that it more explicitly recognizes and provides a framework for adapting to the four basic ecosystem processes: the

water cycle The water cycle, also known as the hydrologic cycle or the hydrological cycle, is a biogeochemical cycle that describes the continuous movement of water on, above and below the surface of the Earth. The mass of water on Earth remains fairly co ...

, the mineral cycle including the

carbon cycle The carbon cycle is the biogeochemical cycle by which carbon is exchanged among the biosphere, pedosphere, geosphere, hydrosphere, and atmosphere of the Earth. Carbon is the main component of biological compounds as well as a major compon ...

, energy flow, and

community A community is a social unit (a group of living things) with commonality such as place, norms, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given geographical area (e.g. a country, village, t ...

dynamics (the relationship between organisms in an

ecosystem An ecosystem (or ecological system) consists of all the organisms and the physical environment with which they interact. These biotic and abiotic components are linked together through nutrient cycles and energy flows. Energy enters the syst ...

), giving equal importance to livestock production and social welfare. Holistic Management has been likened to "a

permaculture Permaculture is an approach to land management and settlement design that adopts arrangements observed in flourishing natural ecosystems. It includes a set of design principles derived using whole-systems thinking. It applies these principl ...

approach to rangeland management".

Framework

The Holistic Management decision-making framework uses six key steps to guide the management of resources: #Define in its entirety what you are managing. No area should be treated as a single-product system. By defining the whole, people are better able to manage. This includes identifying the available resources, including

money Money is any item or verifiable record that is generally accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of debts, such as taxes, in a particular country or socio-economic context. The primary functions which distinguish money ar ...

, that the manager has at his disposal. #Define what you want now and for the future. Set the objectives, goals and actions needed to produce the

quality of life Quality of life (QOL) is defined by the World Health Organization as "an individual's perception of their position in life in the context of the culture and value systems in which they live and in relation to their goals, expectations, standards ...

sought, and what the life-nurturing environment must be like to sustain that quality of life far into the future. #Watch for the earliest indicators of ecosystem health. Identify the ecosystem services that have deep impacts for people in both urban and rural environments, and find a way to easily monitor them. One of the best examples of an early indicator of a poorly functioning environment is patches of bare ground. An indicator of a better functioning environment is newly sprouting diversity of plants and a return or increase of wildlife. #Don't limit the management tools you use. The eight tools for managing natural resources are money/labor, human creativity, grazing, animal impact, fire, rest, living organisms and

science Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence ...

/technology. To be successful you need to use all these tools to the best of your ability. #Test your decisions with questions that are designed to help ensure all your decisions are socially, environmentally and financially sound for both the short and long term. #Monitor

proactively Proactivity or proactive behavior refers to self-initiated behavior that endeavours to solve a problem before it has occurred. Proactive behavior involves acting in advance of a future situation, rather than reacting. It refers to taking control o ...

, before your managed system becomes more imbalanced. This way the manager can take adaptive corrective action quickly, before the ecosystem services are lost. Always assume your plan is less than perfect and use a feedback loop that includes monitoring for the earliest signs of failure, adjusting and re-planning as needed. In other words use a "

canary in a coal mine Sentinel species are organisms, often animals, used to detect risks to humans by providing advance warning of a danger. The terms primarily apply in the context of environmental hazards rather than those from other sources. Some animals can ac ...

" approach.

Four principles

Savory stated four key principles of Holistic Management® planned grazing, which he intended to take advantage of the

symbiotic Symbiosis (from Greek , , "living together", from , , "together", and , bíōsis, "living") is any type of a close and long-term biological interaction between two different biological organisms, be it mutualistic, commensalistic, or para ...

relationship between large herds of grazing animals and the grasslands that support them: # Nature functions as a holistic community with a mutualistic relationship between people, animals and the land. If you remove or change the behavior of any

keystone species A keystone species is a species which has a disproportionately large effect on its natural environment relative to its abundance, a concept introduced in 1969 by the zoologist Robert T. Paine. Keystone species play a critical role in maintaini ...

like the large grazing herds, you have an unexpected and wide-ranging negative impact on other areas of the environment. # It is absolutely crucial that any agricultural planning system must be flexible enough to adapt to nature’s complexity, since all environments are different and have constantly changing local conditions. #

Animal husbandry Animal husbandry is the branch of agriculture concerned with animals that are raised for meat, fibre, milk, or other products. It includes day-to-day care, selective breeding, and the raising of livestock. Husbandry has a long history, starti ...

using domestic species can be used as a substitute for lost keystone species. Thus when managed properly in a way that mimics nature, agriculture can heal the land and even benefit wildlife, while at the same time benefiting people. # Time and timing is the most important factor when planning land use. Not only is it crucial to understand how long to use the land for agriculture and how long to rest, it is equally important to understand exactly when and where the land is ready for that use and rest.

Beginnings

The idea of holistic planned

grazing In agriculture, grazing is a method of animal husbandry whereby domestic livestock are allowed outdoors to roam around and consume wild vegetations in order to convert the otherwise indigestible (by human gut) cellulose within grass and ot ...

was developed in the 1960s by

, a wildlife biologist in his native

Southern Rhodesia Southern Rhodesia was a landlocked self-governing colony, self-governing British Crown colony in southern Africa, established in 1923 and consisting of British South Africa Company (BSAC) territories lying south of the Zambezi River. The reg ...

. Setting out to understand

desertification Desertification is a type of land degradation in drylands in which biological productivity is lost due to natural processes or induced by human activities whereby fertile areas become increasingly arid. It is the spread of arid areas caused ...

in the context of the larger

environmental movement The environmental movement (sometimes referred to as the ecology movement), also including conservation and green politics, is a diverse philosophical, social, and political movement for addressing environmental issues. Environmentalists a ...

, and influenced by the work of

André Voisin André Marcel Voisin (7 January 1903 – 21 December 1964) was a French biochemist, farmer and author best known for developing the theory of Rational Grazing (also known as Voisinism, Voisin Grazing or Rational Intensive Grazing). He also lec ...

, he hypothesized that the spread of deserts, the loss of wildlife, and the resulting human impoverishment were related to the reduction of the natural

herds A herd is a social group of certain animals of the same species, either wild or domestic. The form of collective animal behavior associated with this is called ''herding''. These animals are known as gregarious animals. The term ''herd'' is ...

of large grazing animals and, even more, the changed behavior of the few remaining herds. Savory hypothesized further that

livestock Livestock are the domesticated animals raised in an agricultural setting to provide labor and produce diversified products for consumption such as meat, eggs, milk, fur, leather, and wool. The term is sometimes used to refer solely to ani ...

could be substituted for natural herds to provide important

ecosystem services Ecosystem services are the many and varied benefits to humans provided by the natural environment and healthy ecosystems. Such ecosystems include, for example, agroecosystems, forest ecosystem, grassland ecosystems, and aquatic ecosystems. ...

like nutrient

cycling Cycling, also, when on a two-wheeled bicycle, called bicycling or biking, is the use of cycles for transport, recreation, exercise or sport. People engaged in cycling are referred to as "cyclists", "bicyclists", or "bikers". Apart from ...

. However, while livestock managers had found that rotational grazing systems can work for livestock management purposes, scientific experiments demonstrated it does not necessarily improve

ecological Ecology () is the study of the relationships between living organisms, including humans, and their physical environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community, ecosystem, and biosphere level. Ecology overlaps wi ...

issues such as desertification. As Savory saw it, a more comprehensive framework for the management of grassland systems — an adaptive, holistic management plan — was needed. For that reason Holistic Management has been used as a Whole Farm/Ranch Planning too

In 1984, he founded the Center for Holistic Resource Management which became Holistic Management International

Development

In many regions,

pastoralism Pastoralism is a form of animal husbandry where domesticated animals (known as "livestock") are released onto large vegetated outdoor lands ( pastures) for grazing, historically by nomadic people who moved around with their herds. The anim ...

and communal land use are blamed for

environmental A biophysical environment is a biotic and abiotic surrounding of an organism or population, and consequently includes the factors that have an influence in their survival, development, and evolution. A biophysical environment can vary in scal ...

degradation caused by

overgrazing Overgrazing occurs when plants are exposed to intensive grazing for extended periods of time, or without sufficient recovery periods. It can be caused by either livestock in poorly managed agricultural applications, game reserves, or nature res ...

. After years of research and experience, Savory came to understand this assertion was often wrong, and that sometimes removing animals actually made matters worse. This concept is a variation of the trophic cascade, where humans are seen as the top level predator and the cascade follows from there. Savory developed a management system that he claimed would improve grazing systems. Holistic planned grazing is one of a number of newer grazing management systems that aim to more closely simulate the behavior of natural herds of wildlife and have been shown to improve

riparian A riparian zone or riparian area is the interface between land and a river or stream. Riparian is also the proper nomenclature for one of the terrestrial biomes of the Earth. Plant habitats and communities along the river margins and banks a ...

habitats and water quality over systems that often led to land degradation, and be an effective tool to improve range condition for both livestock and

wildlife Wildlife refers to undomesticated animal species, but has come to include all organisms that grow or live wild in an area without being introduced by humans. Wildlife was also synonymous to game: those birds and mammals that were hunted ...

Uses

While originally developed as a tool for range land use and restoring desertified land, the Holistic Management system can be applied to other areas with multiple complex

socioeconomic Socioeconomics (also known as social economics) is the social science that studies how economic activity affects and is shaped by social processes. In general it analyzes how modern societies progress, stagnate, or regress because of their l ...

and environmental factors. One such example is integrated water resources management, which promotes sector integration in development and management of water resources to ensure that water is allocated fairly between different users, maximizing economic and social welfare without compromising the

sustainability Specific definitions of sustainability are difficult to agree on and have varied in the literature and over time. The concept of sustainability can be used to guide decisions at the global, national, and individual levels (e.g. sustainable livi ...

of vital ecosystems. Another example is mine reclamation. A fourth use of Holistic Management® is in certain forms of no till crop production, intercropping, and permaculture. Holistic Management has been acknowledged by the United States Department of Agriculture. The most comprehensive use of Holistic Management is as a Whole Farm/Ranch Planning tool which has been used successfully by farmers and ranchers. For that reason, the USDA invested six years of Beginning Farmer/Rancher Development funding to use it to train beginning women farmers and ranchers

Criticism

There are several claims that evidence for Holistic Management is not based in science. A paper by Richard Teague ''et al''. claims that the different criticisms had examined rotational systems in general and not holistic planned grazing. In 2013 the Savory Institute published a response to some of their critics. The same month Savory was a guest speaker with TED (conference), TED and gave a presentation titled "How to Fight Desertification and Reverse Climate Change". RealClimate.org published a piece saying that Savory's claims that his technique can bring atmospheric carbon "back to pre-industrial levels" are "simply not reasonable."Nordborg, Maria (June 2016
Holistic management – a critical review of Allan Savory's grazing method
Uppsala: SLU/EPOK – Centre for Organic Food & Farming & Chalmers In his Ted Talk, Savory has claimed that holistic grazing could reduce carbon dioxide levels to pre-industrial levels in a span of 40 years, solving the problems caused by

climate change In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to ...

. According to Skeptical science, "it is not possible to increase productivity, increase numbers of cattle and store carbon using any grazing strategy, never-mind Holistic Management ..Long term studies on the effect of grazing on

soil carbon Soil carbon is the solid carbon stored in global soils. This includes both soil organic matter and inorganic carbon as carbonate minerals. Soil carbon is a carbon sink in regard to the global carbon cycle, playing a role in biogeochemistry, c ...

storage have been done before, and the results are not promising. ..Because of the complex nature of carbon storage in soils, increasing global temperature, risk of desertification and methane emissions from livestock, it is unlikely that Holistic Management, or any management technique, can reverse climate change." According to a 2016 study published by the University of Uppsala, the actual rate at which improved grazing management could contribute to

carbon sequestration Carbon sequestration is the process of storing carbon in a carbon pool. Carbon dioxide () is naturally captured from the atmosphere through biological, chemical, and physical processes. These changes can be accelerated through changes in lan ...

is seven times lower than the claims made by Savory. The study concludes that Holistic Management cannot reverse climate change. A study by the Food and Climate Research Network in 2017 has concluded that Savory's claims about carbon sequestration are "unrealistic" and very different from those issued by peer-reviewed studies.

Awards

Savory received the 2003 Banksia International Award and in 2010 the Africa Centre for Holistic Management in Zimbabwe, Operation Hope (a " proof of concept" project using Holistic Management) was named the winner of the 2010

Buckminster Fuller Challenge The Buckminster Fuller Challenge is an annual international design competition that awards $100,000 to the most comprehensive solution to a pressing global problem. The Challenge was launched in 2007 and is a program oThe Buckminster Fuller Instit ...

for "recognizing initiatives which take a comprehensive, anticipatory, design approach to radically advance human well being and the health of our planet's ecosystems". In addition, numerous Holistic Management practitioners have received awards for their environmental stewardship through using Holistic Management practices

References

External links

Savory Institute

Holistic Management International
Permaculture concepts Systems theory Biodiversity Climate change and agriculture Sustainable food system Natural resource management Environmental social science concepts