TB
T. Blijker
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Dutch agriculture is among the most productive in the world, but this comes at high social and environmental costs. The Zuid-Hollandse (ZH) Delta, home to the largest agricultural area in the Netherlands, is both a highly fertile and vulnerable landscape: low-lying, heavily dependent on hydraulic engineering, and increasingly exposed to the pressures of climate change. The region has set itself the ambition of transitioning towards a future-proof and climate-neutral food system, and regenerative agriculture (RA) offers a promising pathway for that transition. However, RA lacks institutional recognition in Dutch policy and social research on the topic is mostly absent. This thesis addresses that gap by examining RA in the Zuid-Hollandse Delta through a moral value lens. By conceptualising regenerative agriculture as a compound moral value with interacting sub-values, it asks:
How is the value landscape, including internal conflicts, of regenerative agriculture in the Zuid-Hollandse Delta constituted, and how is this landscape mediated by technological and institutional conditions?
To explore this question, I examined what values are associated with RA in the Zuid-Hollandse Delta. A discourse analysis of practitioner and scientific texts revealed a broad and plural value landscape. Care for nature emerged as the most prominent value, alongside collective responsibility and knowledge values such as collaboration, learning, and innovation, and justice-oriented values such as intergenerational justice. Economic viability appeared as a recurring concern. Participatory observations at four farms and interviews with farmers contextualised these findings within the Zuid-Hollandse Delta. Each farm expressed the value landscape differently, shaped by the scale, worldview, and business model of the farmer. Despite these differences, two values were shared across all four farms: learning and care for the soil, which farmers consistently described as the core of their regenerative practice.
The values within this broad value landscape of RA, and the norms and practices they prescribe, can also conflict with each other. Two major value conflicts were identified. The first concerns economic viability: within the current agricultural system, financial survival often requires high productivity, which can conflict with other RA values such as care for nature, human wellbeing, and learning. This conflict suggests a structural problem in the agricultural system, requiring systemic change. The second conflict arises between intergenerational and intragenerational justice. Practices that best serve future generations, such as planting food forests, can make regenerative food less accessible to lower-income groups today. This is a normative dilemma that calls for policy instruments to help farmers and society navigate it more fairly.
The values of RA do not exist in a vacuum. Using discourse analysis of agricultural policy documents and interviews with policymakers and a waterboard member, I examined how institutional and hydraulic conditions mediate this value landscape. At the institutional level, policy shares some values with RA, such as care for nature, collaboration, and intergenerational justice, but the full plural value landscape remains unrecognised. A one-size-fits-all policy logic burdens farmers, while a structural distance between policymakers and farmers means regenerative farmers almost never shape policy directly. Moreover, the findings suggest that the economic system, built around productivity and scale and influenced by Big Agro, is misaligned with the plural value landscape that regenerative farmers embody.
At the technological level, hydraulic infrastructure operates according to a technofix logic and centralised control, which can conflict with autonomy and soil care. As climate change intensifies pressure on the Delta's water system, these conflicts could grow. At the same time, the waterboard and regenerative farmers share an instrumental care for the soil, yet this shared value has not been translated into shared practice: the waterboard benefits from regenerative practices without a mechanism to compensate farmers for delivering these public goods.
This research contributes by conceptualising RA as a compound value, enabling the analysis of value conflicts and advancing social literature on RA within a delta context. Practically, it makes the plural value landscape of RA explicit, surfaces structural barriers, and identifies possible conflicts between hydraulic infrastructure and regenerative practice.
Five policy recommendations follow: recognise the plural value landscape anchored in soil care through a co-created working definition; recognise regenerative farmers as a marginalised group that creates broad public value; engage with value conflicts as barriers; relieve productivity pressure on farmers; and open a critical discussion on the technofix logic of hydraulic infrastructure and its compatibility with RA.
Through its findings and recommendations, this thesis takes a step towards the structural, procedural, and recognitional changes that a regenerative transition requires, helping the Netherlands and the Zuid-Hollandse Delta move towards a future-proof and climate-neutral agricultural system. ...
How is the value landscape, including internal conflicts, of regenerative agriculture in the Zuid-Hollandse Delta constituted, and how is this landscape mediated by technological and institutional conditions?
To explore this question, I examined what values are associated with RA in the Zuid-Hollandse Delta. A discourse analysis of practitioner and scientific texts revealed a broad and plural value landscape. Care for nature emerged as the most prominent value, alongside collective responsibility and knowledge values such as collaboration, learning, and innovation, and justice-oriented values such as intergenerational justice. Economic viability appeared as a recurring concern. Participatory observations at four farms and interviews with farmers contextualised these findings within the Zuid-Hollandse Delta. Each farm expressed the value landscape differently, shaped by the scale, worldview, and business model of the farmer. Despite these differences, two values were shared across all four farms: learning and care for the soil, which farmers consistently described as the core of their regenerative practice.
The values within this broad value landscape of RA, and the norms and practices they prescribe, can also conflict with each other. Two major value conflicts were identified. The first concerns economic viability: within the current agricultural system, financial survival often requires high productivity, which can conflict with other RA values such as care for nature, human wellbeing, and learning. This conflict suggests a structural problem in the agricultural system, requiring systemic change. The second conflict arises between intergenerational and intragenerational justice. Practices that best serve future generations, such as planting food forests, can make regenerative food less accessible to lower-income groups today. This is a normative dilemma that calls for policy instruments to help farmers and society navigate it more fairly.
The values of RA do not exist in a vacuum. Using discourse analysis of agricultural policy documents and interviews with policymakers and a waterboard member, I examined how institutional and hydraulic conditions mediate this value landscape. At the institutional level, policy shares some values with RA, such as care for nature, collaboration, and intergenerational justice, but the full plural value landscape remains unrecognised. A one-size-fits-all policy logic burdens farmers, while a structural distance between policymakers and farmers means regenerative farmers almost never shape policy directly. Moreover, the findings suggest that the economic system, built around productivity and scale and influenced by Big Agro, is misaligned with the plural value landscape that regenerative farmers embody.
At the technological level, hydraulic infrastructure operates according to a technofix logic and centralised control, which can conflict with autonomy and soil care. As climate change intensifies pressure on the Delta's water system, these conflicts could grow. At the same time, the waterboard and regenerative farmers share an instrumental care for the soil, yet this shared value has not been translated into shared practice: the waterboard benefits from regenerative practices without a mechanism to compensate farmers for delivering these public goods.
This research contributes by conceptualising RA as a compound value, enabling the analysis of value conflicts and advancing social literature on RA within a delta context. Practically, it makes the plural value landscape of RA explicit, surfaces structural barriers, and identifies possible conflicts between hydraulic infrastructure and regenerative practice.
Five policy recommendations follow: recognise the plural value landscape anchored in soil care through a co-created working definition; recognise regenerative farmers as a marginalised group that creates broad public value; engage with value conflicts as barriers; relieve productivity pressure on farmers; and open a critical discussion on the technofix logic of hydraulic infrastructure and its compatibility with RA.
Through its findings and recommendations, this thesis takes a step towards the structural, procedural, and recognitional changes that a regenerative transition requires, helping the Netherlands and the Zuid-Hollandse Delta move towards a future-proof and climate-neutral agricultural system. ...
Dutch agriculture is among the most productive in the world, but this comes at high social and environmental costs. The Zuid-Hollandse (ZH) Delta, home to the largest agricultural area in the Netherlands, is both a highly fertile and vulnerable landscape: low-lying, heavily dependent on hydraulic engineering, and increasingly exposed to the pressures of climate change. The region has set itself the ambition of transitioning towards a future-proof and climate-neutral food system, and regenerative agriculture (RA) offers a promising pathway for that transition. However, RA lacks institutional recognition in Dutch policy and social research on the topic is mostly absent. This thesis addresses that gap by examining RA in the Zuid-Hollandse Delta through a moral value lens. By conceptualising regenerative agriculture as a compound moral value with interacting sub-values, it asks:
How is the value landscape, including internal conflicts, of regenerative agriculture in the Zuid-Hollandse Delta constituted, and how is this landscape mediated by technological and institutional conditions?
To explore this question, I examined what values are associated with RA in the Zuid-Hollandse Delta. A discourse analysis of practitioner and scientific texts revealed a broad and plural value landscape. Care for nature emerged as the most prominent value, alongside collective responsibility and knowledge values such as collaboration, learning, and innovation, and justice-oriented values such as intergenerational justice. Economic viability appeared as a recurring concern. Participatory observations at four farms and interviews with farmers contextualised these findings within the Zuid-Hollandse Delta. Each farm expressed the value landscape differently, shaped by the scale, worldview, and business model of the farmer. Despite these differences, two values were shared across all four farms: learning and care for the soil, which farmers consistently described as the core of their regenerative practice.
The values within this broad value landscape of RA, and the norms and practices they prescribe, can also conflict with each other. Two major value conflicts were identified. The first concerns economic viability: within the current agricultural system, financial survival often requires high productivity, which can conflict with other RA values such as care for nature, human wellbeing, and learning. This conflict suggests a structural problem in the agricultural system, requiring systemic change. The second conflict arises between intergenerational and intragenerational justice. Practices that best serve future generations, such as planting food forests, can make regenerative food less accessible to lower-income groups today. This is a normative dilemma that calls for policy instruments to help farmers and society navigate it more fairly.
The values of RA do not exist in a vacuum. Using discourse analysis of agricultural policy documents and interviews with policymakers and a waterboard member, I examined how institutional and hydraulic conditions mediate this value landscape. At the institutional level, policy shares some values with RA, such as care for nature, collaboration, and intergenerational justice, but the full plural value landscape remains unrecognised. A one-size-fits-all policy logic burdens farmers, while a structural distance between policymakers and farmers means regenerative farmers almost never shape policy directly. Moreover, the findings suggest that the economic system, built around productivity and scale and influenced by Big Agro, is misaligned with the plural value landscape that regenerative farmers embody.
At the technological level, hydraulic infrastructure operates according to a technofix logic and centralised control, which can conflict with autonomy and soil care. As climate change intensifies pressure on the Delta's water system, these conflicts could grow. At the same time, the waterboard and regenerative farmers share an instrumental care for the soil, yet this shared value has not been translated into shared practice: the waterboard benefits from regenerative practices without a mechanism to compensate farmers for delivering these public goods.
This research contributes by conceptualising RA as a compound value, enabling the analysis of value conflicts and advancing social literature on RA within a delta context. Practically, it makes the plural value landscape of RA explicit, surfaces structural barriers, and identifies possible conflicts between hydraulic infrastructure and regenerative practice.
Five policy recommendations follow: recognise the plural value landscape anchored in soil care through a co-created working definition; recognise regenerative farmers as a marginalised group that creates broad public value; engage with value conflicts as barriers; relieve productivity pressure on farmers; and open a critical discussion on the technofix logic of hydraulic infrastructure and its compatibility with RA.
Through its findings and recommendations, this thesis takes a step towards the structural, procedural, and recognitional changes that a regenerative transition requires, helping the Netherlands and the Zuid-Hollandse Delta move towards a future-proof and climate-neutral agricultural system.
How is the value landscape, including internal conflicts, of regenerative agriculture in the Zuid-Hollandse Delta constituted, and how is this landscape mediated by technological and institutional conditions?
To explore this question, I examined what values are associated with RA in the Zuid-Hollandse Delta. A discourse analysis of practitioner and scientific texts revealed a broad and plural value landscape. Care for nature emerged as the most prominent value, alongside collective responsibility and knowledge values such as collaboration, learning, and innovation, and justice-oriented values such as intergenerational justice. Economic viability appeared as a recurring concern. Participatory observations at four farms and interviews with farmers contextualised these findings within the Zuid-Hollandse Delta. Each farm expressed the value landscape differently, shaped by the scale, worldview, and business model of the farmer. Despite these differences, two values were shared across all four farms: learning and care for the soil, which farmers consistently described as the core of their regenerative practice.
The values within this broad value landscape of RA, and the norms and practices they prescribe, can also conflict with each other. Two major value conflicts were identified. The first concerns economic viability: within the current agricultural system, financial survival often requires high productivity, which can conflict with other RA values such as care for nature, human wellbeing, and learning. This conflict suggests a structural problem in the agricultural system, requiring systemic change. The second conflict arises between intergenerational and intragenerational justice. Practices that best serve future generations, such as planting food forests, can make regenerative food less accessible to lower-income groups today. This is a normative dilemma that calls for policy instruments to help farmers and society navigate it more fairly.
The values of RA do not exist in a vacuum. Using discourse analysis of agricultural policy documents and interviews with policymakers and a waterboard member, I examined how institutional and hydraulic conditions mediate this value landscape. At the institutional level, policy shares some values with RA, such as care for nature, collaboration, and intergenerational justice, but the full plural value landscape remains unrecognised. A one-size-fits-all policy logic burdens farmers, while a structural distance between policymakers and farmers means regenerative farmers almost never shape policy directly. Moreover, the findings suggest that the economic system, built around productivity and scale and influenced by Big Agro, is misaligned with the plural value landscape that regenerative farmers embody.
At the technological level, hydraulic infrastructure operates according to a technofix logic and centralised control, which can conflict with autonomy and soil care. As climate change intensifies pressure on the Delta's water system, these conflicts could grow. At the same time, the waterboard and regenerative farmers share an instrumental care for the soil, yet this shared value has not been translated into shared practice: the waterboard benefits from regenerative practices without a mechanism to compensate farmers for delivering these public goods.
This research contributes by conceptualising RA as a compound value, enabling the analysis of value conflicts and advancing social literature on RA within a delta context. Practically, it makes the plural value landscape of RA explicit, surfaces structural barriers, and identifies possible conflicts between hydraulic infrastructure and regenerative practice.
Five policy recommendations follow: recognise the plural value landscape anchored in soil care through a co-created working definition; recognise regenerative farmers as a marginalised group that creates broad public value; engage with value conflicts as barriers; relieve productivity pressure on farmers; and open a critical discussion on the technofix logic of hydraulic infrastructure and its compatibility with RA.
Through its findings and recommendations, this thesis takes a step towards the structural, procedural, and recognitional changes that a regenerative transition requires, helping the Netherlands and the Zuid-Hollandse Delta move towards a future-proof and climate-neutral agricultural system.