Impact investors flock to food and agriculture sector

Impact investors, defined as those looking to drive positive environmental or social change with their investments, are now putting more of their money into food and agriculture than any other sector. “A growing number of investment companies in this realm are now using capital to help ranchers switch to 100 percent grass-fed beef production, connect small farms to communities with little access to fresh food, and transition farmland used to grow commodity corn and soy to organic, regenerative systems,” says Civil Eats.

In fact, 63 percent of impact investors say they are channeling their funds toward food and agriculture, and impact investment in the sector has increased at a yearly rate of 32.5 percent since 2013, according to the Global Impact Investing Network’s most recent survey.

While many investors and their agricultural beneficiaries praise new funding models that make it easier for sustainable operations to scale up, some critics worry that the influx of outside money might change the power dynamics within agriculture, putting the emphasis on return on investment and moving the dial toward corporate ownership of farmland.

“Agriculture is a whole culture of how to work with the Earth,” says Anuradha Mittal, executive director of the Oakland Institute, which investigates land and agriculture investments worldwide. “When it’s driven by profit, it can be very dangerous.”

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