Feb 13, 2023
The price of land keeps going up across the country as wealthy
investors buy farmland and people move out of cities. This puts
untenable pressure on farmers and land stewards who are producing
healthy food and maintaining biodiversity, land health, and
water cycles. But what can be done against the seemingly
intractable laws of supply and demand?
Neil Thapar, co-director of Minnow,and Mariela Cedeño, partner
at Manzanita Capital, are working to de-commodify
land, and they're using a lot of different tools to do it––so that
land ends up owned and managed by Native American tribes and people
of color. They're also educating investors who want to contribute
to a healthy food/land system not to expect high returns on their
investment, but rather to use their wealth to shift land and power
back to its original inhabitants and to food producers practicing
good land stewardship.