295 Mateusz Ciasnocha and Maria Virginia Solis Wahnish – From EU Soil Mission to Pope Francis, how to change local and state agriculture and food policies

A conversation with Maria Virginia Solis Wahnish and Mateusz Ciasnocha, both involved in the Farm of Francesco. Maria Virginia is founder of Drink Matera, while Mateusz is the CEO of European Carbon Farmers and member of the EU Soil Mission board. We discuss why it is so important to connect with policymakers and how to actually do that, the importance of farmers' education and a very detailed answer to the 1 billion euro question to enable many more people to get involved in farming. And what has Pope Francis to do with all of this?

How connecting with those who shape our policies can start with a simple visit to a local farm? We delve into the power of personal actions to instigate systemic change, encouraging policymakers to experience the daily life of farmers, paving the way for more grounded and beneficial agricultural policies. The episode culminates with an exploration of the symbiotic relationships between farmers, policymakers, and investors and the transformation of communities through a billion-dollar vision that places technology, collaboration, and human ingenuity at its heart.

This podcast is part of the AI 4 Soil Health project which aims to help farmers and policy makers by providing new tools powered by AI to monitor and predict soil health across Europe. For more information visit ai4soilhealth.eu.

Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or European Research Executive Agency. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.

This work has received funding from UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) under the UK government’s Horizon Europe funding guarantee [grant numbers 10053484, 1005216, 1006329].

This work has received funding from the Swiss State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI).

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The above references an opinion and is for information and educational purposes only. It is not intended to be investment advice. Seek a duly licensed professional for investment advice.

https://foodhub.nl/en/opleidingen/your-path-forward-in-regenerative-food-and-agriculture/

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:19

A packed conversation with two farmers and entrepreneurs who are not only very involved in the regenerative transition, but especially connect outside their bubbles. We discuss why it's so important to connect to policymakers and how to actually practically do that, the importance of farmer education, plus a very detailed answer on the 1 billion euro question to enable way more people getting involved in farming. And what has Pope Francis to do with all of this? This is the Investing in Regenerative Agriculture and Food podcast investing as if the planet mattered, where we talk to the pioneers in the regenerative food and agriculture space to learn more on how to put our money to work to regenerate soil, people, local communities and ecosystems, while making an appropriate and fair return.

Speaker 1: 1:09

Why my focus on soil and regeneration? Because so many of the pressing issues we face today have their roots in how we treat our land and our sea, grow our food, what we eat, wear and consume, and it's time that we, as investors big and small and consumers, start paying much more attention to the dirt slash soil underneath our feet. This podcast is part of the AI for Soil Health project, which aims to help farmers and policymakers by providing new tools powered by AI to monitor and predict soil health across Europe. For more information, visit ai4soilhealtheu or find the link below. Welcome to another episode today with two farmers and entrepreneurs who are putting soil first through the farmer, francesco, and the European Carbon Farmers and the EU soil mission. Welcome, maria, virginia and Mateus.

Speaker 2: 2:15

Hello Cohen, how are you?

Speaker 3: 2:18

Hi, everyone, very, very happy to be here. Thank you for the invitation.

Speaker 1: 2:23

Thank you very much. I'm very much looking forward to we have a full house, which is always nice, and always a bit of a ping pong, which is which is great. But I want to start with you, marie virginia, and to ask, because I know you have a fascinating background, but how did you end up spending most of your time working on soil, most of your awake hours, let's say, focusing on on soil and farming? What led you to that path and that journey?

Speaker 2: 2:49

I think it's a long story but, to put it in context, I am Argentinian and Argentina is a very big land and most of our activity for the country and what we really grow up listening and seeing it is soil, it is agriculture.

Speaker 2: 3:09

And growing up I studied business, so it's another branch, but my family, my father, converted from being a civil engineer into farming a civil engineer into farming so that is how I started getting a closer connection with agriculture, with soil, and connected that with business, which really led me to start discovering how soil is actually super connected with the business sector and with the social world and with the social world. That is something that I am really passionate about and I really feel my call to do a positive social impact in Argentina and in the world. And I discovered with the path that actually studying business and my family working in agriculture it was really connected with creating the social impact. So that is how I turned into all of these spaces and right now I'm really connected with working on the soil, working with agriculture and doing a lot of initiatives to building bridges between these different sectors agriculture, the social and the economic sector.

Speaker 1: 4:24

And just to double click on that. Or to dig a bit deeper, like when you studied business sectors agriculture, the social and the economic sector and just to double click on that. Or to dig a bit deeper, like when you study business, how? I mean, let's say, many business schools, soil is not a huge part of the business. Let's say literature. How did you get exposed to that? Or did you have to force that into it? Bring it into like how, because you mentioned it like it's a normal thing to get very exposed to soil and regeneration, etc. It just doesn't sound so normal. How did that happen?

Speaker 2: 4:54

Actually it's a really interesting question because until I did my master abroad I didn't know it was not that common to link business with agriculture and the funny part or the thing that we study when we are in business school.

Speaker 2: 5:09

I did very normal like business administration, nothing with a very specific specialization in agriculture, but as part of the content of our subjects we see agriculture because, again, argentina lives thanks to the farmers, the agriculture sector.

Speaker 2: 5:28

So, for example, in my financial market subject, when we were learning about like futures and options and all this finance work, we would learn these but specifically apply to agriculture, to like crops, so to the futures for corn or soya bean, and we would go and see how the market is moving on that, on that aspect. So for me was really really that really connected to to all of that, to then when, when learning about I don't know how to do business plans or do things like that, we would learn how to see the amortization of a lot of land, for example. So for me, going back to my studies and kind of closing my eyes and imagining that it was something that I really learned from the beginning and I thought it was really really natural in Argentina we really connect agriculture and the farming sector with business. For us, it's not only a farmer is a farmer, but actually a farmer is and it's fully an entrepreneur.

Speaker 1: 6:39

It's a business person and and how important or significant was soil health at that point? Like how? Because I I see the farming is a business and and thus you're studying that in business school, um, but I also know, or as to see often, that soil health maybe only recently started to become an important driver in economic returns, or at least a discussion point, or degrading soil health becoming a risk in terms of business. Um, and I don't know how leading, let's say, argentina or the business school you went to is, but how, what was soil health something you, you studied or discussed as a, as an important piece of the business, or or not?

Speaker 2: 7:18

yet when I was studying but actually I was sharing at the beginning of this story that I studied business and then I connected with my family and the social work and then I happened to meet Mateusz that is in this today with us. I started introducing in my brain or in my scope, the concepts of soil health and when I dive into that and I learn more of the practices, going back to my family home and like talking with my sister who is an agronomist, I was sharing all these practices with her and getting more into the details of the soil and the planning and all of that. And I was realizing that all of that that I was putting a name to in Argentina is really done for like many, many years.

Speaker 2: 8:13

The concept of regenerative agriculture is not something super popular in Argentina, but when you go to the details or the principles of regenerative agriculture, one of the big ones is no-till.

Speaker 2: 8:28

That in Argentina that has been done for many, many years. The farmers, my sister as an agronomist, she learned in the university only how to farm with the no-till principle, only how to farm with the no-till principle. So for us in Argentina, that concept that we don't know, that is a principle of soil health. It's really present in the practical world and when you talk to a farmer or when you talk to an agronomist, they would say like of course we are doing that like that, but not only because that is good for the soil, but because that is bringing more profits to our business. So there you can see how actually soil health as such is not only good for the soil and the environment, but it's also good for getting a positive economic impact and better profits in the long run. So that is my story. I discovered the concept of soil health and then I realized that actually what I was experiencing was the concept being actually there and very present in my home.

Speaker 1: 9:44

And is it getting more complex now? I think no-till is a great entry, um, but also and north america is an example where they're starting to catch up in many ways. But then the question is, how do you go beyond that and how do you um get out of a lot of the chemicals used in a lot of no-till systems, either the no-till organic or whatever direction you want to go to like? Do you see, like argentina also leading the way, and then we'll get to you, to mateos, but we're going in argentina, deep dive now, um leading the way or having a good platform to go to the next levels almost of complexity when it comes to to soil health, or is it holding it back a bit because it's so advanced in certain things?

Speaker 2: 10:26

No, I think that we need to keep learning and there is a lot of things to grow in the space like this that you were saying of chemicals, or like protection on the crops. I think there is a lot of things to grow there. What happens and what we always like to say with Mateusz is that it is always important to understand the context. It is always important to put the farmer at the center and to understand from that ecosystem that the farmer is in, what is the best path to keep growing in this soil, health and benefits for the ecosystem. So I do think that Argentina and farmers have a lot of things to keep growing and learning. And something that I see very, very common in Europe, like the presence of trees in the crops, because in Argentina we have been doing a lot of no-till, but because there is a very big piece of land, sometimes you would not see like a huge population of trees, so probably there is some space to grow on that side.

Speaker 2: 11:39

So, definitely, like I do think, like, yes, we are advancing the no-till system, but there are other things that we can keep learning and seeing the experience from other countries. What we do have as well is the political challenge and the economic challenge that you may know, and everyone that is listening to me right now may know about Argentina to me right now may know about Argentina. But again, I think that soil health is part of a positive economic impact and a positive impact on the soil and we cannot forget about that. Because I'm going to be very transparent here it is important to put the focus on soil, soil health, but then if you have a farmer that cannot make it to the end of the month, so then the person can cast a more challenging discernment to make when it comes to some decisions. So I I do see it more integral and holistic, and definitely they are. There is a space to grow always yeah, yeah, no.

Speaker 1: 12:43

I think there are many stories of farmers that have been forced into the transition because they couldn't afford the inputs anymore, which is not something you wish to anybody, but it is the story of many and others. Yeah, if you're making a good return or a good income in the current system, why would you change? Only the most innovative and the most, let's say, flexible or the most inventors of farmers are starting to push. If they're comfortable in the current system, why would you change? But many are, unfortunately, because of prices and systems we created are forced to either stop or change because it's just not profitable anymore. So let's switch to Mateusz and welcome him here. We heard him at the beginning with a sentence or two, but now the chance to dig a bit deeper. What led you to going deep I would say very deep in the world of soil health, regeneration and what you're doing now?

Speaker 3: 13:40

Thank you, kun. And even though I'm from outside or on the other side of the world to Maria Virginia, a lot of I would say the principles of my story are very similar. So I'm a farmer and I've been born into a farming family. So back then in the 90s, when I've been growing up, there were and some of them still remain a lot of stereotypes about farmers and farming and all of that. Regenerative agriculture was not the thing at all, and all of the farmers that we knew were around us, and also our farm as well, were not regenerative at all. We've been focused on production, and technology and machines were the names of the game, as they are for many farms still in our region. So you have the narrative of production, not profitability, and not of stewardship, but of productivity once again. So my story starts with that. We've been born into that family farm. That was, on average, in comparison with the reality that we are in, very innovative Following, first and foremost providing for the family, so securing the livelihood.

Speaker 3: 14:59

And then a huge opportunity opened up in 2004. Polish entry, together with many other now member states of the European Union, to the European Union, and we've been bounded by as well as had the opportunity or resource in the common agriculture policy. And back then my dad started thinking critically, as he always is, about some small and big decisions, about, hey, what is the new reality that we are in? And he did many analyses of many sorts, including talking with people, listening, doing scenarios and so on, but ultimately he took a small piece of paper and he did the numbers and projected them in the future. So he was like, hey, this is how much we are producing, this is how much we can get, how much income we can get from the production, and how that will be changing. Those are our input costs and how those are likely to be changing versus a different reality that we could have transitioned into. Versus a different reality that we could have transitioned into thanks to the Common Agricultural Policy of the European Union, which we would not be able to do otherwise.

Speaker 3: 16:08

This transition of changing our way of operation a little bit to significant, but not to a huge, drastic account, which was not planting four crops as we did for liquidity reasons. You basically have to pay off the debt that you took for the production season, either a loan from a bank or an unspoken loan from an input provider and then you have to pay it off with the commodities that you've produced and then you basically continue the same cycle because you cannot get out of it. In 2004, we had an opportunity of getting subsidies or direct payments and then, of course, the variable was okay, do we get a basic payment or do we do more for environmental purposes? And then that payment increases and my dad ran scenarios with that, including on input sites, and we basically made what was back at the time very, very brave decision to transition the full farm back at the time, approximately 200 hectares. Right now we are farming 700 hectares into this mode of operation. So cover crop in the fall, we wait through the winter. We sell the crops when we think the commodities that we've produced, when we think the price is good and we are satisfied with it, we buy inputs. When we also think the price is good, we pay with our own money, not with the credit, so it's automatically cheaper there.

Speaker 3: 17:40

And, long story short, using financial language, you move from negative cash flow to positive cash flow, critical, most important change that we have done as a business ever, and that is the basis of everything that followed, including similarly to Maria's case being able to go out from this family business for a while in order to study and have resources as a family to be able to enable us both Maria and me, those opportunities and then be connected with the businesses who have been doing that, return to the business to transform it or continue transforming it and do other things on the side, or now, not on the side, but as main activities in terms of time commitment European Carbon Farmers and Farmer Francesco, two businesses that we run Farmer Francesco and I run as European Carbon Farmers and then some board commitments, mainly with EU soil health mission or EU soil mission I'm adding health kind of automatically because that's how I like to think about it and Cool Farm Alliance, which I am also on the supervisory board of and it's worth to keep in mind, and then the soil part.

Speaker 3: 18:53

I'm finishing. There is the best common narration to connect different areas, topics, sometimes challenges, into a conversation that is not attention-oriented or has natural tension in it. But if you talk about soil health and if you approach things from soil health perspective, even national security, as we do in our work, from that perspective, you can start and finish in a way that you are not getting into conflict with anyone and it's not either or but. It is this and this and this and this. It's about resilience, ultimately Done at the farmer level, very importantly, as Maria said, in a profitable way throughout. That's obvious and I don't think we'll talk about that anymore or I don't want to stress this out, but the profitability part and the business part and being an entrepreneur and so on is absolutely critical for all of that.

Speaker 1: 20:03

And if we would take a walk now and with you on the farm since 2004, 20 years have passed what would you see now? You mentioned continue to transition. Just to make it visually what you said we farm almost 700 hectares. Just to give an understanding, give an idea of what you are currently I'm using, the more general you are farming and what you have been doing. What are you excited about in terms of practices focused on soil health, as that's the central theme?

Speaker 3: 20:36

Yes. So and, by the way, I invite you, whoever is listening, I want to make the trip either from a city in Poland, if you are Polish, or a city across the world, in Argentina or China, for, for that matter, everyone is invited to the farm and the farm is open and we would love to welcome you to the farm and to actually have you see it with your own eyes. Um, and what you would see, and I hope some of you will see, is a land that is permanently covered. So from 2004 to 2008, we were not, the land was sometimes tilled, using minimum tillage practices, but it was tilled. Then, in 2008, we transitioned into what eventually became because there was a transition period a permanent grassland. So the soil is fully covered If there is no snow and, with climate change, we had very little snow this year.

Speaker 3: 21:35

We didn't have any snow two years ago and three years ago. So you have plants, different species of grass, with other plants that grow naturally in that mix, just growing and maintaining carbon. That is there, maintaining biodiversity and pumping more carbon into that soil as they grow. So this is the major change you would see and it would be green basically all around you all year round. One thing that we are starting since 2022 is we are adding agroforestry systems into the farm, so we are part as European Carbon Farmers. We are part of MIDAS project, horizon Europe funded project that deals with industrial crops on marginal lands for bioeconomy use in the context of climate change.

Speaker 3: 22:31

And as part of that, we have designed and we are running now a demo field of agroforestry system in which we are growing popular trees for industrial application or uses with the same mix of grasses that we are growing on the rest of the farm. We would love to do that at scale. We would love to have trees kind of all around on every single water canal that we have on our farm. And when you think about our farm, think about the Netherlands, you imagine the Netherlands extremely flat, flat, a lot of water, um, relatively small fields. This is our area in poland, one of the most fertile regions of poland, actually dewatered by the mennonites, so a group of people that moved from the netherlands to that region of poland at the invitation of our king and they did amazing work and it's we are still using the invention and they sweat, basically because they did all that work. So this is the region very fertile.

Speaker 1: 23:36

Flat windy, would be nice to have some trees, Exactly.

Speaker 3: 23:40

And we had the trees 40 years ago. When you speak with my late grandfather, the biggest change he would mention to you over 50 years of living in that area that he saw because we moved to that area in 1970s from southeastern part of Poland as a family was the water level going down by like basically three meters. Less trees and less of all other biodiversity, so less birds, less weeds, less shrubs. So the level between the tree and the ground level. We are rebuilding some of that, but the reality is that from biodiversity perspective, the region has opportunities to be reborn.

Speaker 1: 24:29

Let's say and then I mean you both mentioned that, the farm of Francesco. I don't know who wants to take that one. You can point, but let's bring that in here. Obviously connected to Pope Francesco, but just for anybody who doesn't know, I'll put the link in the show notes, but just to give a bit of an overview of what that work entails.

Speaker 2: 24:54

Sure, I can start, then Mateusz can add. So that is how we actually met each other. Pope Francis, in 2020, sent or wrote a letter to young people that are entrepreneurs, change makers and academics economies to come together to Assisi Assisi is in Italy for one day, or three days was back at the time. Days was back at the time and to discuss together different topics of the economy, to basically propose a transformation and build an economy with a new soul and a new life, as he, as he called. What happened after is what we all lived. Is that a covet happened. So this meeting didn't happen at all. It was going to happen. It was pushed for some months, then for more months and then eventually, it happened last year no, two years ago, but what happened back at that time is that all of us, as young people, started gathering together in an online way on zoom like all of us exactly at that time, it was really common to spend with online meetings for like five or six hours.

Speaker 2: 26:15

Um, but yeah, like that is. That is what happened and the the way that we were organized as young people is that we divided into what was called, and is called until today, villages, because these were going to be physical spaces in the city of Assisi, and every village has a topic, like a thematic group, combining two words of the economy that usually don't go together. One of them was energy and poverty, another one was policies for happiness and ours. The way we met is in the village of agriculture and justice countries China, colombia, brazil, germany, nigeria. We gathered online and started sharing Again. Imagine that I was coming from this background that I share with my family farming and me. That at that moment, I was also running a business that I'm running until now, sharing and selling yerba mate from small farmers in Argentina, in the United States, mateusz with his background, and Laidad.

Speaker 1: 27:35

I'll put the link below for people in the US.

Speaker 2: 27:38

Amazing, thank you.

Speaker 2: 27:42

And Mateusz.

Speaker 2: 27:42

And then the friend from, for example, from Italy and Spain, running a business of blockchain with coffee, and like that, several young people started sharing what were those injustices that, from our experience and work, we were seeing in agriculture, in agriculture, and from that we came up with this solution to these injustices that mainly at that time, what was mainly highlighted was injustices on the soil, health, on the principles and education on that, and also the two things like the soil health itself, like how our soil is being damaged and the injustice of not having the real tools, the real trainings, the real knowledge to access to a transformation as farmers.

Speaker 2: 28:42

So that's how Fararma Francesco was born and initially we focused in Nigeria with our friend and colleague Rita, because back at the time, like that was the place that we could apply our the different solutions that we had. And then it started spreading in different parts and the story is really long. But basically today we are an organization that is mainly focused in two big actions, one of them being farmer trainings, with a big action of work that we have done in Nigeria a big action of work that we have done in Nigeria and the other part is the bringing voices of farmers into global processes, and the one that we have focused the most is the COPS processes. So this is what Farmo Francesco was the story, and it keeps in its heart the call of Pope Francis, the response as young people and the passion for soil and agriculture and the farmers.

Speaker 2: 29:59

But maybe Mateo, would you want to add something else to what I said?

Speaker 1: 30:02

First, I have a follow up, Like how did you identify the education piece for farmers as a crucial injustice piece? I think we've heard education many times on the podcast as well, and farmer-to-farmer or farmer training is fundamental. And at the same time, people say, yeah, but you can Google anything now. You can go on YouTube or, as long as you have access to internet, you can find some of this information. But we also hear the counterside of the major agriculture. Education centers are, let's say, not focused on soil health yet, even if you could go there, because inaccessible for most people. So how did you narrow? Like, of all the injustices you could have picked, you picked the one of farmer education.

Speaker 2: 30:48

So what we did was going out and asking to the farmer. So me, I'm from the second city in Argentina, in Cordoba, so I asked two farmers at that time, with COVID reality being really creative, right, like talking, sometimes on the phone, sometimes going, because at that moment, like farmers were always like an essential they could always move.

Speaker 1: 31:15

They could always move, exactly.

Speaker 2: 31:17

And we kind of too. So what's going? And asking to the farmer, again, like me in Argentina, our friend rita to the farmers in nigeria, the joseph in china, in china, colombia, and so on, and we had a form and like yeah, because what do you ask when, like that's a very you have to frame the question really well like it was from.

Speaker 2: 31:45

So, again, we come from the business world. So, um, what we did was following the design thinking process and their design thinking has this, this step at the beginning to to realize what is the main pain of someone by, by asking, kind of like playing the role of a journalist so you actually are really good at that and you would be really good at that. So it was basically asking okay, describe me your day, tell me what do you do. And asking questions like why do you do that like that? What do you see? Why do you see, like, why are you doing what you're doing?

Speaker 2: 32:23

And most of them were saying because I don't know how to do something different. But at the same time, I see that, yes, like last year, my production was better than this year. And like, actually back, like, if I start remembering, every year is getting worse because my soil is getting worse, there is no rain. So, like they, they weren't sharing what they were observing. And every time we were asking why you do that is because I don't know how to do something different. So it's not that actually they said, oh, I'm leaving the injustices of no access into education. They were basically saying no, I don't know how to do it. I don't have time. What would I do? How would I try something different? What would I do? How would I try something different?

Speaker 2: 33:12

so all of that, little by little, led us to see the same answers, in which was impressive in all the countries all the countries were doesn't matter if the farm was the farmer was doing vegetables or the farmer was doing fruits, like all the.

Speaker 1: 33:25

All the answers were were the same yeah, which is which is ironic, and like even if you studied at the best agriculture universities etc. You would still not have access to the the latest soil science and soil health research, like it's. So we're so at the edge in many places now like it's it and it's being shared somehow, but it really feels we're at the cusp of a lot of soil health research, and everyday papers are coming out which like blown our world 10 years ago and like how would you imagine that farmers that have to make day-to-day decisions know all of that, let alone if you are far away from some of these centers? So it's a very, very interesting point. Sorry, mateusz, did you want to step in on the Farm of Francesco piece and share your side?

Speaker 3: 34:15

I'm really enjoying reliving the story because it's very recent when you think about it only four years less than that and at the same time, we've done a lot since then and it's good to come back to the roots, to the origins. It really gives me a lot of energy and gratefulness for, wow, we've done so much and there were so many people, literally all around the world, involved in making this, this happen, and they still are so. So that's the first thing that comes to mind when I think about the farm of Francesco, in light of what was shared already. And then one other thing that comes to mind in the context of your podcast, kun, and the work you are doing and a lot of amazing work that has been shared here through hundreds by now of amazing people from all around the world is this personal challenge of mine of I want to, you know, have an impact. Like I want to see a huge change in the world happening, and then this reality that I want to change is so complex and it's so, you know like, yeah, it's so complex, let me leave it like, like that or at that, and then I am so small, like, like, hey, like it's only a training that you know, you design it and it's simple, and then you leave it and it's five times more time consuming. You have challenges, things that were supposed to be easy are not easy at all, and all of that and and and.

Speaker 3: 35:48

What really comes to mind is like to whoever that is listening to us, whether you are a politician, I hope we are being listened to by some or a lot of politicians and farmers and everyone in between. Whoever you are, you might think, oh, I'm just like listening to this podcast because I don't have anything better to do, and I give it a chance, like your small action matters, whatever that is, and my invitation that I share when I have opportunity and this is certainly one of those is visit the farmer. If you are not a farmer listening to us, visit the farmer. Pick a farmer that is closest to you, for example. Or pick a farmer that is closest to you, uh, for example. Or pick a farmer that, like you really want to visit, and maybe it's a you know it's a big trip to get there, but but uh, that is your chance do it visit the farmer, make it, make it work.

Speaker 3: 36:38

And if making the visit is too big, right now put a calendar node in your calendar, you know, half an hour or even 10 minutes tomorrow morning to look this farmer up and then move this calendar invitation ahead to do another piece of work to make that happen. And if you are a farmer, tell your story, go out there, wherever that is. It might be literally your neighbor or your local priest, or your local imam, or even your uncle, you know, like just getting the habit of telling your story and especially, if I can make a specific request to the farmers, connect with your politicians. Right, if you are. We are speaking at the beginning of february 2024.

Speaker 3: 37:27

Uh, big waves of protests of farmers are coming across europe again and see where they go and how long they will last and where we will be when this interview is aired or when you are listening to it.

Speaker 3: 37:39

Maybe sometimes later, but we are in a period maybe the high, maybe the highways are still blocked with manure, or maybe not, and we forgot about it again until the next wave comes we don't know whenever you're listening to this, but when we're recording this, it's headlines everywhere exactly, exactly and and you it's uh, it's a big conversation, but like if you, as a farmer, do not know, you're a member of the parliament and you're a member of the european parliament and you have not shared your story and your concerns or a concern, keep it specific. I don't like green deal because of this specific theme, not because it's from brussels and it's all bad. I would argue you didn't do your your homework and I might be hated by community of farmers that are protesting, but but this is my poem you're not allowed to protest if you didn't do your homework.

Speaker 1: 38:30

No, I think that's a general rule. But um, and and then what? Let's say for both of you. But let's start with mateos. A politician or a group of politicians comes to your farm or your family's farm. What would be? Because, for that's not a daily job. I mean they may do these visits often, or I mean these visits they have to do in certain sense. But if there's one thing you would like them to remember from that day, only one thing, because our attention spans are short. But if there's one thing you would like to stick, one seed you would like to plant that at some point will grow, what would that be? Specifically on policymakers, what would you like them to at least know or understand or remember from a farm visit of one of your two farms or a farm you have been to recently?

Speaker 3: 39:15

Let me run two scenarios. One is direct answer to your question and that answer is we can, and our farm is an example of that of being able to have a systemic, holistic approach to climate change policy as a politician in this case, and agriculture, food system policy. You need to approach those two policies holistically. You need to design, implement and evaluate them holistically, because otherwise we might get one well and another one at risk, or we might get both at risk or we might have tensions, which we are seeing right now Very, very well with the protests. So it's not a question of do you want to have a climate in which you can survive or do you want to be fed. It's a question how do we do both? And it's not a hypothetical question utopia world, but many farmers all around the world, including those who work with us, european Carbon kernel farmers and Farmo Francesco in Nigeria, mainly because this is where we've done our first farmer training program last year and we are preparing for doing the second one in Uganda or Kenya later this year. If we raise the funds, or once we raise the funds, we'll do those programs are showing it's a universal thing, you can do it, and examples from all over the world just like with the farmer Francesco case of looking at the challenge are saying, hey, we can do it, and I would like politicians to live with a mindset of we can do it, but I always leave them with specific invitations, depending who you are. If I would be speaking with a minister, I would be having a different request to him, which in my case would be hey, mr Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development of Poland, we need a working group at the level of the chancellery of prime minister to work on climate and agriculture together. It cannot be in your ministry, it cannot be in climate ministry. It has to be at the level of the chancellery and ideally that is part of Committee of Climate Change, which we do not have in Poland and we badly need it and we've wrote about that as European carbon farmers at the end of 2021, after I finished my post at COP26 and United Nations Food System Summit, I basically brought those insights and delivered that to both Polish president, prime minister and many other leaders of the world sorry, of Polish space.

Speaker 3: 41:59

The second scenario that I would like to run, which is what is really happening, which is you make this invitation on purpose, because in 99% of cases the person doesn't show up on the farm. It's such a big ask, even though it's not big, that that person never comes. And it can be a lower level politician, it can be the highest level politician Actually the higher level politicians are more likely to come than the lower level politicians. But basically, assume the person is not coming and you really are graced when the person says, yes, I'm coming, it's a success, and celebrate this, it's a big thing.

Speaker 3: 42:39

So if they don't come, then you have to say, or I invite you to say that's what our experience is move to this policy conversation with prepared requests, just because the person didn't want to spend two days or a day instead of an hour, like, hey, I'm giving you one and a half days away, but let's have a specific policy conversation with specific follow-up of somebody from your team planned so that we can not only stay at the level of inspiration, ideas, but the level of actual commitments and following them up, which, once again, in 90% of cases will not happen immediately. It will take a year or two, as our example shows and example many other farmers of the world shows. On that point, there's a very interesting scheme in Northern Ireland soil health monitoring scheme that a friend of mine from EU Soil Mission Board basically was instrumental in developing, and it took him seven years to get it from an idea to a policy scheme. That is voluntary for farmers but it runs at the level of the whole country of Northern Ireland. A great success case.

Speaker 1: 44:02

Yeah, so really come prepared, and come prepared for a marathon, not for a quick sprint, I think, and have concrete questions, not just I hate this and that everything that comes from Warsaw or Brussels is bad, et cetera, et cetera. Okay, but what needs to change and what needs to make it more workable for you and for you, marie-virginia? What would happen if you have, you had many politicians or um, visiting the farm with your family? What would be the one thing you would like them to remember?

Speaker 2: 44:33

I'm really happy that mateo should answer first, because you, I loved your question and it took me some time to to realize, because that I never experienced that with my family farm and actually I was remembering the last time we went that actually Mateusz also came with me and my sister Emiliana, and in Argentina the fields are far away. So I can share some of the story, but I will start by saying the conclusion, that is, what I would like the politician to remember is the pain of the farmer, to feel it a little bit. So the pain starts by the experience. I would like the politicians to remember the experience what it takes to drive for so many kilometers to get into a place, what it takes to arrive to the field and trying to open the gate and realizing that it's closed and there is no sign in your phone. So you need to start driving around and trying to get some sign and to communicate with someone that has the key to come and open the gate and to experience the pain of driving on the field and seeing that it didn't rain. So, because it didn't rain, what you all, the things that you work for so many months are not going to be harvested, or, if they are harvested, it will be not bringing any, any profits and and and so on.

Speaker 2: 46:03

Right and yes, I could be dreaming and saying a lot of complicated things, but when you asked that question, the only thing that I felt was that many times, politicians or even people from different areas of agriculture and I'm thinking about academics, I'm thinking about doctors that are super connected with the world of agriculture and the work of the farmer, they don't really know what is a farm. They don't really know what is a soil and what the farmer leaves and what the farmer stewards every single day on the work. So there is something that I would like someone to remember is that there is a lot of people and there is a lot of effort behind the work that is being done in a farm, and if there is some action that I would like this politician or visitor to take is to invite this person to come to the table and share the experience. Next time I want to do something that will impact this person, because it's very easy to be doing policies from your office that is quite far away from the farm and imagining what is the reality of the farmer. But actually, for me and I really like to describe myself as a bridge builder.

Speaker 2: 47:32

I think there is a lot of value on that, on the politician coming to a farm and to the farmer coming to the table and sitting down and being able to share this experience. So if a politician can experience that in the farm, maybe next time he wants to take some action, he or she will invite that person or call that person and say hey, virginia or Emiliana, what do you think about this, this and that? Do you think it's a good idea? Do you think it's not? And that is the day that we will start and I know there is a lot of people in Argentina working in this way politicians calling farmers and farmers calling politicians, like via WhatsApp, via phone. That is the day that we will start, like each of us doing our right role in the actions, in the table, in the changes. So that is what I would like him or her to remember the pain of the farmer.

Speaker 3: 48:30

And just to say Maria mentioned a lot of farmers in Argentina are living examples of that. Same with us too and with a lot of farmers from around the world. What we know it's exactly that you do have a phone number of chief of staff of the chancellery of the prime minister and you know ideologies in there, but to be hey, this is my experience, like I'm responding with what I lived because of what I lived, like this is exactly that, not like, oh, like you are this or that, um, so you have limited chances with that, but uh, yeah yeah, but you should trust you have to use them well exactly, but once you build credibility and trust and relationship, that continues right, that continues forever.

Speaker 3: 49:34

And then, of course, people move, and and, and this holistic approach is really important, meaning, um, especially the doctors and health sector is really important. And yet I find it to be the most difficult to connect with, like making this connection healthy soil, healthy people. In practice it sounds easy, but then you have a doctor that is working 18 hours per day and getting his or her attention when she or he is objectively very, very, very tired is not a regenerative person at all.

Speaker 1: 50:15

It's not easy, it's not easy yeah.

Speaker 1: 50:20

And so to switch gears a bit in the conversation, um, what if that audience wasn't politicians or policy makers, but investors? I mean, you both are entrepreneurs very active in the space. As an entrepreneur deal with, let's say, the finance world and the money world and the investing world daily. And what if we would do this in, like the capital of Argentina or Poland, or in London or in Delhi, wherever the finance hub is, and we would do this? I like to say we would do this conversation live on stage and the room is filled with investors, either investing their own money or investing, stewarding their money, or investing and stewarding money of others, in a sense of pension funds, banks, etc. What would be the main message or the main thing you would like them to remember after an evening? Listen to the stories of both of you. What would be the main seed you would like to plant into the minds and heads of people in the finance world?

Speaker 2: 51:26

If an investor comes to the farm, like they see that I would like to plant this or like this person to live with, is the idea of, wow, this is amazing. I want to come back, I want to invest on this, of course, and when I'm thinking on that, I am thinking in the reality of Argentina, that a lot of the investment that is done in Argentina is done by the profitability of the business itself, because we don't have a lot of public support or resources that are coming on the way to the farmer. So it really depends on the personal investment or, like private investment, and it's really needed to have someone that is coming either from the agriculture sector of investments or not, to be willing to believe in a farmer, to believe in someone and to make that business growth. And to make that business growth and I'm also thinking in, like I'm thinking in the investment of the commodities or the specialties that the farmer is producing, but I'm also thinking in the technology part, because a lot of the farmers and a lot of the things that are done are done with a lot of effort, with a lot of current structures that the businesses have, and that if the structures were better and if there was more funds in the picture, there could be much better resources.

Speaker 2: 52:57

Sorry results. So this is what I'm thinking. I'm thinking when it comes to water irrigation in plenty areas of Argentina that is needed to keep producing and producing in a good way. And I'm thinking also in the machinery itself, that Mateusz saw that and he's a machine lover, he loves machines from agriculture and he was seeing that he's a machine lover, he loves machines from agriculture and he was seeing that, and he was surprised to see how, in Argentina, a lot of good results are achieved with tractors or with machines that are not the latest technology. So I wonder how much we could achieve if there were more resources in the sector.

Speaker 3: 53:45

I wonder how much we could achieve if there were more resources in the sector. For me, maria assumed something that I think is an invitation in itself, same as for politicians that we talked about before, but equally or even more so for investors Go out and see, meet this farmer, have a look, build this relationship, feel it, don't just look at something from your desk, but make this trip and that can bring us higher to regenerative cultures and all that discussion that you need to have the right culture, which we kind of assume here, but it's not given. In a lot of spaces, including politicians, including some investors and some farmers as well, there are always groups of certain population. So make this trip.

Speaker 3: 54:44

I would say, drop your desire to measure and monetize everything, but just focus on producing food and make money in that business as an investor, like what you are supporting primarily, in my view, should be food production and that in itself should be a profitable business. That then brings you a lot of, brings you or society a lot of other associated services which can be valued and potentially monetized. But I would caution all those who want to enter the space because of this potential of monetization, talking especially about carbon credits that are like the hot topic and, at the same time hot potato, at least in Poland, with what we are seeing as European carbon farmers. So, fundamentally, support great farmers growing great food and once you have this relationship and you are invested in those farmers through direct or indirect ways, let's have a conversation, let's tackle together those bigger, more prone to, let's use the word corruption in different senses spaces and then, assuming you are managing, you know you are not having like 1000 or 10,000 dollars to invest, but the famous 1 billion dollars question is coming.

Speaker 1: 56:27

Invest part of that you can hear, mateusz has been listening to the podcast. It's a perfect bridge. Thank you very much.

Speaker 3: 56:33

Yeah, I know this question is a very difficult one, but, but in of course we're talking about investments, right. So if I say invest part of, I will be kind of repeating the question. But what I'm trying to say is invest some of that without expecting return. Invest that in something that is really missing, is really needed, but it's needed Like. Without this, you kind of cannot breathe.

Speaker 3: 57:01

Maria gave an example of water infrastructure. Maria gave an example of water infrastructure. We can give an example once again from Argentina of knowing places that don't have hospital. So you can have in the proximity of 100 kilometers, right, so you might build the most amazing farm in there, but if you don't have a hospital and school, that kids of those people who are working locally are brought in to do some work that requires their expertise.

Speaker 3: 57:32

If that is not there, that business is really challenging and we really need to think, to feel and respond to those needs so that much bigger investment opportunities can be opened up. By that we cannot think about hey, I have this, whatever the amount is $10 million to invest. I want to invest this in the simplest possible way, but I, out of this $1 million, I will invest $100,000, for example, in doing something that really calls for being done, and then maybe we'll follow up with 200 or half a million to take it from where it is at this particular stage. Just to respond to the reality, as we've been saying earlier in the discussion.

Speaker 1: 58:25

And to lock the question to you in this ping pong match we're playing Maria Virginia. What would you do if you would be in charge of a billion dollar or billion euro? You can choose the currency. When you're this size, you can choose. What would you do if you had to put that to work?

Speaker 2: 58:44

I would choose euro because that will give me more money. No, I'm joking. We joke in Argentina a lot.

Speaker 1: 58:54

But currencies I can imagine yes.

Speaker 2: 58:58

So I think that I will replicate what I've been doing with much more little money but in a bigger scale. We talked in this hour about starting by asking to the farmer first, and this is something that I would like to come back before putting most of that money into work. I would choose different locations and I would ask the farmer getting to know what is the reality, getting to know what is a normal day of the farmer, and probably this would lead into some trainings or what we like to call spaces of encounter between different farmers and between the different key stakeholders of the of the sector, of the ecosystem. So all of the things that we are, that we are talking about, of asking the farmer but creating a space where the farmer can talk with the business person of the region, when it can talk with the governor, with the ministers, and then kind of create these spaces for them to share what are the main pains, what are the main challenges, and design concrete, actionable solutions for that. I know it's not a crazy technology, it's not a crazy solution, but this takes a lot of effort, time and it takes a lot of money.

Speaker 2: 1:00:29

From our experience, so we could do this in different places, create these little processes and, from this, support these ideas, making sure that these ideas that can be businesses, it can be projects, it can be new farms, that they have a sustainability and they can survive on themselves. Like I'm talking about economically-wise in the community-wise, and this combination between different communities, different realities. Actually it doesn't take that much money. So with that money, with one billion, a lot of lives could be improved, a lot of life could be changed. But we need to make sure that it's not like the one perfect solution that will solve everything from one day to the other, but it is enabling a process that goes beyond our action. So then we go, we leave from this process and then the people are the ones that continue this, this transformation. So that is what I would do. I would keep doing what I'm doing, but in a bigger scale and a few final questions.

Speaker 1: 1:01:42

I mean we're on on the hour, but I think we can go on a bit more, which has been dense so far, which is great, and it also means we have a lot to unpack. You mentioned technology, marie-virginia, and I heard maybe between the lines as well don't look for the one single solution that fixes everything, because it doesn't exist, which is for investors sometimes difficult to realize. But if you had to look at technology in the broadest sense, so it could be. In the broadest sense, it could be financial structures which, if you look at the Greek word of technology, also fall under technology. It could be, of course, very practical things on the farm. It could be remote sensing, et cetera.

Speaker 1: 1:02:25

There's a lot of interest for the farming sector. But do you get excited about the use of technology more and more? I mean, apart from the machinery you were discussing before, do you get excited? Are you interested? Are you wary? What is the main? Like the ag tech world or the technology in agriculture? What is your main feeling? Let's say around that at the moment, as we are entering an age where ai comes in, remote sensing, a lot more seems to be possible, but also a lot of risks so I always have two, two mixed feelings inside me when it comes to technology and the application, because of what I mentioned before.

Speaker 2: 1:03:05

Like many times, a farmer or someone thinks that with these very amazing technology, things are going to be solved. And this happens to us in all the scales of farming and in all the places, like recently in Nigeria, like sometimes they would. They would ask support or funding for any technology that would solve everything, and our experience is that it's not about that technology or it's not about putting all the money into buying this machine or replacing some equipment. So that's why, for me, I do think technology is amazing and I do think technology can advance and help a lot in a reality. But technology without the process and without the people and without enabling something around it, for me it's not sustainable. So when I think in technology, I think about the transfer in knowledge, like we were talking about the no-till system.

Speaker 2: 1:04:10

The no-till system can be considered as a technology if you apply that in a reality that has never been applied. I do think that that can be like. There are many cases. A friend of us, with Mateusz he did this in Africa. They started the organization that is called WORK and they brought the no-till technology to sectors of Africa that didn't exist and they brought a lot of tractors and things that they were not there and they're creating all the ecosystem and there it worked and it created a lot of cool Shout out to WORK who we've had here.

Speaker 1: 1:04:47

I will put the link below. It's been a few years so we might need to do a check-in, but we've had them on the show.

Speaker 2: 1:04:53

So yeah, so then in that case you see a concrete example that it gets me super excited, like if we could have a lot of examples like this, imagine, like, how many things we could do. So that's why I say that technology is amazing, but it has to go with something around it. It has to go with people, it has to go with the process, it has to go with this holistic approach.

Speaker 1: 1:05:25

And what about you, Mateusz?

Speaker 3: 1:05:27

For me, the question about investments. I would probably slice up 1 billion in four pieces, three of which would be investment and one would be kind of leveraging. The investment, which is the first piece, would be relatively little money probably 10% of that but impacting a lot of people and then, hopefully, some of them continuing to make impact that you cannot envision before because they were impacted by this thing. And this thing would be exchanges of farmers between different parts of the world, and I'm literally thinking about a farmer from Poland going on a tour to Argentina, meeting with farmers, being able to ask all the questions that he or she wants to ask, and vice versa, from the Argentina side. Or going to China, because the reason why I'm saying is to china, because we, we really had.

Speaker 3: 1:06:30

The reason I'm saying is and you can see that with the protests as of now and the narratives being presented in those protests is this narrative of somewhere else. The food is being produced in a bad way. We are doing it here. Well, ours is safe, or it's organic or who knows what, but they're somewhere, sometimes, you know, literally across a border, two kilometers away. Those guys are doing it really, really bad and there are some places or some actors that are producing food in a way that is not right.

Speaker 3: 1:07:06

But, broadly speaking, my experience of agriculture all around the world and I've been on farms across five continents, small, big and everything in between is that, on average, farmers are doing amazing work. Wherever I go or maybe I just go to those farms that are doing amazing work, but, but I will. I don't want to be a farmer. That is one of a very few saying at a conference and everybody is in a bandwagon saying, hey, we are growing amazing food here in Poland, whereas those Argentinians they are really bad, which is not my experience at all. So that would be one enabling that and making those connections, giving them exchanging WhatsApp numbers and so on.

Speaker 3: 1:07:49

The group number two that probably money-wise, I would spend $700 million out of that $1 billion would be some kind of revolving fund structured around investing in people and land that you transition to a new generation. So you either have a farm like ours that has 700 hectares and we hire or we employ five people, five, six people, um, which could easily support even 20 farms doing either enterprises on top of ours, or you know having a small vegetable garden producing for the local demand, or you dream it something else, but we we are not willing to do that because we don't have the people available and we don't have experience of enabling that and many other things. But we are not doing that because it's not worth our time as we, as we look at it right now, and I would really love to see a lot of the farms transitioning to a new generation and having a side enterprise within that bigger business.

Speaker 1: 1:09:05

So that would be point which is a fascinating point you're making, because the narrative and this is is a whole different podcast, but a strong narrative has been like always less people on the land, but also like this is as much as we can produce in terms of production et cetera, more. If we would set up differently and if we would have different structures, stacking enterprises as we love to do in other and other sectors of the industry or in other places of economy, like actually this could support way more people and does way more jobs and does, etc, etc. And way more, potentially, food as well. We just haven't been set up. We've been set up on more machines and less people, but there are.

Speaker 3: 1:09:48

There's a huge potential to unlock, even from existing land, a lot more yeah, like my, you know when I start dreaming and then, of course, the dream doesn't stop once you start dreaming but like not very ambitious dream, makes me imagine us on the land that we have, of course, with way more people than we have right now, producing 1,000 times more food than we are producing easily. But you need probably 1,000 families to do that right, or maybe 500, whereas we are one family with a few employees, so we can produce plenty of food more on the same area in a way that is contributing a lot, especially on the social dimension, because, yeah, there's a huge opportunity there and I see huge need and opportunity there. That's why I'm pitching this as the core, finance-wise, of this 1 billion investment portfolio. The third bit of the investment, which would potentially be the most difficult to pull off but, strategically thinking, I think would be ultimately, or could be, the most impactful, impactful would be offering or investing 100, 150 million of that 1 billion to be matched up with a government or multiple governments that have money to be invested into some or certain set of development banks not by, for example, me partnering up with Polish government to have a stake in Asian Development Bank, but to support a small island state having a stake in the same bank, just kind of giving the money to that country so that they can have a stake.

Speaker 3: 1:11:49

They have a board observer position or board position and you probably can add up some kind of training program that takes people who are having those board positions or observer positions to a country that is offering that money and you train them and so on in how to oversee investments and through that this bank is able to invest more money into projects, including in those countries which don't have the ability to pay the pay, their stake or buy their way into those systems, which ultimately and we had very interesting conversation together with maria and one of the ambassadors to Rome-based agencies recently who was saying very passionately and I know he's been working on that for a few years about hey, the decisions are made in a way that you put more money, you have either permanent seat or, realistically, permanent seat, and then those who are putting less money and we cannot, you know, increase our stakes from three thousand three million sorry investment per year to 150, as a country that was mentioned in that conversation.

Speaker 3: 1:12:57

So basically, we have no chances of of doing anything governance wise. We are completely out of here and you need to and we do that with with the cop work and farm francesco. You effectively need to diversify voices in the choir in those places. It cannot be just big players with money basically saying we are good as we are and even if you have a tremendous point, we can agree with that over coffee or a cocktail, but in formal proceedings it's the big sevens in the table.

Speaker 3: 1:13:31

In the UN, so that would be my most needed investment scenario. But I would not put $1 billion for all of that and then with some millions that are left, I would really do amazing work marketing all of that, every single farmer that goes through this, building a second enterprise within an existing farm. I'm dreaming now, but I would make a movie about those guys, or a book, or let them write the book, including the failures, and just communicate that. So we are having more and more people inspired and learning from successes and failures, and that's why your podcast is so amazing, because because you do exactly that very interesting.

Speaker 1: 1:14:20

Thank you for the compliment first of all, um, but very interesting way of framing the decision making. I think it's. I'm probably going to get emails, but the first time somebody brings up that, like how to diversify the seats at the table or the choir, because otherwise we just get the same decisions and money can help with that and stakes and can change. And I want to be conscious of your time and finish up, which usually leads to other questions. So let's start the uh, the final question, uh, saga. Um, if you had a magic wand, you can decide who takes this first. It could change one thing. So we're still a bit in the dreaming uh piece as well, but this can get very concrete. If you could change one thing overnight, um, but one thing, what would that be?

Speaker 3: 1:15:09

I would have, ideally, every single member of the parliament anywhere in the world. But let's make it a little bit more realistic. Every single member of the parliament, the upper chamber and the lower chamber of the Republic of Poland, read Soil Manifesto of the European Union and create a caucus of soil health friends in the parliament, similarly to what Australians have in their parliament.

Speaker 2: 1:15:40

And me, if I would have a magic power to do that in the Argentinian context, I would make sure that all the farmers it doesn't matter what they are producing, it doesn't matter how big and small they are are able to sit down in a table or together and have a proper conversation and recognize that they are all the same. They are just farmers, we are just farmers, no one is better, no one is worse, and that we are able to listen to each other and we are able to talk, understanding that I am not better because I do something or I'm not worse because I do something, but we are able to have a fraternal conversation.

Speaker 1: 1:16:35

Actually, that's a really good way to wrap up. I mean, there's so many other rabbit holes we could go to. We've scratched the surface on many things, but I'm sure this won't be the last time we're chatting, and so thank you so much for listening, first of all, to the podcast, for all the work you're doing both of you and for coming on here and take some of your valuable time to share with the world, although Mateusz was very clear that the storytelling piece is something that we should all do, especially in this space, especially farmers should all do much more, but thank you for taking the time and doing that here thank you for the opportunity.

Speaker 3: 1:17:12

Thank you everyone. Our farms are open and you are all invited and talk with your politicians yeah, thank you for the invitation and feel free to to connect with us.

Speaker 2: 1:17:23

We are happy always to, to talk, to learn from you, from your experience, to share more of ours and to keep building a community all the way.

Speaker 1: 1:17:42

AI for Soil Health is funded by the European Union and has received funds from the UK Research and Innovation under the UK government's Horizon Europe funding guarantee. For more information, visit ai4soilhealtheu or in the links below. Thank you so much for listening all the way to the end. For the show notes and links we discussed in this episode, check out our website investinginregenerativeagriculturecom. Forward slash posts. If you liked this episode, why not share it with a friend or give us a rating on Apple podcasts? That really helps. Thanks again and see you next time.