The growth of regenerative agriculture relies not only on sustainable farming practices but also on the creation of a robust market that supports these practices. Regenerative agriculture aims to restore soil health, enhance biodiversity, and capture carbon in the ground, offering significant environmental and economic benefits. However, for these practices to thrive, a solid market infrastructure needs to be in place.

In the latest issue of the Guidepost, we dive into the growing trend of carbon insetting—where companies reduce emissions directly within their supply chains, rather than relying on external offsets. With regenerative agriculture at the forefront, startups like Eion and Funga are pioneering solutions that boost soil health and remove CO₂. As corporations face pressure to meet climate targets, insetting offers a more credible and impactful route forward. Plus, we look at the latest market shifts in agtech, food M&A, and the regenerative finance movement.

The Local Line + Edacious partnership is just one more way Local Line supports local food producers. With science-backed testing and powerful sales tools, farmers can now prove the value of their food and get paid for it.

Four Trends Driving The $25B Food-as-Medicine Industry

One firm that is taking a sober approach to regenerative ag is Trailhead Capital, a Denver, Colorado-based VC investor. Trailhead Capital said global food systems and nature are at a crossroads, pointing to threats such as deforestation, greenhouse gas emissions and species at risk of extinction, among other issues, owing largely to conventional ag and food practices.

Avalo, a crop development company based in North Carolina, is using machine learning models to accelerate the creation of new and resilient crop varieties.

In this conversation, Emma Fuller, co-founder of Fractal, discusses their novel farmland investment model, which makes minority equity investments in farmland while incentivizing soil health practices. 

Trailhead Capital is a Denver, CO based venture capital firm investing in the regenerative future of food and agriculture through its $50M Regeneration Fund I LP, which has made 27 investments since launching in April of 2021.

Rather than applying ag lime to farmland to reduce soil acidity, Eion supplies farmers with a 1:1 replacement: crushed olivine.

Watch Now - CNBC’s Diana Olick reports on a new effort to limit carbon emissions.

EarthSense, Inc. announced today that it has received a grant from Shell GameChanger. The grant will help validate the application of EarthSense’s autonomous field robotics technologies for oil seed cover crops as feedstocks for biofuel production.

Fractal, a US-based company helping to solve a key gap in farmer financing, has announced an expansion of their farmland co-investment product. Fractal has raised more than $15MM of capital and has deployed $8MM to leading farmers across the Midwest.

A check-in interview with Mark Lewis, managing partner at Trailhead Capital, about the inevitability of the “regenerative revolution” and the potential for significant financial and non-financial returns in this space. What does putting almost half of your $50 million VC fund to work in businesses active in the regen space in North America taught Mark about the space, what has changed since 2021, and which big opportunities haven’t we collectively invested in? What is missing and what is needed?

Annual Awards Program Recognizes Innovation in Agricultural & Food Technologies Around the Globe

As the Data Analytics Solution of 2024, Provision joins the ranks of several unicorns in the food supply chain.

The blueprint is designed to help regenerative agriculture investors and businesses select industry-specific metric sets and promote harmonization for impact measurement. It’s intended to be broadly applicable to investors and businesses who invest in or operate directly managed land, as well as those who invest in or provide upstream and downstream services in agricultural supply chains.

New York-based Leaf is looking to build the Plaid of farm data, co-founder and CEO Bailey Stockdale told TechCrunch. The company takes a farm’s unstructured data, standardizes it, and loads it into an application programming interface (API). This allows Leaf customers, who range from crop insurance providers to agtech startups, to better utilize and build off the data. Customers pay for the service based on how many acres their data is harvested from.

Earthshot’s carbon development platform streamlines compliance and derisks project finance with automated feasibility and underwriting tools

Did you know that regenerative technologies can restore the soil ecosystem, improve crop yield, produce higher quality food, reduce farming costs and reduce food waste?

The grant will allow the company to scale deployment of its Clean Current technology, a first-of-its-kind, fossil fuel-free defense against crop disease