The SAFSF Fibers Roadmap: Regenerative Fibers, Regenerative Funding
Like food, fiber crops are part of an interconnected agricultural system that impacts health, social justice, and the environment. These familiar yet often overlooked agricultural products include plant-based fibers like cotton, hemp, and flax and animal-based products like wool, alpaca, and leather. A new report, The Fibers Roadmap: Integrated Capital Opportunities to Support Revitalization of U.S.-Grown Fiber, Textiles, and Leather, examines the interconnected impacts of the current textile industry and the opportunities for funders and investors to be part of the growing revitalization of just and equitable U.S-based fiber production. The Fibers Roadmap, written by Sarah Kelley, Jenny O’Connor, and Calla Rose…
Transitions, Priorities and Opportunities
— Analysis by Traci Bruckner, SAFSF Policy Program Director — The President-elect and Vice President-elect are well underway with their transition. The priorities announced look to provide windows of opportunity for policy ideas that can support a just, equitable and sustainable food and agriculture system. These include: COVID-19 calls for a comprehensive approach to the pandemic, including a renewal fund to assist state and local governments prevent budget shortfalls.Economic Recovery includes assistance for state and local governments, families, main street businesses and entrepreneurs.Racial Equity includes specifically addressing the longstanding inequities in agriculture.Climate Change includes a call for creating jobs in climate-smart agriculture, resilience and conservation. In addition, their agency…
SAFSF Comments on Policy Changes for Sustainable Fashion
On their own, brands can make efforts to be more sustainable, more ethical and more responsible. But it will never be enough to bring the fashion industry’s environmental footprint within science-based recommendations or to ensure adequate wages and working conditions for its millions of workers, argue supply chain experts, environmental and labour advocates, as well as some brand executives. Ultimately, they say, the only thing that can achieve that is legislation. “We absolutely need governments to create more policies to make the apparel industry more sustainable, and beyond sustainable to regenerative. There’s almost nothing out there that requires that,” says…
SAFSF Launches The Fibers Roadmap
SAFSF is excited to announce the release of The Fibers Roadmap: Integrated Capital Opportunities to Support Revitalization of U.S.-Grown Fiber, Textiles, and Leather. This report for grantmakers and investors lays out a seven-year vision for values-based investment and funding needed to support regenerative fiber agriculture and revitalize U.S.-based textile processing and manufacturing. SAFSF has played a leading role in the development of funder interest and information-sharing on the intersections between sustainable agriculture and food systems and fiber systems since 2013, and this report, case studies, and online programming builds on this momentum and proposes pathways forward. READ THE ROADMAP In addition to the Roadmap,…
Food and Agriculture System Wildfire Relief Funds
Last Updated: Friday, October 2, 2020 at 12:00 pm PST In response to the recent wildfires affecting California, Oregon, and Washington, Sustainable Agriculture and Food Systems Funders (SAFSF) is tracking wildfire philanthropic response and recovery funds that focus on the food and agriculture system. This is a dynamic resource. If you know of a fund that is not currently on this list, please contact [email protected]. Feel free to circulate the directory link widely. California CCOF: Organic Hardship Assistance – The Bricmont FundFund information: https://ccof.org/foundation/donate (If you give through the website, send an email to [email protected] to note that your donation…
Winners and Losers
– Analysis by Traci Bruckner, SAFSF Policy Program Director – Public policy picks winners and losers – how a policy is constructed determines who wins and who loses. We see this play out in agriculture policy that supports commodity production. The largest and wealthiest farms are the clear winners – by design. This week, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released their review of the distribution of the 2019 Market Facilitation Payments (MFP) (also called “trade-aid” payments, the program the Administration propped up on their own, with no input from Congress.) The review was requested by Senator Debbie Stabenow (D-MI), chairwoman of the…
Why Policy Matters
– Analysis by Traci Bruckner, SAFSF Policy Program Director – The USDA’s Coronavirus Food Assistance Program (CFAP) contains two provisions: 1) direct payments to agriculture producers; and 2) the Farmers to Families Food Box Program. We could see clear structural problems with the direct farmer payments from the moment the program was announced, and now we’ve seen that the food box program is also problematic, both in its implementation and in the root philosophy behind it.Direct Payments Program Misses the MarkCongress provided roughly $9.5 billion through the CARES Act, for direct assistance to agriculture producers, and this specifically included “producers that supply local…
A Time for Movement
– Analysis by Traci Bruckner, SAFSF Policy Program Director – The unjust and egregious murder of George Floyd is awakening a national dialogue and movement to dismantle structural racism. It is time, no more excuses. We – me, you, SAFSF, philanthropy – must commit to be advocates for change, allies to all communities, and accomplices in dismantling racism. We must reckon with the fact that the creation and growth of our agriculture and food system in this country is inextricably linked to structural racism. White agricultural wealth has its roots in land stolen from Native people. Its growth has been fueled…
No More Excuses: SAFSF Commitment to Racial Justice
The murder of George Floyd is clearly unjust and egregious. We mourn, along with the nation, for his life lost and for his family. Mr. Floyd is the latest in a long legacy of unjust deaths of black and brown people in America. He and others whose names have been tragically seared into our consciousness are only the tip of this iceberg. Far too many others remain unnamed, unseen, and forgotten. We cannot allow this to continue. Our country continues to be built on inequities and systemic racism that have allowed these deaths to happen and to continue to happen, over…
SAFSF Farm and Food Systems Lenders and Investors Group
In response to ongoing member interest in substantive engagement at the intersection of impact investing and sustainable agriculture and food systems, we are excited to invite registration for the SAFSF Farm and Food Systems Lenders and Investors Group. Over the year, this cohort of investing practitioners will gather to: Share and sharpen their skills and strategies for investing in farm and food systems;Enjoy the fellowship and support of other investors in the sector;Respond in real time to farm and food economy disruptions due to COVID-19. Cohort Focus Our focus will be on real transactions in real places. We hope most participants will share a loan or investment, either…
