Terra Regenerative Capital (TRC) invests in businesses that strengthen North American agricultural supply chains. From food, to fiber, flora and biofertilizers, TRC seeks to catalyze the adoption of regenerative practices by connecting farmers and ranchers to value-add and diversified markets. Through equity investment and professional support, they aim to make the agricultural sector a sink, rather than a source, of atmospheric carbon.
According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, agriculture accounts for an estimated 10 to 12 percent of human-caused greenhouse gas emissions globally. Terra Regenerative Capital Founders Tara Smith Swibel and Calla Rose Ostrander believe this can change. “We’re not interested in more of the same system,” Swibel tells Food Tank. “We want the whole system to convert to regenerative, and for that to be the baseline for how we do agriculture.”
Terra Regenerative Capital identifies business leaders and entrepreneurs in the agricultural field who have demonstrated their ability to support on ground agricultural transition by connecting to new and valued-add markets that bring agricultural producers better value. “Securing financing for the transition to regenerative practices is often difficult, and this financial strain can deter farmers from adopting sustainable methods,” writes Laimonas Noreika, CEO and founder of European climate technology firm HeavyFinance. Terra Regenerative Capital believes that by be rewarding farmers for practices they are already doing, they will have the incentive to change. And according to a report by Boston Consulting Group, regenerative farming can increase profitability for farmers after a transitional period.
“When we look at investing in a business, we look at how they interact with and support farmers in learning new practices. The farmers they source from don’t have to start out as regenerative, we want to start with where [farmers] are and help them move into the future of farming,” Ostrander tells Food Tank. Examples of conventional practices to move away from include using glyphosate to destroy crops after harvest, or leaving soil without vegetation for part of the year.
In addition to using traditional metrics of capital growth, Terra Regenerative Capital tracks soil health, biodiversity, and how the changes are benefiting the socioeconomic ecosystem within which companies and farmers make a living. These metrics help determine whether farmers are meeting the standards that allow them to make transformative changes in the food system.
Tracking these figures helps Terra Regenerative Capital to ensure their funds are creating real change. “I came to this really concerned about carbon sequestration, when I understood the potential of soil to be that carbon sink that we need,” Swibel says.
Cairnspring Mills, an organization supported by Terra Regenerative Capital in Washington’s Skagit Valley, demonstrates this by offering farmers rates above market value if they commit to implementing sustainable practices. After developing a profitable boutique mill in Skagit Valley, Cairnspring Mills is now building a new commercial flour mill deep in wheat country on the land of Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation outside of Pendleton, Oregon.
“I think that’s exciting because it’s shifting these really large-scale conventional wheat growers out of a chem-fallow glyphosate system and into something where we can begin to restore riparian areas around salmon habitat that the tribe is also concerned about,” explains Ostrander. “So we start to bridge between conventional agriculture and traditional biodiversity and soil health.”
Tree-Range Farms, another organization backed by Terra Regenerative Capital, focuses on creating more natural forested habitats for chickens on poultry farms. In forested pastures, chickens can freely forage on plants, sprouted grain, and bugs and don’t rely on antibiotics, according to the organization. Chickens are processed in a facility owned by partner non-profit organization The Regenerative Agriculture Alliance and then brought to market by Tree-Range Farms. This partnership ensures farmers have everything from technical assistance, to processing, and a secure buyer for their birds.
“That means of aggregation by Tree Range is everything because that singular chicken farmer cannot reach the marketplace without Tree Range,” Swibel tells Food Tank. “It’s exciting—a different strategy for scaling within the Midwest, but a highly regenerative system that is really thought out from the very beginning.”
Terra Regenerative Capital’s funding is being distributed at a time when the Trump-Vance administration is committing to reduction in or elimination of federal funding for climate-smart policies. Farmers recently expressed concern over the recent pause in Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities grants from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Some of Terra Regenerative Capital’s partners rely on federal grants, and Swibel and Ostrander admit there is some uncertainty regarding the future of funding sources. Still, they believe Terra Regenerative Capital is right on track to time the wave of investments in regenerative agriculture. According to Swibel, “I just don’t think there’s been a better time to invest.”
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