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
380 Frederik Lean Hansen - Double-purpose chickens and the regen dating agency matching landowners with land seekers
A barefoot conversation across his Danish farmland with Frederik Lean Hansen, advisor on regenerative farm finance, revealing the efficiency of his pasture-raised chicken operation and Abunda, the revolutionary business he's building to connect land holders with entrepreneurial farmers.
How many times have you visited a farm or heard a story from a farmer or landowner who wished for more people on the farm? Someone to start a market garden, run a chicken operation, or build an advanced biofertiliser brewery? More stacked enterprises, more diversity, and more hands and eyes on the land- of course, only if it makes financial sense. But let’s assume that’s the case. Where do you find these entrepreneurial people who fit your context, your farm, country, culture, and personality? And once you find them, how do you structure the financial and legal side to create a partnership that lasts?
We probably all agree that we need more well-paid people on the land—so how do we make that happen?
This episode is a conversation where we walk the land (just a few hectares) and check in on the latest developments: pasture-based chickens on Fred’s farm, the earliest steps into agroforestry and, most importantly, Fred’s new venture focused on land matching.
==========================
In Investing in Regenerative Agriculture and Food podcast show 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. Hosted by Koen van Seijen.
==========================
👩🏻💻 YOUR OUR WEBSITE
💪🏻 SUPPORT OUR WORK
- Join Gumroad
- Share it
- Give a 5-star rating
- Buy us a coffee… or a meal!
==========================
🎙 LISTEN TO OUR PODCAST AND SUBSCRIBE TO OUR CHANNEL OR WATCH IT ON 📽️ our YouTube channel
==========================
FOLLOW US!
==========================
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.
Thoughts? Ideas? Questions? Send us a message!
Thank you to our Field Builders Circle for supporting us. Learn more here
https://investinginregenerativeagriculture.com/course
Find out more about our Generation-Re investment syndicate:
https://gen-re.land/
Feedback, ideas, suggestions?
- Twitter @KoenvanSeijen
- Get in touch www.investinginregenerativeagriculture.com
Join our newsletter on www.eepurl.com/cxU33P!
Support the show
Thanks for listening and sharing!
How many times have you visited a farm or heard a story of a farmer or land owner that wished they had more people on the farm? Someone to start a market garden, someone to run a chicken operation or an advanced biofertilizer brewery? More stacked enterprises, more diversity and more hands and eyes on the farm? Of course, only if it makes financial sense, but let's assume that's the case. Where do you find these entrepreneurial people who fit your context, your farm, your country, your culture and your personality entrepreneurial people who fit your context, your farm, your country, your culture and your personality? And when you find them, how do you structure the financial, legal side to make a partnership that actually lasts? We probably all agree we need more people well-paid people on the land. So how do we make that happen. This is a conversation where we walk the land, albeit only two hectares, and check in on the latest developments around pasture-based chickens, on the land of FRED and the earliest starts of an agroforestry system, but, more importantly, on the new venture of FRED focused on land matching between people owning the land and people able to work the land but they don't have access to it, facilitating land partnerships which should last. This is the Investing in Regenerative Agriculture and Food podcast, where we learn more on how to put money to work to regenerate soil, people, local communities and ecosystems, while making an appropriate and fair return. So welcome to.
Speaker 1:I have the feeling I keep saying this is the last month to another special episode. So I will say if everything is special, nothing is special. Obviously To another episode and we have Fred back on the show episode. So I will say, if everything is special, nothing is special. Obviously to to another episode and we have fred back on the show and it is a different one at least, as we're walking land a couple of hectares, we're close to the chickens, we're actually bare feet. Of course we had to, because it's a really nice day here in the danish countryside and I think it was about a year plus we had you on, yes, after a massive tour through Europe, I think, 12 different farms you visited and worked on not just visited, but actually spent quality time on the land and in their books. So we're going to talk about that as well. And that was exactly the moment you were landing back in Denmark figuring out what to do, and a lot has happened since then, so of course, I'll put the link in the other episode that we did previously in the show notes.
Speaker 1:If you haven't listened to that, don't do it now. Do it another moment. But you might want to take a stroll, or you might want to cook something, or you might want. Whatever you end up doing, and tell me as well what do you do when you listen to the podcast. It's always nice to hear those. But welcome back, fredman.
Speaker 2:Thank you for having us on on your beautiful piece of land, walking through a very diverse pasture. You're more than welcome. At least it's a bit more diverse than the neighboring fields, I would say. Which, of course there are.
Speaker 1:It's funny because you see the very, very monoculture and there's some very stubborn plants poking through, which there always are, of course. But yeah, so just to describe a bit, always the walking the land episodes are we try to make them as visual as possible, even though they're out here, obviously like where are we? Just geography wise, and what should people imagine if they would be walking here with us, what they see around?
Speaker 2:well, first, of all, we are right around an hour southwest of Copenhagen. It's just outside a town called Nestle. Specifically, this place is called Korshøj-Gorsvaj which is a mouthful.
Speaker 1:Try to Google that. Only Danish people can Google that probably.
Speaker 2:Even some Danish people find that difficult. Only Danish people can do that. Probably Even some Danish people find that difficult. The entire land plot is actually 3.3 hectares, so that includes some houses, two houses. There's a bit of a perennial market garden, a little bit Mostly hobby that one. And then we planted quite a few cherry trees, which is an alleyway in the middle that we haven't got to yet, and then we have the pawpaw trees that are struggling a little bit for the first year here, but but then on top of that we have the, the chicken or the hens, really as they are, and yeah, so there's essentially a small, tiny flock trying to figure out if we want to do a dual purpose kind of operation in Denmark. What would that look like? What is the, what's the sales, what's the price we can, we should and can take for that, and what is the optimal way of doing it and what kind of feed is really great and how often should we move them? How does the grass respond?
Speaker 1:tons of questions of course, and they're, they just arrived, like, this is two months in. Right, they're 19, they were 20 and so that's predator. Issues like how serious is that? And how do you because it's interesting immediately and that was definitely a theme of the other conversation we had a previous one you go into okay, how does this look like economically and time wise, and how does this look moving wise, an hour and minutes? And, okay, does this make sense? Like what are?
Speaker 1:Of course, 19 is not a sustainable number, but it gives you data. It gives you data on feet and how much, yeah, insect versus grain and all of those things that, like, those models aren't really those recipes. I think, on the like if you would be wanting to do that in in the danish countryside or many other places, nobody is able to tell you. No, like what? Okay, do you need a thousand chickens or ten thousand or five hundred, or what do you need to build? What kind of grass do you need? How do you optimize for? Because those recipes, quote unquote, are basically non-existent. So this is research you're doing, basically.
Speaker 2:Definitely, and a lot of these assumptions that you're mentioning or alluding to, at least they are unverified still. And even in this context, we're still getting started and from my current assumptions I start to be able to make a nice living from it at around 600 hens.
Speaker 1:It's a bit of a step, yeah but not completely, not a massive amount of course of hens relative to what is the stand in many other places.
Speaker 2:But that allows me to hire someone, pay them well, and I would need to convince my neighbor to use a little bit of his land, which I think I can. Hopefully I'm lobbying to it. Made it later today serving some cake to convince no, but it's so.
Speaker 1:So that's on the current land would you need for that?
Speaker 2:around a hectare more okay, which is? Essentially this plot right next to conveniently enough, so so that should be enough.
Speaker 1:Of course not growing all the feed yourself like there's a yeah no, I couldn't.
Speaker 2:I couldn't do that here for sure. But one of the one of the assumptions was that, oh, we can avoid a massive amount of feed if we're just letting them stroll around and find their own food, and the fact that we have a quite a we have a close vicinity to, like a wildlife, a bit of a wildlife reserve here. So that's a lot of insects really that's coming our way. Despite the fact that we're surrounded by a lot of monoculture, we're still finding a lot of insects here, and thus the hens are also finding that, which is great. So in those two months that we've had them, we were counting on, let's say, around 75, 76 kilos of feed for these hens per month, and so far, after two months, we've spent 50.
Speaker 1:Which is a third. What was the number based on the 75?
Speaker 2:Some industry reports are asking other people around here. So it may have been a bit high and we planned it relatively conservatively, but those were the numbers that I could find and again it just proves that assumptions are just assumptions and we're going to have the proofs in the pudding.
Speaker 1:Really, it's such a big difference.
Speaker 2:It is. And also we have to also take into regard that these are new hens. Yeah, so the feed consumption will probably pick up.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so they are dual purpose, relatively focused, you mentioned before, which we've covered deeply Two of them are with Claire. Yeah, we'll link that below as well, if you want to know more.
Speaker 2:Definitely inspired by plantain. For that, 100% Plantain Farm UK. Shout out to Anne and Claire. Yeah, annie and Claire. Hello, and George and Rupert, of course. Yeah, so two of the breeds are like what you would probably call strictly or dual purpose breeds that are purposefully bred for that. So it's Plymouth Rock and it's Light Sussex, they call it here, but they're essentially meaty hens, right, and so they work well for both. Of course, it's not a like a hybrid hen that lays 365 eggs per year, but it's not that far off and you're going to get 320, 300, something like, depending on how the welfare and all kinds of other factors.
Speaker 2:And then they actually work well for slaughtering as well, so we can take time off in the wintertime. That's kind of part of our context. Here is really, we would like to have the option at least to not have to take care of 600 or 1,200, whatever hens throughout the winter.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, it's part of the, which is interesting, yeah, from a puzzle perspective, how also the land perspective, of course. Then you need to at the logistics. You need to house them somewhere. Yeah, you cannot have them outside.
Speaker 1:To a certain extent, like it's, the logistical challenge becomes just much easier to put them inside, which, of course, is where the whole industry went to yeah instead of having that role on the land, which they do, that here they take way more insects and other sources than you planned for, you thought or you modeled yeah, well, I'm aware that a lot of these breeds are obviously somewhat accustomed to the Danish climate over time, but they still suffer a bit in the cold and they definitely up their feed consumption and the egg production is way down in winter.
Speaker 2:So from an economic perspective the general idea is that they're not efficient egg layers in the wintertime anyway, and we think we can get a good price for them if you sell them as meat. So that remains to be seen as well, but yeah, but in all of these things and, in all honesty, it's like we're thinking that we really want to first of all test how much do we really want to take care of hens? Yeah, there's also other things, and there's a bit of a dead animal here.
Speaker 1:Not a hen, but something that wants to take the roots of your trees.
Speaker 2:I forget the name of it, but yeah, it looks like a big rat really. Yeah, more furry, anyway. So, visually speaking, we're walking next to the cherry trees. We planted 70 cherry trees which we're going to try and make some beverages from, unless my girlfriend eats all of them. Beforehand yeah, she's Persian, so she loves the sour cherries really.
Speaker 1:Do you see like have you rotated? Or it's two months, but like the impact of the chickens on the land yeah, well, you can see it, the place we started.
Speaker 2:Well, now you can't see it, but you probably didn't notice any difference right next to the shed over there where we have the future brooder yeah, the future brooder, because the difference is very minimal, because the land has been responding like insanely well. So we thought that we were not going to be able to put chickens back there until after, I don't know, three months or something like that, but after one month the grass was essentially ready. Well, a bit more than a month, let's say five weeks, it was basically ready for. So we also, to be fair, we didn't push the grass that hard in that spot and we tried to push the grass a bit harder down here just to see what will happen.
Speaker 1:Is there any thought on integrating other animals on the ruminant side? We often do, but of course then the winter comes as well, integrating ruminants and chickens in a nice insect orchestra.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think we're just too small for that. To be honest, our plot doesn't really lend itself very well for that. But I think we're probably due to the slug a classic slug issue in the perennial market garden there.
Speaker 1:You're gonna go for ducks?
Speaker 2:We're looking for ducks, as you might imagine, as we're walking past the struggling pawpaw trees.
Speaker 1:Last year was an absolute slug disaster in most of Northern Europe and this year looks better, I think.
Speaker 2:Well, if you ask my mom who's just walking over there, she'll curse them for sure.
Speaker 1:Last year. We were in a market garden last spring like probably this Andres Yara, and the amount like in the thousands per day, like it was crazy, yeah. And then, and of course, everybody, suddenly it was like this whole explosion. Everybody was looking for runner ducks, to get them. It was all business around runner ducks for hire, basically. But we were, I think, at benedict bursals they're the market garden. They also had a massive issue and they couldn't get them in because they're fully vegan, so they didn't want animals on the land, okay, but they just kept removing them and it was just an endless because they were all set up for drought and I think last year was very wet, so they they were used to like very dry circumstances suddenly became super wet and like the market garden just was ambushed by I could Wow.
Speaker 2:that's an interesting topic, by the way. And regenerative how does that kind of work in practice? I'm a bit puzzled, to be honest.
Speaker 1:I think there are market gardens around, especially oh yeah, you need to be really good, obviously with compost, and but then yeah, if you have a slug problem, are you hardcore enough to not get the slugs or not get the ducks? For the slugs and that's a question. I don't know if I would be that radical, but also like my, my carrots being devoured yeah, and also what's the actual? Issue. Let's say you're vegan.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're getting ducks to do the work, yeah I mean, they're gonna be happy to do it and you're just caring for animals, then hello doggies the guard dogs are around and so okay.
Speaker 1:So here figuring out recipes, what could work? What's the been the reaction from the surrounding? In that sense, very receptive.
Speaker 2:Hello, yeah, everyone just wants the eggs. We are just an undersupply.
Speaker 1:Which I think is pretty cool. It's such a pattern that I'm seeing with everyone.
Speaker 2:Why do you think that?
Speaker 1:is.
Speaker 2:I don't know.
Speaker 1:I think that people Such an access to quality, relatively okay, price like easy. You see the difference when you break what makes eggs such a low-hanging fruit or, I don't know, gateway drug or whatever term you want to use. Because you hear it everywhere and for crazy prices like you can push it up to, I think like a euro, more than a euro per egg.
Speaker 2:In certain happy chicken situations In Copenhagen I've seen a sales price of more than a euro, which I think to be honest. I don't feel comfortable going that high.
Speaker 1:to be honest, or, like the sport people that are really looking for this.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Like what's the? That we suddenly care by quality of eggs and where they came from in the chickens compared to any other protein that we don't really care about yet Well, I think it's quite tangible. You can go and see it and it's a lot of people, a lot more people have had chickens in the backyard compared to a cow in the backyard. Very true, so I feel like it's probably more relatable.
Speaker 2:They know someone. They've held a chicken or they've been traumatized by being in a kindergarten where they chopped off the head of a hen and then it was running around, and now they're traumatized for life and they're scared and then they just want someone else to do it. I don't know, but you get the point.
Speaker 1:I'm not sure about like Danish kindergarten. It's happened, I'm just telling you. Of course it has happened.
Speaker 2:I've got a cousin who's afraid of chickens and now he won't come here because of that.
Speaker 2:Wow, okay, yeah, no, I can, but it's much more relatable because it is smaller and people don't have them yeah, it feels more and also, like I feel like the quality difference is probably easier to detect, like you, the freshness and the that I always talk about this experience when the first time I I tasted these pasture-raised eggs really at again at plantain and I usually would put salt on my eggs and I just didn't have to and it was just kind of mind-blowing for me and I feel like it's the same with our eggs here.
Speaker 1:It's like a superfood and relatively accessible, Like an amazing steak would push you down, like set you back quite a bit and eggs, even if they cost 60, 70, 80 cents, it's a very complete superfood. Yeah, it's interesting how many of these places with amazing pasture raised eggs are constantly sold out, like you. Basically, Of course, you have 19 chickens there's nothing right.
Speaker 1:But the reception and the fact that you even look at. Okay, if I got to 500, 600, I know I could make it work and I can probably. That's like 500 eggs a day. That's not insignificant.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And you don't want to drive all the way to Copenhagen to sell that Like you want to, probably, or?
Speaker 2:Well, I would think that I could sell them locally. Yeah, given the response so far, but who knows? Maybe I'll find one sales outlet in Copenhagen or whatever.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it one sales outlet in.
Speaker 2:Copenhagen or whatever. Yeah, yeah, it also is a matter of finding enough people, really, who want that, and whilst I do think that they probably are here, even I say quote-unquote even- in a place like Nestle, where I am now, I think they do exist in my sense so far, and also I think it's the fact that eggs are not just. If you have a steak, how much can you really do with it? You can eat it.
Speaker 1:You can grill it.
Speaker 2:But with eggs it's an ingredient, it's a product in itself, so there's so many things you can really do with it, and so it's just. I feel like it's more accessible price-wise, it's more versatile. There are not a lot of people who are scared of eating it, meaning that, okay, some people at least would hesitate to eat a lot of, let's say, red meat for various reasons, and it's not the same with eggs. Eggs are just everyone loves eggs.
Speaker 1:It's just interesting and it's a bit of a revival because we had this whole cholesterol scare, but that somehow seems less now. I think a lot of research is not backing up the fact that we should really be scared.
Speaker 1:I still remember Pierre-Will of Le Blanc Co came on the show and said yeah, really well-raised eggs or chickens, the eggs can be super healthy. Or if it's raised on soy, et cetera, et cetera, it can be very inflammatory, like it is. That's kind of product that can go both ways, like many animal proteins. So you can see it very quickly what you fed it it's going to show up and people start to recognize them very interesting. And then totally yeah, this is not most of your, let's say, week go. Of course you move the chickens and of course you collect the 10 eggs etc. But that's not.
Speaker 1:And you do some of the analysis. Okay, do I actually want to do this, etc. Yeah, but you do a lot of financial planning and work with clients all over europe and that morphed into, or is about to, or starts to morph into, a company. So not quote unquote, just because it's not just say freelance work for, okay, a farmer in spain that wants to understand his or her financial situation or, like what we discussed last time, dashboarding and things like that. No, it's actually. It's becoming a company. Yeah, it is. And how did that happen? How did it come about?
Speaker 2:Well, it's like a good love story, right.
Speaker 2:I met someone no, it's.
Speaker 2:I started working of course, it's actually mostly in the UK, for farm clients, really and I met my now business partner, harry Epsom, who's a land agent and he's been dubbed the regenerative land agent of the UK somehow Some not a self taken title, but a given which is very important.
Speaker 2:He's very humble in his ways. So, yeah, we met and it turns out that we started having common clients really and working more and more together, and we saw the same issues really of people wanting to find people to work with and they couldn't find the good people to work with really. So we thought, ok, if we're seeing this pattern pretty clearly, could we help solve that? And so we looked at the existing ways of doing that. You have the concept of land matching really, which is not unknown and not unheard of, but it would appear that it didn't release. The current attempts had not solved the problem in its entirety. I think they solved pockets of it, like it's often been very regionally focused, it's often been very manual, which has its value, of course, but doesn't make it very scalable and therefore not economical.
Speaker 1:The current solution. Let's say what's the current problem and the current solution? It's a landowner looking at a contractor, someone to farm the land for a bit and hopefully pay rent.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean there's a few different things that go wrong there, but mainly it comes down to good farms are run by good relationships, and so what we saw, both in the literature, really, and by talking to people and understanding from our own experience, is that the main thing that goes wrong in these collaborations or partnerships as they are joint venture or contract farming or tenancy really as well, has a degree of sometimes of profit share, etc. It could be is the relationship between the farmers really that go wrong, and why is that right? So we started looking into that and it turns out that there's no. There's currently no real in-depth alignment of expectations.
Speaker 2:there's no match between necessarily the holistic context, if you will, the visions, and so there's just not a lot of matching happening in general and I'm I totally pay respect to all of the different people who've done land matching in the past and they've done really amazing work, but it's also been relatively limited how many they could reach really, because it's it's been fairly manual and I'm saying that right now our process is super manual it's more manual than we would like to.
Speaker 2:Of course, we've, in the in the last let's say, four or five months, since we've really agreed that this is what we're doing, we've gathered a lot of processes and templates and standard ways of doing things and using different digital tools together to streamline the process Okay, that's nice and build, of course, a database of candidates really for landholders, which we call land seekers essentially, but it's still a relatively manual process, right, like a manual dating process, for it's like. Tinder for farms. I'm not. Well, I didn't say that we should cut it out.
Speaker 1:But I think the issue is so large, Like you have so many people for some kind of reason, and we can do a whole series about land ownership issues, should it be concentrated, et cetera, et cetera. But let's say they have the land, yeah, and they're not going to, for now, sell it into or give it to the commons. Some will, but let's say the majority 80-20 won't, Probably being very generous. So what's going to happen there? Many are not willing, able or interested in managing that land differently, which means most of the land is managed subpar, like the absolute basis, to get maybe a subsidy to pay the rent, but not to its fullest ecosystem or even financial probably financial as well potential. And then there's this whole group but that's an assumption, of course that are people that are able to farm at a certain scale and able to communicate money and run it as a company, like a small company we talked about it last time as well incorporate with others and do the like, value add etc. And bring home an interesting salary but, they don't have.
Speaker 1:They weren't lucky in the sperm lottery that they were born on land, and so there's that huge mismatch.
Speaker 1:Yeah, then, of course, the question can is it actually a scalable way of bringing them together and not help five or ten per year, which is amazing, but yeah, it's not going to cut it. Let's say, in this transition, because there's this generational shift as well, can we start pre-selecting people already for all those farms that are going to be up for sale, up for transition, up for anything? Because, yeah, what's the average age? 60 something, 65 something, and that's an issue, and so you're stepping right in the middle of that tension.
Speaker 1:Okay, with young, younger people that want to farm some, some are able. Okay, let's match. But then this is really interesting, like if my land so this and like, oh yeah, are you happy if there's like 70 cherry trees in your land and a chicken caravan?
Speaker 2:maybe not, maybe yes there's so many things to just talk about from what the things you just mentioned.
Speaker 1:Yeah, sorry, it was a bit of a rant. The question is where to start.
Speaker 2:Let's say we take the perspective of the land holder right. That's the, that's your Farm owner or, we say, land holder, because they may be renting some of it or on different they can decide.
Speaker 1:they can decide, they have the control of it at the end of the day.
Speaker 2:So, from their perspective, we're lucky, I would say, to work with some of the, I would say, pioneers in the UK as of now who really want to move the needle and have access to a fairly big piece of land.
Speaker 1:So a lot can happen. And when you say, move the needle, are they interested themselves to farm and bring others on as well? Like to start stacking these things, or is it like I want someone to take this out of my hands and just run with it, but I don't want to be moving the chicken tractors, or I don't want to be doing my whatever I was doing before?
Speaker 2:Well, I guess a mixture of what you're saying. When you say pioneers, are they still involved in that as well? They're what you're saying, because when you say pioneers, are they still involved in that as well? They're involved in the sense that they have a pretty, fairly clear vision, actually, that we in some cases help them refine as well, and they want to be involved in the direction of the farm, but they don't, like you're saying, want to move the chicken caravan because they are doing other things and they're doing essentially you could almost look at them as like portfolio managers of an investment fund.
Speaker 2:Interesting yeah, okay, you have in on the farm. You have a few stacked enterprises. You may have cows and there's some follower chickens. You may have a market garden and some people even have not directly farming related, but more like processing steps, like a butchery, like it's a real estate and you can't imagine and like hospitality things, so like.
Speaker 2:There's a whole range of things that are related to activities around food and farming that ideally regenerate the land right, and mostly for now we're focusing on the ones that are producing food. But we have examples of, let's say, finding someone who can tie it all together between the different enterprises and actually run a farm shop.
Speaker 1:Right, that is an example, but it's so interesting from the conversation we had as well like how we expect all of these functions to live in one person or two, maybe a couple and it's like nowhere else in economy.
Speaker 1:We expect that. We're like no, you specialize and you start hiring people or finding people, join ventures. What are the structures? That specialization makes sense? And, of course, you want to do diverse things. I'm not saying you want to plant strawberries every day, and so these are the pioneers that recognize okay, there could be space for other people if I only had the time and attention for this, or that's it. But actually, if I have somebody that that does the farm shop properly, it's amazing. But it's also a job and some or it's a. And then so somebody comes to you that because you're not looking for, are you? Maybe it's a question like for employees versus entrepreneurs. Is that a?
Speaker 2:it's for now, it's been mainly looking for someone with at least a bit of an entrepreneurial spirit, because you're essentially looking for a partner yeah, you're looking for a business partner, not an employee. But it also happens that, okay, this is, this could be a big risk for both sides. Let's test, test it out, so we don't. Of course, we can't decide things for the landholders nor the land seekers. Really. We can recommend things and we can encourage, and so we do encourage testing it out, really the relationship and having a framework of leveling expectations and having conflict management look like right, and let's make sure that we check in regularly.
Speaker 2:What does success look like? Right? And let's make sure that we check in regularly. Let's make sure that there's a there's at least a potential for a mediator to come in and help in the cases where it gets difficult, because it does get difficult and there's a lot of risk and it's a lot of farming. Is just risk management, right? So that's another reason to not take everything on yourself is well, maybe I should share the risk with someone who has their hands on the stove, really, with the right incentive, we are aligned in the vision sufficiently to work together and we know how each other, how each person, prefers to communicate and things like that. There's these things that are really important but often overlooked, which where we work with an occupational therapist to help us on the psychology side and at the end of the day, we hope that's going to help and so far it looks good, but we're only getting started. It could be an answer for many things, but we're hopeful.
Speaker 1:Because so far you've been focusing on, or let's say the starting point, is the land folder. Because I can immediately imagine they are eager obviously to to have, when well matched, extra help, support, entrepreneurial spirit etc on their land. Because usually what we see in, I think, anywhere on a, let's say, mid-sized farm or reasonable size plot, we're only scratching the surface of how many enterprises, how many ecological enterprise, holistically we can push the boundaries. And it comes to agroforestry, when it comes to processing, when it comes to keeping money on theirs, we're very much at the beginning of many places, but they all require semi full-time attention. So of course not all gets done. And from the other side, like on term of, like the land seekers, how has been the response there? Because they are seeking, which means they have been talking to farm like what's not in it for them. But how is this helping them to find better places to start and trial faster?
Speaker 2:well, I guess the basic principle is that we help them find it right and they've been looking, probably yeah.
Speaker 2:They've been looking. A lot of them. Well, all of the ones that we're in touch with, which is quite a few at this point, they're actively looking for land, and for a variety of reasons, and so we help the land seekers by essentially onboarding them to our network, and so it means that they sign up right, and based on that sometimes just based on the sign-up form that we have we can already say oh, look, this opportunity over here looks quite promising, let's look into it. There's something that might be a match, and I think the key word there is might.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because it could be so diverse, like the predictability there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, of course. Course it's a few months in, but it's going to be. Yeah, like, but then the next step is that they essentially fill out what we call a mini holistic context. Right it's. We try to condense the most key questions to answer to make sure that we can actually match people in a relatively reliable way, and we're still hand-holding part of that process, right it's interesting how the holistic context starts to pop up.
Speaker 1:Yeah, everywhere, from writing contracts on investment to these kind of things to, for sure, relationships, it's very interesting, definitely.
Speaker 2:Well, it does make sense because it's not only your vision, right? It's also like what's your actual situation? Do you already have money at hand to invest in something? Are you going to have to fundraise? You might have to look for a landholder who has the finances to invest in your enterprise, or you need to find someone to help you with raising that money from a bank. Whatever, it is right. There's so many different factors and I think the that's part of it right now is that each land seeker is in a different situation. There are a lot of similarities.
Speaker 2:Let's be honest that's interesting as well, yeah, but, a little bit in a different situation, depending on what's the financial background, the social background, what's the skill set. Where are they in the journey? There's like two major categories, really, if you will, of land seekers that we're seeing. There's the slight, relatively young person. Sometimes they've had a previous life in corporate life or whatever, and sometimes not, but they've done some farm. They are regenerative first, if you will, right, and they're a little bit just looking for a lifestyle, but also looking to build assets for themselves, right, and they can't find land because it's too expensive or for whatever other reason. So so that's like the but they are. They don't have as much experience hands on, right, they might have a few years.
Speaker 2:They might have done a farm tour like I did, maybe two times that or or something like that, and so a lot of them will need some mentoring on the practical side. So we're essentially starting to assemble mentoring teams and we're lucky enough to have a really big network, of course well, not of course, but we do have a really big network of some of the really high qualified, both consultants and mentors and from each topic really that you'd imagine you would need. So you could say they're needing some mentoring, usually on the practical side of things, whereas you've got the other side of the coin where it's kind of farmers first, if you will. That they're probably well, they're usually a bit later in their career as well. They've done farming, they've done maybe conventional farming or organic farming, and they are maybe 40, 45, sometimes a bit younger, but they would need to unlearn. Instead. They've got a little bit of.
Speaker 2:Again, it varies how much they would need to unlearn, but often there's a bit of unlearning to do and so the mentorship around that is like let's match them up with let's roots to regeneration or whatever, or the mentorship function that they could gain help with right.
Speaker 1:So it's like depending on, and I'm obviously making averages here, right the two major categories.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of in-betweens and segments and so on that we can talk about, but essentially those are the two big segments that we're seeing, and I think it's quite interesting to see that both of them, with a relatively quote-unquote small amount of mentoring, can actually get really far yeah, that's interesting.
Speaker 2:And then, from a business model perspective, it's a land holder that pays for the service basically, yeah, as of now, yeah, and the idea is that we would have secondary revenue streams really. So we want to make it cheaper and cheaper for the landholders really over time and to the point where we have a free version, really, and everything we do is shared open source really, as you might remember from our previous, which was a big topic last time Big topic in our last.
Speaker 2:So I've managed to brainwash Harry into that. No, but he was quite open to it. I think it just makes overall sense, but also just makes strategic sense for us. If we want to build a momentum, if we want to provide value for our users and customers up front, there's no need to hide things and we can't do everything, and by doing things open source, we're actually inviting collaborators on board. Actually, that exact approach has meant that even some organization who otherwise might see us as competitors we are collaborating with them already. We have an example of Southwest Lange Matching in the UK otherwise might see us as competitors. We are collaborating with them already. We have an example of Southwest Lounge Matching in the UK, in England. We're collaborating with them. We're sharing the different adverts from each other and we're helping each other and there's no problem in that and I really like that. I think that's showing potentially a new approach and we'd love to champion that. I think that's just really needed and like what's the ratio?
Speaker 1:like how, of course it's a few months in, but how tricky has the matchmaking being? Like what kind of connections have already happened? Has it been faster, slower than you expected? Because it is a bit, could be a bit of a needle in a haystack. Like also geography, like it's how you're going to say to someone who is in, I don't know, southern greece say, okay, please move to devon to start this dairy thing, like there is yeah, I mean we, we have been focusing on the uk predominantly and so so the geographical question is not too big.
Speaker 2:There's been some situations where people ended up not being relevant because the landowner couldn't really sponsor a visa and stuff like that. Okay, fine. But in general, I would say the matchmaking process has gone super well, beyond our wildest expectations in terms of just especially from the landholder's perspective. Okay, we're getting so many really high qualified talents right and there are and I think, one important thing, the core reason why we're called abunder, it's abundance, right, so we really want to cultivate that abundance of talent, yeah, yeah, but not only abundance from the landholder side, but abundance from the landseeker side. They have a lot of options as well. They don't just have to choose whatever is available, pick the worst.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of options for them too. The power dynamic quickly can be quite and has been of course in history of who owns the land and who farms.
Speaker 1:It hasn't been an amazing relationship in many cases so how do you do that in a in a way that makes sense? It's by giving people options as well, and I think, yeah, there are other places you can go to or other avenues, so you create a bit more equal, equal footing, which is not easy it's probably not that easy, but so far it's going well and I think it's just as much is.
Speaker 2:One thing is the actually being opportunities, which is great, but the other thing is just, it's also just a mindset. How desperate are you feeling?
Speaker 1:as a human.
Speaker 2:I really want to find the perfect dairy partner for my farm. Okay, fine, right, if you're very desperate, it's not going to work out that well for you because, whether we like it or not, human beings are human beings and and unless you are super emotionally mature and very self-developed, if you will, subconsciously you're going to pick up on that desperation and you're just gonna not take it you're not gonna take it and you're gonna.
Speaker 2:You're gonna be. Let's say not to your best behavior, really without even realizing it. It's really funny like that and something I've really learned from working with an occupational therapist. The psychology behind that is is really interesting, I think, but so it's a mindset as well, of just every time we run the process. One thing is we level our expectations with the landhold and say we're going to say to the land seekers if this doesn't work out for you, there are other opportunities. You don't have to be desperate, you don't have to worry about it, because there are and they are growing right. So that's one thing and they are perfectly fine with that, because they're saying I'm I only need, at the end of the day, one or two people. Yeah, and I need in some cases six, but like, mostly it's one or two people. You need.
Speaker 1:I need the best ones in this context, which might take a few rounds to to find that, and then like long term wise, because what's often an issue, or seems to be an issue, people stay around for a season or two and then are continuing their exploration to look for their own land and maybe scrape a bit of money to buy a hectare or two. Somewhere like how do you ensure longevity of these kind of partnerships?
Speaker 2:well, a lot of it is, as far as we can see it. Well, it comes down to mainly two things. It's the, like I said, the relationship and the leveling of expectations between those two parties, if you will. And then it's just, of course, if the business doesn't work out, it's going to have to stop at some point, right, so there's that side of things. So those are essentially the main two things that we support within the matchmaking process. It's the relationship side and it's the farm plan.
Speaker 2:Slash economics of the farm and say okay, we have some templates, you are very welcome to use them. In some cases the landholder wants to make it mandatory really in the process, because it allows to understand where people come from and so on. But essentially they are quote-unquote, just templates and they're freely available, so anyone could use them really, and we at least try to make them well. Harry likes to say that I make sexy spreadsheets. I don't know if that's the best explanation of it, but at least we try to make them understandable, we try to make them easy enough to work with. Even if you're not with, let's say, a financial background, you can ask questions your way and use kind of a step-by-step logic to arrive at. Okay, so what is my annual p? L estimate really? What is what's going to look like in a steady state? What does that look like? What's my idea for this enterprise and not having to just drag it out?
Speaker 1:of your elbow another body part.
Speaker 2:It helps so far that they have something to start with.
Speaker 1:And is, like long-term land ownership or access to that at all on the table for any of these?
Speaker 2:In some cases yeah, it depends. In some cases you have, let's say, a contract farming agreement, which is one of the types. Obviously I don't know if that's obvious for all the listeners you have different types of agreements?
Speaker 1:Yeah, because then at the end you need to get something on paper.
Speaker 2:Like okay, you find a match.
Speaker 2:You wrote your holistic plan yes, all of you, and it matches and you agree on the heads of terms and then, okay, then you need to make a legal agreement right, because, yeah, and the structure is it's a type of share farming agreement or it's a contract farming agreement right, when there's profit share and otherwise it can be a tenancy right. And then the sort of fourth case, if you will, there's an actual joint venture, where you are literally setting up a limited company together. Usually you would test out the relationship for that right.
Speaker 2:That's what we encourage at least. So maybe you start as a quote-unquote normal employee for a year or two to see can we work together really on a long term and will this work?
Speaker 1:right.
Speaker 2:In some cases you haven't necessarily sold everything up front and you might want to see does it sell right? So that's part of it, of course. And then of course, you've got your more short-term things once in a while that pop up, which are sometimes a way into a longer-term agreement, like a grass keep, like renting your access to grassland, use it for a cattle or any of those kind of things that may lead into a longer-term relationship In the land next door here where we're looking at. Yeah well, we'll see what kind of agreement we end up with. I could see it being mostly a tendency just to keep it simple, but we'll see what works out.
Speaker 2:Maybe he wants to do a joint venture. He's a cool guy. I wouldn't expect the kind of attitude really maybe I'm being judgmental of people from the southwest of Zealand in Denmark, where I'm actually born and raised here, but he was quite the neighbor where everyone else around are like quite conventional, let's just say like that. He the first thing he said oh you did this farm to. Okay, I really want to do agroforestry, like okay, that's interesting, yeah nice, I love that.
Speaker 2:So that's a nice neighbor to have.
Speaker 1:So that's the cake I'm serving later to lobby for the lobby for the land. Now, the chickens need that. They need more space. If this becomes, and then you're looking for your own land seeker. Basically, yeah, I'm gonna have to do that.
Speaker 2:So the banda taking off. Now, then I am I'm lucky, let's just say I'm lucky to have someone I really trust very close, which is my parents, and they are helping me whenever I'm really busy, and they're essentially part of this project, right?
Speaker 1:so but of course not signing up for 600 they're not signing up for 600 at this point I'm trying to tease them into it, but I know what the stance is and it's very clear we're not going to do 600 chicken fred no you can do that by yourself, okay, that's, or budgeted properly so you can hire someone yeah or find a joint land, yeah but I think it's such an and what makes, because it's such a seems like an open door, in that sense, of course, you want more people on the land in joint venture and entrepreneurial roles and what, whatever kind of structure you can come up with or make sense at the end legally and financially.
Speaker 1:Why now, what's the piece that it seems to be taking off beyond your wildest expectations in? Like, why 2025 is and not 2020? Like, is there? There's no magic technology that makes it possible. Now, like tinder was there, we feel like what's the? And it's also not. Like people haven't been looking for land the last years. And what's the inflection point now in terms of of those two groups that somehow are both seem to be both ready for at least a lot of trials?
Speaker 2:yeah. So I think there's one one isn't the annoying answer, which is like it could have been 10 years ago and it would have been just as relevant but I think there's another element, which is the fact that the concept of, let's say, ecosystem positive or regenerative farming, or however you want to call it, is becoming more widely known, and a lot bigger groups of people are moving in that direction. So there's a certain wave to catch, if you will.
Speaker 1:By people you mean the land seekers or landholder or both.
Speaker 2:Both. There's a lot of different reasons why, beyond the fact that Harry and I have most of our professional network in the UK and so on, there's a lot of different reasons why we could select the UK as a beginning, as a starting point really. But another is just that there are actually quite a few landholders there that are looking at the public subsidies and grant schemes and are thinking, okay, I'm going to have to make money now, right. So that's one big factor and also just the maturity or, let's say, or observable adoption of regenerative farming practices and ideas and visions. It appears to be a bit larger.
Speaker 1:And you have templates, you have people to point at, like, okay, what would a chicken operation look like for somebody to have a normal salary? Is it 600, 6000? Maybe people don't know the exact number. Who to call to ask? Like, okay, give me a rough model here and you probably have that model, Probably the same on pigs and the same on dairy and the same on grain to a certain extent. Like, okay, what do you need to?
Speaker 2:Yeah, there are people out there who found a lot of really good answers Not perfect answers for every context situation, but a really good place to start from. You want dual purpose? Okay, fine, we call Planton or Claire Annie. You want to make a regenerative beef enterprise? Okay, call Silas or whoever. There's quite a few different people that are just very well positioned to actually help people and it's so beneficial and I find that there's I'm biased because I have a lot of my network there, but I find that there's a big concentration of that in the UK and so it makes a good starting point from a sort of whole product or whole service perspective.
Speaker 1:The ecosystem is there. You need that concentration in a matchmaking enterprise. That's it like a matchmaking enterprise, that's it Like a marketplace. You need both sides and enough volume to make sense. Which doesn't mean you cannot take things in Greece or in Spain, etc. But just the chance you find someone. The chance you find a landholder probably not. That's easy relatively, because they reach out and say I'm looking for someone. But the chance you can present them with five amazing candidates is just more difficult.
Speaker 2:I'm quite bullish on that, just to use a very sort of financial term. I'm quite optimistic based on our current results. To be honest, I hear what you're saying. Yes, of course it's easier in places where you've already built a network of land seekers? Yes, of course.
Speaker 1:But then again you have technology and LinkedIn and if you have a big enough database and you know how to use Instagram and that maybe is an answer to why now because maybe five years ago there weren't enough people looking in those channels to say, okay, I'm looking for places and I have a few years under my belt, I'm looking for a longer term thing and maybe with a house and I want to live in a yurt forever or in a camper van, and we all know those stories and like and that's maybe a maturity of a sector to fill and maybe also there's an underlying that I think hold back.
Speaker 1:But now it's the dating, the online dating industry as well. Like now, it has to be perfect in a bar and this and like it's only there and and they found as well. Like it can be not standardized, but there is a lot.
Speaker 1:It's not impossible to find, like the needle in the haystack, like there are puzzle pieces you can find. You can select on that, and then it might not work out for 20 years, but maybe 10 on the farm, and that's all. That's much better than what we have now, because it's still not run at this ecological and financial max, at its ecological and financial max. That's it. And so if it's for 10 years, great, if it's for five, not better. But let's get going. It shouldn't be for a year, probably, but there's so many semi-perfects.
Speaker 2:And you can build in reward schemes really for the land seekers. According to, I mean, for most of our agreements, we've built in, let's say, ecologic measurements as a key performance indicator. Right, and you could say, okay, you can discuss which one to choose and all these different things, but the fact that they're on the table and they're part of the conversation in an exit situation let's say 10 years or even five years Okay, what does the land look like? How can I compensate you for that? Is that in terms of herd equity?
Speaker 1:Is there another type of machinery you want to? There's some mechanism that you can build into it if it's not forever? Like you become the adopted son and then you take over everything. Like you build up an asset you helped you build up assets on your side and it is relatively mobile, which also probably enables or is a safeguard against some of the toxic relationships, because you have other options to move somewhere else yeah, you're not locked in, necessarily.
Speaker 1:You're not locked in, you can move if it's the case and the land holder can find somebody else like it's not a disaster that never will no oh sorry, did you touch it yeah, it was just is it working? Is it working? No, okay, I saw your hand going up.
Speaker 2:I felt like it was dropping from the magnet here. Oh, there you go. It's much better now, all good.
Speaker 1:I can still see it, so that's an interesting it's the overall.
Speaker 2:What you're saying makes me think of one answer, which is abundance, and this is why we chose the name again, because it really okay. If this doesn't work out, both parties will be fine. We'll have other options, we'll have other options and they'll be fine.
Speaker 1:And there are mechanisms and dynamics and agreements put in place to make sure that, no matter what happens, really people are going to be fine and it's an interesting thing as well, almost like as I'm looking at the land, like it's also fine if somebody hasn't grown up on that farm and spent 30 years walking it and knows every crook, of course it might be better, but again, we're in such a degraded state. Like anything that is, almost anything is better than we currently have in terms of production, in terms of complexity, in terms of and so, yeah, you're not going to find someone that knows every single angle and knows from the top of his or her head the production and the yield from every field from the last 30, 40 years. Yeah, that would have been your children that didn't want to take over, or like that. There's but there's, I think, also trauma there and pieces that we shouldn't underestimate in countryside, like who wants to take over things yeah might not be your direct bloodline it might be
Speaker 1:somewhere, and it could be like gay brown always maybe he's going to do the groundswell, this probably will be out after that, but he always likes to ask okay, in especially conventional, so he's might not going to do it, but in conventional rooms, okay, who here has somebody to take over and one or two hands usually go up or something, and in region it's significantly more, but might not be exactly your children and that's okay. Like these are, we need people in the land, like whatever way we can get more hands and eyes on the land, and this sounds like one of them I sure hope so, otherwise I'm yeah, no, no yeah no, I hear you and that's one of the bigger things right, you said why now, and I think that's part of the issue.
Speaker 2:It's an obvious thing that you have a very, let's say, unequal distribution of land ownership. You have a very aging farmer population We've heard that so many times and it's just true and they're not becoming younger.
Speaker 1:So every year we talk about it, they're becoming one year older. That's it. What are we doing about it exactly? How do we get more people on the land? That's it actually.
Speaker 2:There was one of the first talks I had when I met the people of new foundation farms was okay, but fine, I think your ideas and everything sounds amazing. There's a few things to talk about and all these different things, but how are you going to get enough people involved? And they're like, yeah, we have thought about that, which of course they they did, but it's just that was the first conversation really I had with with mark drool was okay, how are we going to get enough people into region?
Speaker 1:really, and we might have found part of that picture, but it's not like we're standing on stages and inspiring people to get in no, no, and that because for many it isn't like it's a very particular job or a collection of jobs, which can be amazing, and I think we're going to see way more people wanting to do that but they require hand-holding and not feeling alone as well, and I think for many farmers in general and region farmers almost specifically because they're so isolated in many cases they're surrounded not isolated, but they're surrounded by as Matteo and Matteo actually call it also social monoculture around them, social monoculture, if you have a few people.
Speaker 1:No, because many countries I don't know the countryside here, but other places many people have left. The people that are that remain not necessarily are the most like progressive, because it's a sort of self-selection, except if you go on a region route, in a sense because you really want to push, but it immediately puts you in a whole different group. Yeah, or actually alone, meaning you'd be looked weird, like we talked about last time as well. Weirdly in the pub you'll be. Your channel won't be selected for soccer practice.
Speaker 1:Real stories of her like there's a lot of socials that your fields don't look so neat I mean we heard it from the earlier organic pioneers and so have a few people around you, either living on the farm or nearby that are that you can share the daily things with, is a very I heard it on another podcast somewhere somebody said deep pioneer in the us like what would really change his life is to have four or five other people around them, not next door next door would be amazing but four or five other farmers that are or land holders or seekers that are in transition, and that they can discuss these kind of ecosystems with and mentality and holistic context and how do we make stuff grow instead of kill it and like what are?
Speaker 2:because if you have nobody around you, then you're only going to find on youtube and it's pretty yeah and I'm dimensional totally and I think there's somewhat a part of that is has been emerging with some of these online communities, like climate pharmacists is one of them right and I think they're doing well in many cases Great WhatsApp groups in general as well, etc.
Speaker 1:So there is that.
Speaker 1:But that doesn't replace the physical presence of someone you meet at the pub regularly, or someone you have coffee with in the morning and then you're going to do your different pieces and you have regular contact, because you're moving the chickens and he or she is moving the cows, or you're doing the market gardens and apart from the fact that you would like to have some more people growing food on your land or around your land, because that just creates more life and better food for you, that's it and so very interesting.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for sharing so early, on, both in the chicken side of things 19 chickens let's see in a year or so or maybe not. Maybe in your holistic context it doesn't fit and it stays there and that's also fine. Like we don't like it's not that it has to, but of course, with the Rwanda, like what? Yeah, how many do you have a goal for? Like this year? Of course it's very like how many relationships you connected, which sounds really again like a dating agency. But like what would you consider success after a year of trial and pilot? A thousand users?
Speaker 2:Users, meaning Land holders and land seekers.
Speaker 1:In a ratio, like do you seek, like do you know it's 80?
Speaker 2:We haven't defined our ratio yet, but you're touching on some topics we haven't decided on yet.
Speaker 1:Is it 80-20 or 50-50? What are you aiming for? You don't know yet what the successful marketplace looks like.
Speaker 2:No, it's. If you judge by the current state of things, it's going to be more, let's say 30-70 in favor of land seekers, meaning more land seekers, of course, but equally which is really. Because another thing is that, okay, you can't really count them one-to-one. No, of course, because a landholder will often have more than one opportunity for a land seeker, right? So, okay, how many do you actually need of landholders compared to they? Come in a group?
Speaker 1:yeah, and we've we have for the weird sect, like they're already. There's some of these stories yeah, there's some of these stories of these pioneering region farms and then they of course were especially, let's say, five to ten years ago, I think open to anybody that would just come, because nobody would in their right mind would go to these places and then finding out, not really checking in there, some people put up a tent and a yurt and a caravan and suddenly there was like a little extreme commune living there and they had to kick them off.
Speaker 2:Like I've heard a number of stories, I've heard that literally from a client as well.
Speaker 1:So there is anyway, of course we're in a different, but it's an interesting. It also attracts some other people. Let's say but sure, but you need a, which is an interesting point to bring up. Like we even imagine how many stacked enterprises, like families or couples or people can a farm support, like in a piece of land, and I think we don't really know the answer. It's probably higher than we. I think it's higher than we expect.
Speaker 1:Yeah definitely which doesn't fit. Doesn't fit in any farming model, because we always went the other route. Okay, less less.
Speaker 2:One tractor, one guy and a lot of hectares and one sprayer, maybe two sprayers.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but it's interesting if you look from a like how do we even plan land use? We never imagined it's more, it's always less and the models always account for, okay, more efficiency, so less people, and actually this is a pretty like no, actually we've seen that. I remember an example in Germany of organic farmers that are retiring now, like the original organic ones 30, 40 years ago, and they support one family with that farm then actually on land. An interesting land story with thomas cleand, thomas cleand ripple that then culture land took over. They took the farm.
Speaker 1:They paid a very nice pension to the farmer instead of one family because they took the land ownership piece out and the rent out. Now five families can be supported by the land. Yeah, because they have suddenly flexibility, because they don't have the massive rent. Still the farmer's taken care of. Like the retired farmer has a beautiful house, piece of land will live forever but didn't get the main huge bonus or the huge land speculation price for the land and because of that, five families instead of one which is such a weird economic.
Speaker 2:Where can I, can you put that in the show notes?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I put it in the show notes, it's Thomas Ripple, thomas Klimt Ripple, who now actually is transitioning and we are interviewing him soonish on the training of farmers. Like it's a very interesting french model where they apprenticeship for region farmers or agriculture farmers amazing, a lot for years, and then they then help them to match land as well, and I'll send it to you I love that.
Speaker 2:That's like the first time I thought about it.
Speaker 1:This kind of thing is that kind of project, because and he's bringing that to germany, exactly how he helped Terlino in the land ownership piece as well.
Speaker 2:We should work together with him, because I love that. When I was traveling around myself, this is one of the things that I talked to most of the farm owners about was okay, how many times have you actually had volunteers on your farm? Well, I've had one or two, or sometimes they've had 12. How many times have you had, like, a some learning objectives? Well, none. Okay, maybe this it's time to make some structure around that. Oh yeah, that'll be great, right? So, and I think this is probably what he's doing, right, and it's not to say that they will be paid, even like.
Speaker 1:There's a like, really okay. How do we train the next generation of farmers? We'll explore it and we'll put it in the show notes as well, because it sounds awesome.
Speaker 1:It's such yeah I'd love, because we need to like start working on the funnel of more capable multi-year under their belt region farmers. Yeah, that then, because the land piece is going to grow and grow like the amount of land holders are going to get in touch. I don't think it's going to be the issue. Beyond the pioneers that already are in their holistic context, many others will think if I can have, instead of the normal tenant that I know is actually destroying my assets, at least not building it what if I can have a different relationship? I don't think that's the issue of the supply here, but how many good hands and good minds can you get on the land?
Speaker 2:and that's it. And then the landholder essentially can decide what their own role will be, because if they don't want to be super involved or maybe they don't feel comfortable with all of these different enterprises, there's a potential to get a mentorship team and you can even get support on managing the fund. There's yeah, there's all kinds of, let's say, add-ons. If you will. That can be selected, but doesn't have to. They're there if you need it, but if you don't, fine, that's great, yeah, super.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much you're more than welcome and thanks for stopping by on this beautiful day.
Speaker 1:How many times have you visited a farm or heard a story of a farmer or land owner that wished they had more people on the farm? Someone to start a market garden, someone to run a chicken operation or an advanced biofertilizer brewery? More stacked enterprises, more diversity and more hands and eyes on the farm? Of course, only if it makes financial sense, but let's assume that's the case. Where do you find these entrepreneurial people who fit your context, your farm, your country, your culture and your personality? And when you find them, how do you structure the financial legal side to make a partnership that actually lasts?
Speaker 1:We probably all agree we need more people well-paid people on the land, so how do we make that happen? This is a conversation where we walk the land, albeit only two hectares, and check in on the latest developments around pasture-based chickens on the land of FRED and the earliest starts of an agroforestry system, but, more importantly, on the new venture of FRED focused on land matching between people owning the land and people able to work the land but they don't have access to it, facilitating land partnerships, partnerships which should last out. Our website investinginregenerativeagriculturecom slash posts. If you liked this episode, why not share it with a friend and get in touch with us on social media, our website or via the Spotify app, and tell us what you liked most and give us a rating on Apple podcast or Spotify or your podcast player. That really, really helps us. Thanks again and see you next time.
