The Business of Soil Health

S2:E12 – Pricing Resilience: How Soil Health Could Reshape Farmland Value with Delta Institute

Soil health drives resilience, input costs, and long-term productivity - yet none of that shows up when farmland is appraised.
Lucas Chamberlain and Gillian Chesnut of the Delta Institute are trying to change that. Their team is working directly with farmland appraisers, lenders, and soil scientists to test a radically rooted idea: what if soil health were valued like any other asset?
Through pilot projects across Illinois and Michigan, Delta Institute has developed a Soil Health Index and incorporated real soil measurements into formal appraisals. The goal isn’t a new credit market - it’s to reshape the core plumbing of farm finance: land values, underwriting, and operating loans.
In this episode we dig into:
How farmland appraisals actually work - and why soil health has been invisible
The Soil Health Index they’ve built with the Soil Health Institute
What happened when 15 real farms received “soil-informed” appraisals
Why comparable sales data is the biggest barrier
The role of lenders, insurers, and remote sensing
Risks and unintended consequences for land access
The vision for loan products that reward lower-risk, conservation-minded operators
If soil health truly improves cash flow and resilience, Lucas and Gillian argue it should lower borrowing costs and raise equity, without relying on subsidies.

S2:E11 – Pay-for-Practice Misses the Point: the Behavioral Economics of Soil Health

Reid Hensen, co-founder and managing partner at Celium Group, is a rancher, agricultural economist, and a data systems architect for some of the leading public and philanthropic soil health programs.
His view is soil health adoption is a human systems problem, rather than an economic or technology problem. In his view “regenerative ag” is wise resource management with long-time horizons supported by trusted advisors and community problem solving.
We touch on multiple financial levers of soil health, including on-farm profitability, management practice change (with some great livestock management examples), stacked enterprises, and risk management.
We kept trying to bring him back to a narrow view of economics, and he kept pulling us out to consider the human factors like technical assistance and advisory support, and the importance of viewing technology as an amplifier of a system rather than a solution in and of itself.
In addition, he offers a deeply informed critique of capital deployment across private, philanthropic and public avenues.
Reid is empathetic, insightful, and wise, and he doesn’t sugar coat his opinions. Hope you enjoy the episode.

S2:E10 – Finance Serving Farmers: How Food System 6 is Rewiring Capital for Regeneration with Lauren Manning

Can we truly expect farmers to risk everything in order to regenerate the land?
Lauren Manning, Executive Director of Food System 6, joins us to explore what it takes to build a financial system that serves farmers, rather than the other way around.
Drawing on her background as a rancher, lawyer, and investor, Lauren shares how her own experience being denied a farm loan shaped her mission to rewire agricultural finance for equity, resilience, and regeneration.
At Food System 6 (FS6), Lauren and her team are tackling some of the toughest structural barriers in U.S. agriculture, from the limitations of FSA loan guarantees to the farm foreclosure crisis. Their work spans from EQIP Bridge Loans, helping producers fund conservation practices without maxing credit cards, to loan guarantees for regenerative agriculture, designed to de-risk unconventional borrowers and unlock patient, values-aligned capital.
We talk about:
The meaning behind “Food System Six” and what comes after industrial agriculture
Why non-bank lenders are key to financing the next generation of producers
How the EQIP Bridge Loan program helps farmers access public funding sources without drowning in debt 
The emerging farm foreclosure crisis, and what can be done about it
Why “financial empowerment” and “dignity in finance” are essential to system change
🎧 Listen now for a candid, data-rich look at the intersection of policy, capital, and regeneration, with one of the leading thinkers reshaping how money moves through the food system.

S2:E9 – From Funds to Capital Orchestration with Ivana Gazibara from the TransCap Initiative

What is systemic investing, and how does capital orchestration move real dollars to real acres? 
Ivana Gazibara, Director of Prototyping at the Transformational Capital Initiative (TransCap), joins Sami and Patrick to unpack their Midwest blueprint for scaling regenerative agriculture. 
We cover TransCap’s transition map (and some of the barriers it surfaced), why another fund isn’t enough, and how a neutral platform can align philanthropy, catalytic, and commercial capital around shovel-ready deals. 
We also touch on metrics of success and why capital deployed is less important than acres impacted.
🔗 Resources mentioned in the episode
TransCap Initiative (Transformation Capital Initiative) - https://transformation.capital/
Systemic Finance for Regenerative Agriculture (Transcap article introducing the capital orchestrator concept) https://medium.com/transformation-capital/systemic-finance-for-regenerative-agriculture-b8f74845be1c
Transcap’s System Map of Regenerative Agriculture in the Midwest - https://transcap.kumu.io/financing-the-regenerative-agriculture-transition-in-the-midwest
New Capitalism Project Lab – funder collaborative supporting TransCap’s work - https://newcapitalismproject.org/
ReFED – an analog capital orchestrator - https://refed.org/
GroundBreak Coalition (McKnight Foundation) – another analog capital orchestrator - https://groundbreakcoalition.org/

S2:E8 – A Million Acres and 35 Million Pounds of Seed: The Story of Green Cover and the Economics of Cover Crops, with Keith Berns

Early regenerative pioneer Keith Berns, co-founder of Green Cover, recounts how multi-species cover crops transformed from niche experiment to a million-acre business. 
Green Cover is a cover-crop innovator and one of the country’s leading cover crop seed suppliers. In this conversation, we talk with Keith about:
Science and Practice:He discusses the limits of single-variable academic research in inherently complex, multi-species systems, the specific cases where single-species cover crops still make sense, and strategies in areas of limited moisture where cultivation may be more challenging.
Economic and Policy Factors:Keith breaks down the direct economic benefits of cover crops (including livestock integration, fertility gains, weed suppression, and improved water infiltration) that compound into long-term resilience as soil organic matter builds. He also explains how federal crop-insurance rules, particularly “Annual Production History,” continue to restrict both producer adoption and seed production.
Signals of Demand:Keith talks about the indicators he’s watching to gauge future adoption, why incentive programs alone aren’t enough to drive meaningful growth, and how he’s managing the challenges of scaling in a maturing market.
Data and Decision-Making:He highlights the largest data gap he sees in the industry—where empirical evidence still lags behind what farmers observe in the field—and shares what growers are managing day-to-day: economic pressures, agronomic trade-offs, and practical constraints like planting windows.
We hope you enjoy this grounded, data-aware conversation about the pivotal yet still-evolving role cover crops play in regenerative agriculture and soil health.

S2:E7 - 45Z Update: A Tax Credit Impacting Decisions On 40% of Corn Acres, with Mitchell Hora

What’s happening with Section 45Z—and what does it mean for farmers, ethanol producers, and the broader regenerative agriculture movement?
In this update episode, Continuum Ag founder and seventh-generation Iowa farmer Mitchell Hora returns to break down what’s new (and what’s still in limbo) for the 45Z Clean Fuel Production Credit, how policy delays and the government shutdown are impacting adoption, and what’s next for the biofuels market.
We dive deep into how Continuum Ag’s TopSoil platform is helping farmers verify low-carbon practices, the economic realities of farmland, and why Mitchell believes soil health is more critical than ever for resilience and profitability.
We talk about:
The latest developments and delays around 45Z and the USDA’s CI calculator
How the “book-and-claim” model could unlock mass farmer participation
Why 45Z could be the most powerful driver of regenerative adoption yet
The collision between high input costs, rising land prices, and farm debt
What Mitchell’s 2024 harvest revealed about the ROI of soil health
Why keeping family farms viable will require new finance models and investor partnerships

S2:E6 - Netting $3K–$5K per Acre: The Business Case for U.S. Agroforestry with Jeremy Kaufman

Corn and soy net $100–$200 per acre -- or less, given the extraordinarily difficult commodity markets at the moment.
Chestnuts? Potentially $3,000–$5,000. But those returns don’t come free, the upfront cost of installing and maintaining tree crops is significant.
Jeremy Kaufman, the co-founder & COO of Propagate, digs into the economics and project finance structures they've built to make commercial agroforestry viable and ensure farmers aren’t left holding all the risk.
In this episode, we dig into:
The detailed economics of commercial agroforestry with chestnuts, black locust, and other “growth crops” in U.S. agroforestry
The financing models bringing landowners, farmers, and investors together
The market outlook for the commercial crops they recommend How Propagate structures deals across landowners, farmers, and investors
Jeremy's hard-earned lessons that carbon credits alone rarely pencil, but add value as a stacked revenue stream.
Jeremy also shares lessons from nearly a decade of building Propagate: crop orientation vs. practices orientation, which kinds of investors actually fit this space, and why humility is essential when working with farmers. 

S2:E5 – 1.14 Million Acres, $55M Paid: Inside the Soil & Water Outcomes Fund

How do you turn conservation into a cash crop?
From his experience in the 1980s farm crisis to $55M in outcome-based payments, Adam Kiel explains how creating market signals for conservation underpins the Soil & Water Outcomes Fund (SWOF).
Adam, the Managing Director of SWOF, shares how they've built outcome-based contracts that shift risk off farmers while delivering measurable results for corporations at scale.
Instead of cost-share programs, SWOF sends clear market signals that conservation has value by paying producers directly for soil, water, and climate outcomes.
We talk about:
How Adam’s roots in the 1980s farm crisis have shaped his mission
How SWOF grew from 10k to 1M+ acres in just four years
$55M already paid to farmers through outcome-based contracts
The mechanics of capital flows, verification, and upfront payments
Why soil sampling costs and closed-source models keep Adam up at night
Where corporate demand is strongest
Why producers choose to participate

S2:E4 – We’re Not Chasing 100x, and that's the Point – with Sara Balawajder from Builders Vision

What does catalytic capital actually look like in practice?
In this episode, we sit down with Sara Balawajder, Director of Investments at Builders Vision, to go behind the scenes of one of the most active and respected impact investors in food and ag. Sara leads Builders Bridge, a flexible, early-stage portfolio that sits between philanthropy and market-rate capital, with a mandate to unlock system-level change.
We cover:
Builders Vision’s North Star goals and how they guide every investment
Why 3–5x returns, rather than venture-scale, are their targets for food and ag
How Builders Vision blends impact and financial returns through creative structures like redeemable equity
What it takes to underwrite risk in long-cycle businesses without power-law expectations
The emerging role of debt, downside protection, and offtake infrastructure in Regen Ag
Plus: Sara shares a reverse pitch—the biggest gaps she sees, where she wants to invest but hasn’t yet.

S2:E3 – Inside the Opaque Market for Ag Ecosystem Assets with Dom Sutton-Vermeulen

This is one of the most exciting, detailed, and hopeful conversations we’ve had about the pace and structure of capital flowing to producers investing in soil health.
It turns out that one of agriculture’s most opaque arenas—corporate supply chain investments in ecosystem assets—is becoming a major source of funding for soil health improvements. And it’s accelerating.
As co-founder and CEO of Millpont, Dom Sutton-Vermeulen has a front-row seat to this emerging market. Millpont is building the infrastructure to ensure the integrity of ecosystem assets like carbon, water, and biodiversity. His team works across project developers and corporate buyers to ensure environmental claims are credible, not double-counted—and that producers are compensated.
From this unique vantage point, Dom shares what he’s seeing:
Why the market for ag ecosystem credits is accelerating with corporate buyers even as sustainability teams are shrinking
The critical role of a clearing house in market governance
How data is the new cash crop and how farmers and ranchers can think strategically about it
Where the dollars are flowing in offset, inset, and carbon intensity (CI) markets mapped to specific production systems
Why major corporations are doubling down on ecosystem asset programs—not for PR, but to manage long-term supply chain risk
The extraordinary growth rate in these markets including rate of growth, acreage numbers, and whether it’s just due to the law of small numbers
How Carbon Intensity is emerging as a new standard and what that means for producers in row crops vs. pasture systems
Premium payment amounts for producers, from early pilot premiums to mature CI programs
Opportunities Dom sees, both to build additional infrastructure companies in the space as well as project development gaps
If you’re trying to make sense of this complex and fast-evolving space, Dom offers one of the clearest, most grounded perspectives we’ve heard.