Regenerative Agriculture Meets Personal Finance | Eddy Garcia & Sam Schiebold

Share This Episode!
.

Today’s episode features the most resourceful guests ever, Eddy Garcia & Sam Schiebold from Living Earth Systems.

Eddy and Sam bring a wealth of information on how to re-think how we feed ourselves.

From living on the land to growing tonnage of produce and feeding 20 people from a tiny parking lot.

They are on a mission to inspire and educate the world on how to properly grow and sustain food through plagiarizing nature.

Listen, learn, and let us know what you think about Eddy and Sam’s awesome cause.

Episode Summary

Eddy & Sams’s Background

  • Eddy talks about living off the land as a kid in Hawaii on fish and coconuts
  • An experience that many would pay hundreds of dollars for
  • That reshaped Eddy’s thoughts on wealth
  • He realized he could acquire more or desire less
  • At a young age, he also realized giving was really important to him
  • He never stayed at home and skipped school for surfing
  • Sam went a more traditional route
  • This included a Physics degree from a top-10 university
  • She quickly realized that her degree didn’t mean much to her
  • Sam ended up finding her way to Hawaii and got into a concept of permaculture

Permaculture vs Regenerative Farming

  • Permaculture is the idea of making a sustainable food source much like a forest
  • Eddy & Sam practice something different than Permaculture called Regenerative Farming
  • Eddy gives a history lessons on these methods that stem back from the 70s
  • He says he just tries his best to just copy nature
  • This means not bringing in plastics and artificial fertilizers
  • It also means a lot less human interaction
  • Patagonia recently released a regenerative farming certificate

Starting Your Own Crop

  • Eddy calls out a potato as a great starter
  • These grow in warm or cold climates with little effort
  • Another option is radishes
  • Seed to radish is only a 25-day process
  • He also recommends different types of greens
  • Eddy also says you can grow a lot of things from organic vegetables

Teaching & Empowering

  • Eddy and Sam are producing courses and videos on growing
  • These tackle anything from composting to urban farming
  • Also helping others overcome a fear of not having a “green thumb”
  • These are all around a closed-loop methodology
  • This means not bringing in or taking out materials
  • That means growing is way cheaper
  • We also cover how this could work for busy professionals
  • They also teach classes and make films on-site in Hawaii
  • This is done on a 170-acre farm in Maui
  • They also have tours and farm to table dinners
  • Eddy and Sam are also actively bringing a portion of Maui back from being a  trash dump.
  • Finally, there’s also an intern program!

 

Key Takeaways

  1. Acquire more or desire less: Eddy talks about rethinking how we look at money and how nature plays a huge part in that.
  2. Less with more: It’s amazing what Eddy is able to grow in such tiny areas, some as small as an eighth of an acre

Call to Action

Try to grow something. Potatoes, radishes, or an aquaponic system. If you really aren’t ready, then find some sustainable sources of food for your next grocery run.

Join the Community

We’d love to hear your comments and questions about this week’s episode. Here are some of the best ways to stay in touch and get involved in The FI Show community!

  1. Sign up for our exclusive newsletter
  2. Join our Facebook Group
  3. Leave us a voicemail
  4. Send an email to contact [at] TheFIshow [dot] com

If you like what you hear, please leave a rating/review!

The FI show on iTunes

The FI show on Android

Check out our Partners

Personal Capital LogoWe are completely obsessed with tracking our net worth to understand our current financial positions (you should be too). Instead of spending dozens of hours adding up all our assets and subtracting our debts, we use a free service called Personal Capital.

This free, easy-to-use portfolio management tool aggregates all of your financial data and helps to track your spending, net worth, and investment accounts. Keeping track of your money has never been easier. With 1.6 million users and growing, this platform is becoming a leader in its industry. We have both been using Personal Capital for years and highly recommend it. Sign up for your free account here!

 

Eddy & Sam’s Information

Living Earth Systems Website – http://livingearthsystems.com/
Regenerative Education Centers Nonprofit website – https://www.recenters.org/
Malama Ka’aina (short film) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpiWxz9yQpc
The Carbon Story (short film) – https://www.recenters.org/carbon
How to Build a Cubic Yard of Soil (online course) – https://courses.livingearthsystems.com/living-soil

Learn More About Your Hosts

Fly to FI (Cody’s Blog)

Saving-Sherpa (Justin’s blog)