Investing in Regenerative Agriculture and Food
Investing in Regenerative Agriculture and Food podcast features 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. Hosted by Koen van Seijen.
Investing in Regenerative Agriculture and Food
105 Elizabeth Whitlow on how to change the ag world with the gold standard of regen certification
Can yet another certification change the agriculture world? Elizabeth Whitlow is the executive director of the Regenerative Organic Alliance (ROA) who are building the revolutionary new certification for food, fiber, and personal care ingredients.
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An interview about the importance of certifications or labels in existence with label fatigue. This conversation dives deep into the whys and how of creating the gold standard of regenerative certification.
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What is Regenec and is there a label for it? This is a question I get all the time, immediately followed by why do we need another certification or label as many people have, rightfully so, label fatigue, and there's hardly any space left on packaging, from dolphin-friendly to kosher, vegan, rainforest-friendly, grass-fed, conservation agriculture, bird-friendly, etc. This conversation dives deep into the why and how of creating the gold standard of Regene certification. Welcome to another episode of In March last year, we launched our membership community to make it easy for fans to support our work. And so many of you have joined as a member. We've launched different types of benefits, exclusive content, Q&A webinars with former guests, Ask Me Anything sessions, plus so much more to come in the future. For more information on the different tiers, benefits, and how to become a member, check gumroad.com slash investingbridge.com. Welcome to another episode today with Elizabeth Withlow, Executive Director of the Regenerative Organic Alliance, who are building the Regenerative Organic Certified Program. I'm very excited for this interview. So welcome, Elizabeth.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you. I am excited and honored to be here. Thanks for inviting me. You've had an array of amazing guests. Appreciate that you want to talk to us.
SPEAKER_00:And we're following that with today. I think a lot of people have questions on certification in general and why do we need it or why don't we need it. And it's definitely the work you're doing is creating a lot of that. And I think it's a huge lift. I'm very excited to dive deeper into it. But I want to start with a personal question. What brings you to soil?
SPEAKER_01:Gosh, what brings me to soil has been 20 five plus years of working with farmers and working in farming and coming to this point in my career just two years ago when I was offered this position to be the director here at the ROA, a lot of learning around what I already probably knew inherently around organic farming and all the methods that I had seen farmers practicing over the years. But I think in the last two years, three years, the whole world has been riveted by this topic that wasn't so sexy or even really that deeply talked about except maybe our NRCS or among soil scientists but soil it's so amazing and that quote you know that I use a lot I think a lot of people are really inspired by this concept that there are more living beings in one teaspoon of soil than there are humans on the planet I mean you can go so many directions with that so that alone is just like the most inspiring and exciting concept. And so we start there. We start with that and this fascination with what is going on in the soil microbiome and this incredibly fast moving emergent science around it is also super fascinating. You know, we've only identified 15 or 20 percent of the organisms in that microbiome. And so we have a long way to go. And just what we've learned with that tiny fraction that we've identified and the important role they play in moving nutrients and cycling soil and moving nutrients to plant roots and the effects that it has on those plants and the foods that grow from that healthier soil is pretty staggering. So that's why soil.
SPEAKER_00:And just for anybody that's listening and thinking, what is the ROA? What is the alliance? And then obviously we're going to dive into the certification program you're building and have launched.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, thanks. The ROA is the Regenerative Organic Alliance. And it was founded by a group of stakeholders, long time advocates and pioneers in the organic sector, Rodeo Institute. They do a lot of research around, they've been doing research and trials in organics for 40 plus years. And they came together with the founders, Patagonia Company and Dr. Bronner's. And they all looked at what was happening in organic and felt like, gosh, you know, they had some concerns about the direction that organic was going and what they saw as a weakening of the organic standard. And they wanted to essentially put a stake in the ground to keep organic strong because it composed a huge portion of their supply chains, but also had this vision for a future of agriculture that included more than just like what you can't use and can use on the farm, but rather have this certification that would focus on three main pillars. So the ROA exists to create the highest standard for regenerative organic in the world. And that is based on these three pillars. And one is soil health. The other is animal welfare. And the third is the human component, that social fairness or fairness to farmers and farm workers. So those are the three pillars that we stand on.
SPEAKER_00:So it's fair to say that they came together to take organic to the next level, but you also mentioned concerns with the current organic standards. So what were or are some of those concerns?
SPEAKER_01:Well, I mean, the one that many people were talking about at the time when that group came together at the Rodeo Institute in late 2017, it was just on the cusp of the National Organic Standards Board recommendation to the National Organic Program in the U.S. that they allow hydroponics or soilless production. And there was a real serious division within the organic sector and the folks advocating for the fact that organic farming needs to happen in the soil, in the earth, and not in a pot, a plastic pot that has imported soil medium with imported fertility products. products, and in many cases, reappropriated water. So that was one of the main concerns. The other, and then since the NOSB did vote, it was a very tight, it was eight to seven in favor of allowing hydroponics and has since caused great ripples in the sector over here. And so our program does not allow any hydroponic farming. I mean, certainly farmers can start in pots, but no harvesting like fruit or crops from the pot, essentially. The other part that was a real concern was factory farming of animals, this industrialization of organic livestock operations. And the NLP had tried, there was this pasture rule. I'm not sure if you're familiar with that. And I won't get into the details of that because we could talk about that for the whole hour, but we won't. We will focus instead on the fact that what was happening in organic livestock was this proliferation of extremely large scale operations where you have 10 000 milk cows gathered in one place or where especially poignant at the time was the is still is the laying operations for the organic eggs and broiler operations for organic chicken where these were large-scale operations with 50 000 100 000 birds in a house and not having any access to the outdoors
SPEAKER_00:which was and is allowed according to organic sort of Yes,
SPEAKER_01:it was being allowed. There were some gray areas in the rule. But then the Trump administration, within weeks of stepping into office, Trump had basically eviscerated that and removed that from the NOP. So now we were back to square one on that. So really just seeing this need to have livestock operations that really focus on access to the outdoors.
SPEAKER_00:That all triggered the realization of we need an add-on or we need a layer on top of the current organic system.
SPEAKER_01:Exactly. Yeah. And, you know, one other really important thing, especially now in this, what we've all learned in the last year with COVID and the vulnerability of those workers on the front line is that there were no provisions to take care of the people, the farmers or the farm workers. And so really what the ROA set out to do is really high bar, really ambitious and aspirational to no end. And we've learned a lot. And during the last year, two years, we completed our pilot last year in January and have since been revising the framework that originally came out as the ROC framework and the standards. So we've done significant revisions and work on those with the input from all of the stakeholders and very participatory process with every one of our pilot participants giving us lots of detailed feedback on how that framework worked or didn't work in their setting, as well as working with the four different certifiers who we approved and onboarded today this work with us, and then all of their auditors. So we got a lot of great feedback. And it took, you know, we had four different task forces working to digest and deliberate all that feedback and then make their recommendation to our board. And then the board had to come to agreement as well. And then we were able to make these changes to the framework.
SPEAKER_00:So we're now beginning 2021. Where do you stand?
SPEAKER_01:Oh my gosh, we're busy. We have probably, we have nearly, I think, 60 applicants in there. right now in the queue?
SPEAKER_00:And applicants are farms or food companies? Or what should I envision when we say applicants?
SPEAKER_01:So we are a farm level certification. I think the real important concept behind the ROC is that it will be brand driven. Brands are going to build this and support this because number one, they pay more. They pay twice as much as farmers. And we have our fee scale set quite low to help onboard more and more farmers. It's at 0.5%. 1%. So it's like of their gross regenerative organic crop value, the fees are quite low. Brands pay twice that. So first off, you know, the brands will drive this with their adoption of it and by having this consumer facing logo on package, but who's applying is our farms only. We will license the brands to purchase this rock product that gets certified at the farm level. And right now the farmers, we have applications from all over the world. We have very large large grower groups of cacao farmers, coffee farmers, cotton, sugar. We have a huge mix. We have laying operations in the U.S. and grain operations coming in, tropical fruits in Central America, mixed veggies in Mexico. It's been all over the place. It's really exciting and overwhelming, I have to say. But yeah, we're fine. We're in a really good position. We've worked so hard the last few months. I've been able to assemble this stellar team. here and for the first year it was me primarily with NSF International and we contracted with them as our program manager and they provided really awesome support and many people from different departments or divisions who helped us launch the pilot program and and then oversaw the whole kind of feedback process and then at that point when we concluded all that process we I hired on a quality manager for the ROA who is going to basically rotate taking that all internal. So the ROA is a scheme owner. We own this term that we have the mark, we apply for the trademarks, we own the term regenerative organic certified. And as the scheme owner, we also are now going to be the scheme manager by hiring on a quality manager and developing our systems completely in accordance with ISO standards that any robust certifier or certification will follow. And in the coming year or so, we will get accredited under one of those international organizations, either ISO or ISEAL or something along those lines, just so that everybody knows that we've got this really excellent kind of systematic way of making decisions and everything is done according to those international standards for conformity assessment, what they call for certification.
SPEAKER_00:And what do you say to people that are saying, oh, why do we need another certification? We have so many logos already on the packaging of some of the brands you mentioned have their packaging full of logos. But what do you say to that general response that I hear a lot about, oh, why is Regen not certifiable? And I said, actually, people are working on that. And then immediately the response from other people is, oh, another logo, another certification. What is your go-to answer when somebody brings that up?
SPEAKER_01:I get it. I mean, I worked in organics for 20 years and then I was in animal welfare for a couple of years and there is a proliferation of labels and no real estate left on a package. And I completely empathize with everybody from every level of farmer, the brand and the consumer. But it doesn't mean that we shouldn't set out to create this label that will equate to the highest label you can get that will speak to all your values. That's the intention of the ROA is that this label will really address all those different concerns that people bring to their, you know, when they go shopping for their food, fiber or body care products. So it's important to have the offering out there that is super high bar and addresses all those needs. And, you know, a lot of folks are concerned about the organic label and where there was a kind of waning of confidence in what that meant. There's the non-GMO project has been hugely successful, but how meaningful is it when you have a non-GMO label on something that like water or a product that has, there is no GMO that you need to worry about, but yet we've got this non-GMO label on it. I think just having a really meaningful label with credibility is important. In the coming years, we'll be doing a lot more consumer education around that. Right now, the main focus is on the certification. That's strict focus for me. Keeping the team focused on that is developing a really rigorous certification program that we can be proud of. We're not going to get accusations of having a watered-down kind of program by any stretch. And that's a risk out there with some of those claims and some of those labels is there's not a lot of integrity behind them.
SPEAKER_00:And in terms of like, let's say the end of this year, what would you consider success? Like, do you have a target in the amount of products or the amount of certified farms? What are you looking forward in the next 12 months as we are at the beginning of the year?
SPEAKER_01:I would, you know, I really love to measure it by the acreage or hectares that we convert. That's where we're going to see the most improvements, the of course, and then how many workers and farmers we help. We are looking at different KPIs as we go out and do these audits. And so we are collecting this data and trying to figure out what is the best way to measure the success. But for me, looking at the amount of land that we convert to this method, the amount of farm animals that we will impact by creating more conditions that honor those animals' needs to express their natural behaviors and be out on pasture and so
SPEAKER_00:forth. I really like to experiment. I'm very always very interested in decision-making frameworks and I like to use the ITN, which is importance, tractability and neglectiveness framework, which comes from the effective altruism movement. They have a number of other frameworks and actually I should do a webinar soon about frameworks, but it's another, that's for another time. But it's, I'm fascinated about if, first of all, how, obviously that's why I asked always why soil at the beginning as a question, why somebody spends their career of many other options. in this specific one. And that's why I always ask that. But also in this case, specifically on certification, in terms of if you had to score it on that framework, which means importance, let's start with importance. Like if we would fix this, how much better would the world be if we fixed, in this case, the certification issue of regenerative?
SPEAKER_01:Well, I mean, fixing agricultural production and the problems with factory farming and industrialized farming, it's not going to solve all the world's problems, but it's solve quite a few. It
SPEAKER_00:does a lot.
SPEAKER_01:A lot. These are foundational issues and this would provide kind of this bedrock change. If you have healthier soil, you're sequestering carbon, you are cycling carbon more, you are growing healthier food, you are therefore having people with access to healthier food and more bio-nutrients in their food equates to better health. So there's a whole cascade of effects that go with solving this problem. I mean, we've got so many different problems that relate to farming think of industrial ag is one of the highest emitters of greenhouse gases so that's one the exploitation of the vulnerable folks who are at that very you know the farm workers the migrant workers the farmers themselves so you know eliminating that exploitation the soil degradation that is causing topsoil loss so that we have supposedly only about 60 harvests left, according to UN scientists.
SPEAKER_00:Which was a couple of years ago when that article came out, actually. So we have to, we're 55 probably.
SPEAKER_01:Right. That's true. And I don't know. I mean, that one.
SPEAKER_00:It depends where you are. It's context specific.
SPEAKER_01:Sure. Very complex. But I do think it's just so alarming when you think about species extinction and loss of topsoil and the kind of pervasiveness of toxic chemicals so that we are finding them in our bodies, in our blood in our urine in you know all throughout whether it's a pristine mountain stream far far away from any agricultural production or you know the kern river i don't know but you're finding these persistent toxic chemicals everywhere and so if we could eliminate those i think like the importance of that cannot be understated
SPEAKER_00:i completely agree and i think everybody on the pod would be strange you're listening to this if you're not on that camp but then moving to the t the tractability which is actually the solvability like how solvable is that and I would love to get your image, like how important is the ROC, the ROC, a good certification for regenerative? How crucial is that for the solubility of the huge agriculture issues, which are enormous, as you described in the previous answer, like how can this be in a relatively short timeframe? Like if we have 200 years, it's a different discussion, but we have 10, 15, and you said we have KPI, we want to have an impact on a lot of acreage, a lot of animals and a lot of people. So how crucial is good certification in that as a leverage point?
SPEAKER_01:Well, I mean, I think that good certification or this ROC certification could be really important in this, but we have to think like nothing's going to be solved that quickly on a global scale. It's 1% of our farmland in America is farmed organically. So that's 99% that we need to look at converting. And there has been tremendous movement, as you know, and I'm sure all your listeners are aware, like this whole concept of regenerative has seized a nation. It's seized the world. And we're seeing conversions to regenerative practices on pretty large scale. We've got Cargill and Walmart announcing commitments to regenerative. Now, I don't know what exactly how they define regenerative, but if you are incorporating more practices to minimize tillage and to increasingly lean on cover crops and a really robust, beautiful mix of cover crops to build healthy soil.
SPEAKER_00:It's a good step.
SPEAKER_01:It's a great step. And so, you know, I don't think that the ROC is going to solve all the world problems. But in short order, I think, you know, it's going to require all kinds of shifts. And, you know, just beginning and looking at the gains that we can make in this coming year and the momentum that we will gather from that. And, you know, we'll be able to really prove this out, I think, over time and show kind of the amazing potential that regenerative organic holds and the benefits that it brings to those farmers who implement those practices. practices.
SPEAKER_00:You're very deliberate on the organic piece, which is very interesting.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:In a sense that it's very deliberately built on top of organic and you've always worked or you've worked quite a while in organic. Do you see that this is different? Because I'm sometimes worried that maybe organic at the beginning had the same hype as regenerative is now. I'm obviously in a bubble and literally we're all in a bubble now because of COVID. But is this different because you interact with a lot of brands? Like is regenerative hitting another nerve or a better nerve or a nerve better than organic did or is doing. Because only 1% is, like you said, it's only 1% of farmland and that's 30, 40 years of work.
SPEAKER_01:Right. But don't forget that we're importing a lot
SPEAKER_00:here.
SPEAKER_01:So rather than have our own farmers in the U.S. farming organically, we're bringing it in from other countries. So, you know, making that shift here for the farmers here to enjoy those benefits of the organic premium and the benefits of the organic farming that is done in a way rather than kind of input substitution model where you're just you Thank you so much. that we get now with climate change is improving their resilience and adaptability is huge. On top of, as they learn over time that they can increase their yields with these practices and decrease their reliance on imports, also bringing in more pollinators and increasing the biodiversity on their farm equals improved pollination of their crops. And I wanna say one thing too, as far as you said, striking a nerve or touching a nerve, It's more like, let's think of it like playing a chord and finding a beautiful chord to play in music is that I think so many brands are reaching out to us.
SPEAKER_00:Resonating.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, it's resonating. And I mean, we have one staff person who all week long is talking to brands and farmers who want to know how to get certified.
SPEAKER_00:And you didn't see that in organic. You didn't see that. No, not so much. So it is different.
SPEAKER_01:It's different for sure. There's some excitement around it. There's like all this, these people who want to partner and join forces and find ways to collaborate. We've got this concept that I am so excited to develop this year of this, the ROC flagship farm, essentially. And so like the Rodeo Institute will of course be our first flagship farm, but then we've got other applicants right now who are doing such amazing work in their communities, farming in these regenerative organic ways and also feeding their communities and giving opportunities to just work expressing all kinds of diversity and in those approaches there at those farms where we can start to celebrate that and help educate in a region other farmers. It's regenerative as unique to its location as all the practices are going to change depending on what you're farming, where you are, what your climate is. If it's an agroforestry setting or an annual row cropping or what have you, it's going to be different. And so having these rock flagship farms in different regions to stand up as models and to be educational centers and help other farmers see and learn what they're doing is going to be, I think, really helpful in the movement. For sure with farmers, rather than send out trained NRCS tech service providers or agronomists, or as we did in the Green Revolution, we were sending out all this great advice, quote unquote, from funded by USAID, funded by all the lobbyists or all the corporations that supported those projects. And bringing chemicals to the world and bringing these other ideas of the green revolution to the world that were completely contrary to what you would want to see happen in so many ways. So I think, you know, having that education stem from the farmers within a region is really important and like, you know, lifting them up as heroes in their communities and sheroes as the farmers who really get to help teach their neighbors. Farmers are always looking over the fence line at each other. And if they see that she's planting this cover crop over here and they're like, what in the heck is she doing over there? And they're making fun of her, which happens a lot, I think, in the early days of organic. But then they start to see the success that she may be having with her yields or with her milk cows or the reduced number of times the feed truck comes to that particular farm. The farmers are all watching that. It's not a mystery to them. So that's one idea that I'm really excited about as far as just kind of helping build this movement and prove out the benefits of these methods.
SPEAKER_00:And in terms of like the big brands are starting to make commitments. You mentioned Walmart and we have Nestle, General Mills, Danone and many others. Are we going to see a twofold question? Are we going to see, or do you hope to see any ROC certified ingredients in on their shelves anytime soon? And it also comes to another question of accessibility because organic has the, I mean, it became more accessible, especially in the last years, which maybe actually diluted some of the original values because it became more in industrial and it became maybe those two are connected. I don't know. In terms of ROC, is there not a trick, but is there a way to actually make this accessible to the farm workers that actually grew these crops to begin with, which in some cases, really good nutrition, dense food is completely off limit for many people? What is the social part there in terms of consumers? Is that part of ROC? And if not, what are your thoughts about it?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, well, let's see. So first off, you know, as far as those large corporations go, if they are going to meet our criteria and they earn that seal, then they can have a consumer facing product. And Danone was, you know, has been very, very interested in this, very supportive of it. I know General Mills is doing a lot with regenerative ag, you know, with ours, it's regenerative on top of organic. So it adds another layer and it's challenging. I mean, I definitely recognize that it's a bit cumbersome to require the organic certification as the baseline for rock because there's just a lot of, you this law and we have to meet, we follow it. Even though we're not an accredited NOP certifier, we're only going to work with NOP accredited certifiers or those international equivalents. And our organic is in our name, our trademark name. So we do have to abide by those rules. And that has its challenges, but I think ultimately is going to be really good because it just keeps that program really rigorous. And that seal that is going to be forward-facing means that those brands have gone through all those different...
SPEAKER_00:It means something,
SPEAKER_01:yeah. It does. And in our social framework, if you wanted to look into it deeper, you look at the ROC framework, there's a whole buyer's criteria. And so that applies to any of those brands who are going to have that consumer-facing logo means that they paid a premium to the farmers. They made sure the farm workers met the social standards, which are quite high. They have long-term contracts with the farmers. There's transparency. So the farmers know you know where they're going and how long this contract is and that they have full transparency and so it puts the farmers more in a position of power this idea of empowering the farmers and the farm workers we're trying you know how you codify that through a framework is
SPEAKER_00:which hopefully makes they can afford the product
SPEAKER_01:yeah and so then you get to like the cost like oh gosh that's gonna that that mango bar might cost like five dollars instead of a dollar or something like you look at the cost of it and so number one you know we're keeping our costs really low, our fees really low to try and help just onboard more farmers. And I think brands are really excited to commit to this. Like the brands I've been working with for the last two years are amazingly dedicated to doing this. And it seems like they have the margins to do this and to allocate a small percentage more towards support this effort and then some. You just look at how the brands are out there how much money brands spend to go have a presence at a place like Expo West. Have you been to Expo East or West before? So when we're all back in circulation again.
SPEAKER_00:Just describe it for the international audience. What's Expo West or East?
SPEAKER_01:It's grown so much. And I mean, it's chaos. It is. It's a pretty chaotic event. Now, it used to be something very much like by the original kind of movers and shakers in the organic sector. And it's gotten so big now. It's just a It's kind of a must do. You must exhibit there as any kind of food brand in this organic or natural sector. But it's definitely the most costly use of money. And I think a lot of companies could spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to have a really big presence at Expo.
SPEAKER_00:And a portion of
SPEAKER_01:that. regenerate their farm and to thrive. And so I think that part is really important. And just other brands looking at the stability of their supply chains and seeing that it's not stable and they need to rely on this kind of constant flow of product from their suppliers. So they need to really help strengthen their communities in which they depend. So I think that's another reason for the brands who get really excited about this and are really throwing down and interested in getting a rock product out there. We hear from a lot of them and I think there's going to be some beautiful partnerships forming this year with some
SPEAKER_00:of
SPEAKER_01:those brands.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I think it comes to, I don't know if it was a quote of Henry Ford, but starting to pay minimum wage so his workers could actually afford. Because otherwise you need to, that market, the farmers have been squeezed, the farm workers have been squeezing worse. So it's really trying to switch or to flip that at some point you have to start somewhere and it's going to be a challenge on all sides. And somebody has to squeeze a bit the margins and probably that is on the brand side, especially the brands with good margins. In terms of neglecting this, have you seen any other approaches globally on like a rigorous regenerative approach framework certification? Have you come across anything else in this space doing or trying or attempting this?
SPEAKER_01:There's some regenerative ag certifications or programs that are not necessarily attached to organic. And for us, we see regenerative as intrinsically linked to organic. It has to be organic or it can't be regenerative. You can call it regenerative ag if you're minimizing your tillage and adding a cover crop, but you're still planting Roundup Ready corn and soy that is feeding this concept of here in the US, all our subsidies drive farmers towards that at their peril in some cases, but it's like it's our federal crop insurance program. It rewards them for growing Roundup Ready corn and soy the most. So it's kind of this idea that we have to produce cheap food that I think is really one of the neglected areas we need to really think about is changing our mindset. We aren't entitled to cheap food. Eggs cost more than 10 cents. But yet, if you go to any big box store in America, you will find a dozen eggs for a dollar. I think that's outrageous. How do you produce an egg for 10 cents? You don't. Somebody's losing there. And everybody's losing. In fact, I don't even know how it comes to that. Like the consumers are getting a product that is really low quality. The farmers are getting shafted or losing their farms. And the companies that are benefiting are the ones that are they're getting government subsidies and they're paying low prices to their suppliers. So I think it's a mindset change that we really need to have. And we need to value the production of healthy products. Let's
SPEAKER_00:switch gears a bit to the investment side. Let's imagine, and hopefully there are, many impact investors or investors looking for, let's say, deep net positive impact with their portfolios. Without giving investment advice, obviously, where would you point them to in terms of Regen Food and Ag? If they've read the books, they saw the movies, they visited some farms, and now they want to get their hands dirty, where should they start or where would you start?
SPEAKER_01:One really important piece of advice, quote unquote, I'll say, is patient care. capital, not looking to turn like invest and turn money around so quickly that you have to be in it for the long term. And you've had one of my favorite people on your show, Philip Taylor from Mad Ag. And like what he's doing, I think is a fantastic example of how we can really build this movement. I'm not sure which episode that was. And I didn't even get a chance to listen to the whole thing. But what Phil's doing with the perennial fund is pretty extraordinary.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, we'll put it in the show notes. Cool.
SPEAKER_01:I think it's going to bring a lot of change. And it's like recognizing that farming is something, adopting these different methods takes time. You don't just do it in one night. And it may even take, like, as you get off that chemical treadmill, it's going to take a few years to build the health back into your soil so that you don't need those chemical inputs. And as you incorporate more and more regenerative practices and improve your yields and recapture some of those profits at the farm level, you know, the way Phil's program works, that they will loan the money to them. But then over time, once the farmers through that transition trough, that they'll be ready to start paying that back. And I think that kind of investment in this work is really important. And you had another really fascinating guest. And I just throw it out there because I thought that the invisible fences with the collars.
SPEAKER_00:Frank Wooten. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Frank Wooten. It's fascinating. I mean, because I do think a lot about it, like how much labor it takes a farmer to move fences, how many times they are spending having to go out and find the calves that got away or the sheep that got away, and also what it does to wildlife corridors. It's going to open up entire landscapes for wildlife.
SPEAKER_00:In ways that we cannot even imagine yet.
SPEAKER_01:So much. It's really fascinating. And maximize your forage intake by looking on the satellite and drawing in wherever that, in the morning, rather than have to go out on, used to be horse, now most farmers are out on four-wheelers, But, you know, they've got to go out and figure out where to move the animals next, especially in that peak growing season. So I thought that was super fascinating and not being really in the investment world. So I'm probably not a good, don't have a lot of good tips on that.
SPEAKER_00:I have another question for you in that sense. What happens if you would wake up tomorrow and you're the investment director and actually it's your fund of$1 billion. So it's a lot of money and I don't need to know the exact breakdown. I'm interested in what you would focus on because I'm interested in decision-making frameworks or what would you prioritize if you had not an unlimited amount of money, but a lot of money to invest? So not to grant, but to invest. It could come back without a return. I mean, that's up to you. But what would you focus on first, second, maybe third, or you would focus everything on one thing?
SPEAKER_01:No, I have a couple ideas there on where that money would go first. I think the first thing is infrastructure. Farmers really need improvements on infrastructure so that they can access the market and be more in control of it and not only have one outlet. One Cargill elevator in every town across the Midwest doesn't give farmers a lot of options. So giving farmers, you know, investing in infrastructure so that they can get food to local market and they can diversify their crops. So, you know, you need food hubs and distribution centers. We need mobile slaughtering units. We need different ways to receive that food besides the one grain elevator. So that would be one. And that wouldn't just be across America. It could go all over the place.
SPEAKER_00:I think it's a problem every Yeah,
SPEAKER_01:and definitely I like to think of it as an opportunity, but it's a huge problem, like how people access food. going into research. So finding the ways to kind of funnel that money into proving the case for regenerative organic. And then the other would be to angle towards consumers. Back to what you saw was my pet peeve is this idea of cheap food is like educating consumers on the value of eating local, eating seasonally, eating food grown without chemicals and in these other ways that you're going to have more bionutrient rich food. And so, you know, consumers just need a lot of education on that. And we have vast amounts of money that go into the USDA food stamps program, but it drives people to purchase very cheap food and is resulting in like this complete epidemic here of obesity and diabetes and heart disease, all because we're after this cheap food that has no real caloric value or improves the health of those folks consuming it.
SPEAKER_00:I think it's a great answer. So we took your fund away. I'm sorry, but if you have, it is maybe more powerful. You have a magic wand and you can change one thing in the agriculture system, what would that be?
SPEAKER_01:I think that we need to eliminate the influence from corporations who benefit from the subsidies that are driving farmers to more and more chemical and GMO production and basically tax, put a tax on conventional industrial agriculture, much like we have for tobacco or gasoline, and use the taxes for that to reward farmers who are implementing these more farming in service of life and in service of their community and improving the ecology where they're growing food and fiber.
SPEAKER_00:I like the question because it forces you to pick one or it forces you to pick the highest leverage point if you had unlimited power, which is always nice to hear what people come up with. And as a final question, definitely inspired by John Kemp, what do you believe to be true about region ag that others don't believe to be true? Where are your
SPEAKER_01:That's true. Really, what we do is we produce corn that goes to ethanol or corn and soy that goes to animal feed in other countries for us to import the livestock back here. It's just kind of a vicious circle of deception. And I think letting farmers truly feed the world through these methods by bringing agriculture more local whenever possible and implementing these methods would be something I believe to be true. and love the work of John Kemp.
SPEAKER_00:I think it's a great point to end. I think it's still, there's a lot of A lot of bubbles to pop from people that really feel that the current industrial agriculture system is feeding the world, which by no means it's true. And thus that these cute regenerative farmers, which in many cases are enormous operations and producing more biomass, food, nutrients, calories than their neighbors, are in no way possible. They could never feed the world. And my answer is go and visit them and go and count some of the calories and go and see for yourself, because it's quite a shocking illusion that we have that the current industrial Ag system is feeding the world. Most of the world is fed by smallholder farmers. And that's, thus the regen farmers can never, they never can compete because maybe their corn yield is just a bit lower in a good year. In a bad year, it's always higher compared to anybody else, but they might produce, I don't know how many other crops. So it's a very interesting
SPEAKER_01:illusion
SPEAKER_00:that we never look at the full picture there. And I get really annoyed, like, but can we actually feed the world with it? Like, really? Are we still, are we still having that debate? Like we have the rock solid proof that it's very complicated, but it's absolutely possible.
SPEAKER_01:It's totally possible. I mean, we've just come out of four years here in America of complete lies being told by our president straight to the camera, to the news media that makes people think that there's all these flaws in our system and you just keep repeating, repeating, repeating a lie and then suddenly you've got a bunch of people believing it and seizing onto that and becoming so incensed that they may storm the Capitol, for example. We just saw it all happen and unfold before for our very eyes. So I think you're totally right. And that busting that myth, debunking that myth that we have to feed the world, like feed your community.
SPEAKER_00:Start with that.
SPEAKER_01:And if you grow some crops for export, like that's fine to diversify and bring in cash, of course, but really making that shift to feeding the community. And as you just said, like small farmers do feed the world. And so it's just, it's a misconception for sure.
SPEAKER_00:For better or for worse. I'm not saying it's an ideal system, but it's the amount of calories produced. And if you do it well, I mean, we've all, we've visited examples, but I would like to tell everybody that hasn't or is doubting here, like go visit very interesting, go visit farms, first of all, and spend a lot of time there and go and visit the outstanding examples, the farms you will be a flagship farms and others and see the amount of, I would say the amount of life created on it and the amount of food that comes off it or fibers or oils or all of the above. But it's definitely the abundance is quite interesting to see. in places that normally don't have a lot of abundance?
SPEAKER_01:I live on a little, like an acre and have a little micro farm and it's stunning how much food you can grow on just like one little area. And so when you take that with a farmer who's got real experience and really grows and does it all day long, like you can feed, you can grow a lot of really beautiful, healthy calories in that way and feed quite a lot of people. I just think everybody should do their best to know the hands who feed you. Know those hands and know those people, get to know farmers in your community and just remembering that farmers are a really vulnerable spot. It's tough. It's really tough work. And I think anything we can do to support and better know the farmers and the stewards of our land and food are going to bring us that much further to better health for us and for the planet.
SPEAKER_00:I want to thank you, Elizabeth, so much. I'm wishing you luck with this crazy busy year and getting 60 plus applicants and probably there will be many more coming in through the certifications and getting products out there, ingredients out there and all of the above and getting all the partnerships with companies going. It sounds like a lot of fun and a lot of work. It's awesome.
SPEAKER_01:It's great. It is a lot of fun and a lot of challenges. And I mean, I just would say those 60 applicants came in when we haven't even really celebrated far and wide that we're open for business. We were doing a self launch. We can test our system. So I'm excited to see what's going to happen once we start pushing it out there. And really, we've got a lot more certifiers coming on as well. So the more certifiers we have, the more we can do this work in different regions. So it's going to be a really great season of growth for us. And I thank you so much for your work. I listen to your show all the time. I start making comments. I'm kind of like the anti-social media type that I'll get on there. And thank you for all your great work.
SPEAKER_00:Thank you so much. If you would like to learn more on how to put money to work in regenerative food and agriculture, find our video course on investing in regenerative agriculture dot com slash course. This course will teach to understand the opportunities to get to know the main players to learn about the main trends and how to evaluate a new investment opportunity like what kind of questions to ask find out more on investinginregenerativeagriculture.com slash course if you found the investing in regenerative agriculture and food podcast valuable there are a few simple ways you can use to support it number one rate and review the podcast on your podcast app that's the best way for other listeners to find the podcast and it only takes a few seconds Thank you so much and see you at the next podcast.
