“We have disconnected ourselves from nature, thinking that we are the intelligent ones. But we are just part of an intelligent system."
— Ernst Götsch, Syntropic Farming Pioneer
When Karen De Vries left South Africa, farming was the last thing on her mind. Today, she’s leading a movement in syntropic farming at La Loma Viva, southern Spain — transforming 15 hectares of degraded land into a flourishing food forest oasis.
In this interview, Karen shares her unexpected journey and how syntropic farming is set to reshape landscapes — including in her homeland, where she’ll be facilitating a groundbreaking workshop this September.
Discover her inspiring story of reconnection with the land, alongside nature's deep capacity to regenerate.
Interview with Karen de Vries, Co-Founder, La Loma Viva
Mia Brown (Be The Earth Foundation):
You're originally from South Africa, but moved to Granada in 2009 to pursue your dream to live off the land. Were you involved in farming before?
Karen de Vries (La Loma Viva):
Not at all! If you'd told me when I was younger that I'd be a farmer in Spain...I would've died laughing.
I studied psychology, then anthropology, then went travelling for a year. In Hawaii, I met some people who told me I need to do this permaculture course — that it would change my life.
They said, if you're an anthropologist, instead of just studying people, you could actually help them — learning to harvest rainwater, grow food, build shelters.
I thought, oh this does sound interesting...
When I got back to London, I talked to my old boss about experimenting with permaculture. I was so excited by it. He happened to own a farm in Spain and got excited too. “Why don't we see if it works?” he said.
My partner and I went to the farm for the summer, thinking we'd just grow a few crops. Then we saw all the olives and almonds ripening and thought, why not make some olive oil and sell almonds..?
By the end of the year, the farm owner said, "This is quite fun, isn't it? Shall we keep going?!" What was supposed to be one summer turned into 15 years!
MB:
How would you describe syntropic farming?
KV:
Syntropic farming is the world's most regenerative type of farming. Other methods, like agroecological or organic might use fertilisers or manure. Syntropic farming uses very little inputs — and instead works with natural processes. It looks at how nature regenerates itself and reproduces those processes to grow food and simultaneously regenerate soils and ecosystems.
For example, if you take a plot of land and just leave it, after a while you'd see weeds coming through, then different plants colonising. If you left it long enough, weeds would give way to woody perennial plants and eventually, trees would grow. That's called ecological succession. It's how plants naturally colonise an area — making it better and better.
In the old days we used to leave fields fallow. That was the prime agricultural technique for gaining fertility.
In syntropic farming, we harness this process of ecological succession. But instead of leaving land fallow, we actively recreate the natural processes that would develop in that area. Fast-tracking and mimicking what nature would do.
We plant loads of vegetation. The more plants in the ground; the more photosynthesis occurs; the more the soil is fed. You can't have regeneration without plants. Photosynthesis is key.
We also use a lot of what we call ‘selective pruning' — cutting back the plants and putting that biomass onto the ground, adding even more organic matter.
In life, we have entropic forces and syntropic forces. Entropic forces — entropy — are where energy is winding down, becoming less complex, fewer relationships. Syntropic forces are building life, relationships, and connections. Building energy into the system. Photosynthesis is the main syntropic force that we use.
It sounds complex — in practice, it's simply learning to work with nature and not against it.
MB:
What are you're currently growing at La Loma Viva?
KV:
Your typical Mediterranean array — olives, almonds, walnuts, pomegranates, citrus and other fruit trees.
We also work with a lot of support species. Plants that we prune to put organic matter back on the ground for more productive soil. For this, we use hardy, drought tolerant species, local aromatics like rosemary and lavender — these grow really easily here without irrigation.
MB:
Does your land require less water than surrounding areas because of the syntropic method?
KV:
That's right. A lot of the farmland around us has been abandoned because of the water issue. People who are still farming use a tonne of irrigation, growing lots of exotic trees — mangoes and avocados — depleting aquifers. La Loma is becoming more and more an oasis of green in a sea of dry land. It's more resistant and resilient for sure.
Biodiversity has increased so much as well. When we started experimenting with syntropic farming, we didn't realise one of the biggest joys would be all the birds returning. We see lots of wildlife — it's incredible.
MB:
Wow — a similar story to the Knepp Estate in the UK. All these species we thought extinct...now flocking there!
KV:
Yeah, I'd love to visit Knepp one day.
MB:
What's the most inspiring thing you've seen at La Loma Viva?
KV:
One really inspiring thing happened last year. We'd had a bad drought for 3 years and could hardly water anything in the syntropic areas. We thought we'd lose everything.
But weirdly, our plants were super resilient. We couldn't believe it. They were all giving shade to each other, growing together.
Then, in the following spring, we began to reset one area and dig the soil. After just 5 years, we could see how much browner and richer it had become. We couldn't believe that this was happening in the midst of a terrible drought event!
MB:
Incredible. A whole different story underground…
KV:
It was really inspiring.
The syntropic method transforms the way you look at nature.
Most people will say that plants are always competing — for water, nutrients, sunlight — but Ernst Götsch, our teacher, proposes that plants collaborate more than they compete. They share nutrients, they share water, they really help each other out. There is now lots of scientific evidence to prove this.
It changes your whole perspective.
Have you seen Life in Syntropy?
MB:
I haven't…
KV:
It’s a fantastic 15-minute documentary some colleagues made for COP21 — introducing syntropic farming to the public sphere. We saw it and were so inspired.
Then literally a week after watching it, a friend called saying that Ernst Götsch, the father of syntropic farming, was coming to Spain and they thought that our farm could be a good venue. We couldn't believe we were going to meet him!
MB:
Gosh — how serendipitous!
KV:
It's been an amazing journey. Syntropic farming has taken us to the next level of inspiration, understanding that life and nature are working syntropically, creating conditions for more and more life.
I'm so excited to be doing our workshop in South Africa — the first of its kind there. The landscape is similar to the Mediterranean, but with more rain and less degraded land. It gives us a much better canvas to work with.
We think the vegetation is going to explode there!
Join us for the first official Syntropic Agriculture course in South Africa, Boschendal — by Be The Earth Foundation & La Loma Viva, 13-17th September.