I’m excited to introduce you to Sean Bremner. Sean reached out to me a some months ago via email and we have been conversing about different topics relating to vermicomposting and sustainable agriculture. I've invited Sean to write a few blog posts here relating to these conversations because they have personally been very enlightening and I think you'll find the same. Ideally, they can help get conversations about sustainable agriculture and biological amendments moving in the right direction.
Before we get there, I hope this brief interview with Sean gives you background to both his personal experience and motivations. From talking with Sean I’ve found we share many of the same values including the importance of education and open access to information to solve large problems.
Zack: Hi Sean, thanks for agreeing to answer a few questions. Can you start us off with a little bit of background about yourself and what you're currently up to.
Sean: Hi Zack, thanks for having me here! I grew up on farms around inland KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, and developed a deep passion for nature, especially plants and soil ecosystems. Growing up and living in South Africa, you’re exposed to incredible economic disparity, and a lot of it is intrinsically tied together with food insecurity, which is also one of the most pressing concerns in much of Africa. At some point along the way, I realised that I would love to be a part of the solution of addressing food security throughout Sub-Saharan Africa in the most sustainable way possible and based on the best available evidence. So almost 10 years ago I set out to learn as much about sustainable agriculture as I could, including weeding out the misinformation (there’s a lot) and focusing on the solutions that are proven to work.
At the moment, I’m in the middle of a long travel stint throughout Southern and Eastern Africa that involves working on and volunteering on various projects, farms, and homesteads.
Left: Location of KwaZulu-Natal, SA Right: Howick Falls located in KwaZulu-Natal, SA
Zack: I understand you have vermicomposting worms that you travel around with you. How did this come about and more generally how did you become interested in vermicomposting?
Sean: I have a 30 litre plastic bin that I started a few years ago with a handful of red wigglers, and I’ve taken it with me all over the place. This came about partly because I didn’t have the heart to leave them behind, haha, but also as a part of a long experiment to take a small bin into different environments and climates, use only local organic matter as feedstock, and see how the worms fared. And also a way to teach myself how to care for worms and ensure that they thrive no matter where in the world I find myself.
I’ve been fascinated with earthworms since I was a child, and when I began to learn about sustainable agriculture and Permaculture, vermicomposting was among the most popular soil amendments around - so pretty much a match made in heaven. Since then I've become an unrelenting advocate for vermicomposting both at home and at a farm scale.
From left to right: 1)Deep vermicompost trench system. 2) Walking windrow raised bed with E. fetida. 3) Vermi-nursey system 1m x 1m
Zack: Can you share more of your experience with Permaculture and more broadly your experience with agriculture?
Sean: Permaculture has long been closely associated with sustainable agriculture, and it seems natural for many to gravitate toward Permaculture and similar design and nature-focused philosophies when it comes to agriculture. I began practising Permaculture methods a few years ago and would ultimately get my design certificate last year along with helping manage a large and well-established Permaculture farm for a year.
Starting top left and going clockwise: 1) Permaculture bed 2) Permaculture agroforest 3) Perennial agroforest 4) Agroforestry surrounded by vetiver grass 5) Deep mulch bed with heirloom corn 6) New deep mulch bed
I've also visited, worked at, and volunteered at a number of farms, homesteads, and projects over the years to learn more about how different people implement Permaculture and other types of agriculture. It’s a really interesting and dynamic world, and there’s always something new to learn about, but in recent months I’ve been drawn more toward agriculture as a whole rather than focusing on a single movement.
Zack: We share a lot of interests and hobbies around technology, data privacy, the open source/access movements. Can you tell us where your interest in technology comes from? These interests are seemingly quite different from agriculture and composting or are they more similar than it seems?
Sean: I’ve had an interest in technology since I was very young - having access to ideas, limitless knowledge, and novel concepts has always been extremely appealing for me, and technology facilitates that like nothing else. Among the most interesting notions in software is the Free and Open Source Software movement - to simplify this quite a lot, it’s about putting your creations and knowledge into the public commons for everyone to access, often without a price tag attached. It’s about freely and openly sharing information for the betterment of everyone, regardless of their income level, and it goes hand-in-hand with the open access ideals within scientific literature. For me, this is a philosophy that should extend to more areas in society as a whole, especially agriculture, where those suffering with food insecurity may benefit significantly from knowledge that could help them grow food for themselves as well as earn an income.
Zack: What do you think are the biggest opportunities in agriculture right now? Do you have a general vision of what agriculture as a whole should look like?
Sean: I think urban agriculture is going to be a fairly big market in the future: people would benefit greatly by being able to grow or source specific types of food on a more local level, such as fresh greens, which tend to be more expensive to buy than to grow compared to most other produce. Organic and regenerative agriculture are also making big strides for sure, but until they can offer similar pricing for consumers, I don't see either of them upending conventional farming as it stands right now.
The big problem with agriculture, at least as I see it, is that it's extremely polarised, similarly to many other aspects of society. We're too quick to demonise and write off one movement and too eager to put another on a pedestal. Ideally, we should take the best of each and use them to meet the needs of our growing population. For instance, the tillage practices of regenerative agriculture combined with the mechanisation and efficiency of conventional farming alongside biofertilizers and cover cropping. Conventional farming already produces enough food to comfortably feed ~16 billion people, so now it’s mostly about making sure that it's done as sustainably as possible but also that we address the logistics of where all those calories are actually going. [hybrid ag picture?]
Zack: Who do you think people should be listening to more or who deserves a louder voice in the agricultural space?
Sean: There are a lot of voices in the agricultural space, some louder than others, and I think it’s better to seek out those that are quietly working in the background to make the world better and providing more balanced perspectives according to the data. Agronomists, extension specialists, and agricultural professors usually offer the best, well-rounded information available. One person that I really enjoy the work of is James Wong, an ethnobotanist based in London; he’s really good at taking horticultural and agricultural myths and either finding the truth behind them or debunking them completely.
Zack: What is the biggest success humanity has had in the last 50 years and what is the biggest challenge you see facing the world in the next 50 years?
Sean: Despite what we read on the news, I think that the human race has made tremendous progress in the last 50 years, where the vast majority of people have been uplifted in one way or another. We’re solving world hunger, we’re closing the income gap for many parts of the world, poverty is being eradicated, and we’re also being kinder to the environment in a lot of ways. For instance, deforestation is at an all-time low, and it’s a trend that will likely continue as stricter conservation laws are put into place and enforced, and it’s also worth keeping in mind that we’re in the middle of a once-in-a-generation energy shift as we move toward renewables.
In terms of the biggest challenges we’re facing, it’s difficult to say. At one point I thought that climate change would be the biggest issue we’d face as a species. And although climate change is undeniably important and must be addressed, it’s not quite the most pressing concern we have right now. Things like rogue artificial intelligence, bioweapons, and nuclear war are much greater threats to society in the nearer future. Thankfully, there are a lot of really smart people working on these issues, so I'm quite hopeful for the future.
Zack: Do you have any social media or contact information you would like to share? Do you offer any ag consulting?
Sean: At the moment I’m currently looking to start up a sustainable agricultural NGO that will provide a range of different private services while also working within Africa, and will make social media channels available once it’s up and running. In terms of agricultural consulting, I do offer services for small to medium-scale farms.
My contact details are:
Phone number: +2772 862 0920
Email: sean.king.brem@gmail.com
Zack: Thanks Sean! Really looking forward to reading your up coming posts. Please keep us updated on your NGO progress. If anyone has any questions or comments for Sean please comment below or reach out directly!
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