Shifting policy to enable a just transition to regenerative agriculture in the US

Mobilizing cross-sector action to shape policies that support regenerative producers and communities

This work was part of a collaborative initiative of the Growing our Future US project from 2020-2025.

Explore our tools & resources from the 5-year collaborative period

Don’t miss our 2023 policy education toolkit

to better understand the shared priorities of broad-based coalitions – and the rapidly progressing policy landscape – that would enable a just transition to regenerative systems.

Use our worksheet

Co-creating a collective vision for regenerative agriculture, to host a conversation in your community that can build a foundation for state, county, and municipal level policy advocacy.

Background: Why we focused on Shifting Policy

Policy can be a lever of system change: it can galvanize action, create incentives and disincentives, shift resource flows, and create opportunities where they didn’t exist before. From 2020-2025, Growing our Future brought food and agriculture players together to align on shared policy priorities and pathways to support the transition to regenerative agriculture, while acknowledging and beginning to solve key equity challenges that could be eased by policy. We focused on equipping and educating organizations to understand – and advocate for – the policies that would ensure access to conservation support programs for all agricultural producers, especially from historically underserved farm communities, including but not limited to Black, Indigenous, Latino/a, immigrant, farmworker, undocumented, and other farm communities of color.

Finding regional and local pathways to unite local communities through legislative action

Throughout our work connecting businesses and producers around shared policy priorities at the federal level, a new need emerged: local and regional value networks require ongoing support and financing tools to incentivize sourcing from regenerative farms and ranches. Legislative advocacy at the state and municipal levels presents a unique opportunity to unite communities around defining context-specific principles for regenerative transition. To complement the enormous task of shifting federal agriculture policy, local efforts allow also us to build on the unique strengths and needs of regional supply chains.

Highlights and learnings from our Shifting Policy work, 2020-2025

In 2023, we published a policy education toolkit to better understand the shared priorities of broad-based coalitions – and the rapidly progressing policy landscape – that would enable a just transition to regenerative systems.

From 2020-2023, we leveraged our cross-sector team to find intersecting priorities for Farm Bill advocacy and our grants to grassroots organizations enabled over 50 farmers, ranchers and farmworkers to participate in a fly-in on Capitol Hill in 2024.

We focused our advocacy towards farmworker health, safety, and justice, supporting partner organizations at events, such as a 2024 press conference in Washington, D.C. with Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett (TX-30).

From 2024-2025, we convened and activated local communities in support of policy for more resilient and local food and agriculture systems, for example, legislation to incentivize regenerative sourcing in Colorado.

Spotlight on Regeneration in Action: Colorado State Regenerative Transition Conversation Tour

From 2024-2025, we brought together over 150 local stakeholders in Colorado, in partnership with the Alliance for Collective Action and the Earth Regeneration Alliance. Together, we shaped state-level policy to reflect Colorado’s diverse needs for soil health, farmer resilience, and climate goals. Building on the momentum of the 2024 Regenerative Agriculture Tax Credit bill (SB24-152), we co-designed and co-facilitated a participatory process to shape legislation for a more just and regenerative food and agriculture system in the state and beyond.

Through the Conversation Tour, we:

Held three state-wide and regional multi-stakeholder convenings to inform and shape legislation on defining and incentivizing regenerative agriculture for the State of Colorado, generating momentum for advocacy.

Stewarded over 150+ diverse stakeholders to input feedback and shape legislation.

Convened participants with two Colorado state senators working across the aisle to co-sponsor and steward regenerative agriculture legislation, mediating, facilitating, and liaising across advocacy groups with vested interest in seeing legislation come to fruition.

Distributed travel and participation stipends to historically underserved farmers and ranchers to enable broad-based participation and amplification of diverse voices.

Our convenings and conversations at Yellow Barn Farm, REGENERATE conference, and our state-wide virtual gathering coalesced diverse perspectives into a collective vision that serves as a foundation for a state-level definition for regenerative agriculture. Read our full conversation synopsis and takeaways here and here.

Above photo: Stakeholders from across the state of Colorado at Quivira Coalition’s 2024 REGENERATE Conference in Denver, CO, enabling cross-sector dialogue with Senator Cleave Simpson (San Luis Valley).

“It gave me hope and lifted my spirits that we can make a significant step moving forward with Regen Ag and that there are so many people working on it.” - Participant in our conversation tour to shape regenerative sourcing policy in Colorado in advance of the 2025 state legislative session

“Policy brainstorming similar to this in the past has seemed like an area that’s not open to general/normal producers so it was cool to get this opportunity.” - Participant in our conversation tour to shape regenerative sourcing policy in Colorado in advance of the 2025 state legislative session

“I see myself as more of an active player in the conversation than I did before.” - Participant in our conversation tour to shape regenerative sourcing policy in Colorado in advance of the 2025 state legislative session

Join us

Partner with us to ideate, co-design, and facilitate participatory policy processes in your jurisdiction to advance a just transition to regenerative agriculture.

Tap into our extensive network of policy advocates and government affairs experts to advance your regenerative goals through local, state-level, and federal level policy engagement.

Email [email protected] to learn more and join us in Forum for the Future’s food and agriculture work.

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