Leading a panel on scaling regenerative agriculture in Asia, Beverly Postma, executive director of Grow Asia, said that Asia’s agriculture and forestry sector supported more than 100 million rural small businesses, making it the region’s engine room for growth
These small and medium-sized enterprises are critical not only for local livelihoods but also for national GDP, highlighting the scale of both the economic opportunity and the social impact of empowering farmers across Asia.
The key to unlocking this potential lies in encouraging the widespread adoption of regenerative agricultural practices.
“The transition to a more regenerative and sustainable ecosystem will play a crucial role in securing Asia’s food security, protecting nature, enhancing transboundary resilience against climate risks, and – most importantly – improving the livelihoods of rural businesses, particularly for women and young people,” said Postma.
“These businesses are the engine of growth for the region, with agriculture and food contributing significantly to GDP in most Asian countries. To empower this engine of growth, we must first empower the farmers at its heart.”
Supporting farming communities
In South East Asia, food company Thai Wah has experienced the impact of soil health on yields.
“Just imagine: three years ago, within Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam, you were getting about 60 million tonnes of tapioca output. This year it’s roughly around 15 million tonnes, and next year we’re expecting about 45 million tonnes. While the need to feed the world has increased, the supply of tapioca, which is a carbohydrate source, has decreased. And that has become a burning problem for all of us,” said Hataikan Kamolsirisakul, head of strategy sustainability and new business group, Thai Wah.
She highlighted a Thai government simulation predicting that by 2030, around 20% of the country’s soil could degrade to desert-like conditions, putting the 12 provinces that produce 60% of tapioca at risk.
“That is a real wake-up call for all of us,” said Kamolsirisakul.
Working hand in hand with farmers has become central to the company’s strategy, a model it says is now delivering tangible results.
“The model that we’ve been building in terms of working with the farmers and the farming community, trying to support the farmers, help improve the yield, using the waste byproducts from our factory to increase the organic matter in the soil. I think that model has now been proven, and we are getting traction, and farmers are seeing the benefit of it,” said Kamolsirisakul.
“It’s not only the farmers who see the benefit at the ground level, but it’s also other tapioca factories… they are now seeing that they cannot solely rely on chemicals, cannot solely rely on the normal farming practices, but they also have to sort of jump in and support their own farming communities as well.”
Strengthening the family
Global confectionery major Mars Wrigley has also channelled resources and expertise to drive and accelerate the transition towards more sustainable practices.
Fay Choo, Asia cocoa director at Mars Wrigley, said the firm emphasises trust-building and farmer-to-farmer learning to contribute to a modern, inclusive, and sustainable cocoa ecosystem.
The company invests in modern planting technologies, improved genetic material, and research in Indonesia to boost productivity, while scaling knowledge through a network of trained village “agripreneurs”.
Choo highlighted critical role of women in agriculture, emphasising their underrepresentation and the need for equal voices.
“In the Mars cocoa supply chain, we work across 800 villages. And in these, we would identify the women and youth in particularly and train them on these higher productivity systems. Why the inclusion of women and youth in particular? We have seen through our [Mars] Cocoa Academy networks that when we invest in women and youth, the returns are much, much greater in terms of technology diffusion and adoption in these villages. Clearly, there’s a case for businesses to invest more in that front.”
