Redesigning Finance from the Ground Up

If we are serious about transforming food systems, we must also be serious about transforming finance.

Finance is a critical piece of the puzzle. The challenge is that current approaches in financing food and agriculture too often reinforce existing power dynamics, concentrating decision-making with capital holders while leaving farmers, communities, and ecosystems on the margins. 

Current channels tend to funnel capital toward efficiency and scale, often at the expense of resilience, equity, and ecological health. This leaves farmers and regenerative enterprises—the very actors capable of building resilient systems – without the resources they need to thrive.

At Transformational Investing in Food Systems (TIFS), where we work alongside investors, enterprises, and communities, we’ve seen firsthand how the design of finance shapes who benefits – and who is excluded. Catalytic capital offers a different path – mobilizing patient, flexible funding that absorbs early risk, accepts reduced financial returns in exchange for higher impact returns when needed, and creates room for innovation that traditional markets overlook.

It’s a concept familiar in impact investing circles, and is increasingly being applied in regenerative and agroecological systems, where it is urgently needed. 

Financial design must begin with the needs of stakeholders and ecosystems, not solely with the requirements of capital. When funding and business structures are co-created with farmers, communities, and enterprises, outcomes are not only fairer – they are also more resilient, effective, and capable of driving lasting transformation in food systems.

The opportunity before us is clear: by centering multi-stakeholder design and deploying catalytic capital, we can build financial vehicles that serve farmers, communities, investors, and ecosystems together. These are not abstract ideas; they are practical innovations we are already piloting at TIFS, for instance by incubating solutions like DiversiFund. When finance is redesigned to meet system needs, it becomes both fairer and more effective.

DiversiFund: Reversing Traditional Fund Design 

A new, systems-level investment vehicle, DiversiFund brings together diverse capital sources to support regenerative businesses and drive landscape-scale transformation.

DiversiFund builds on years of TIFS’ work as ecosystem architects, designing frameworks, convening stakeholders, and incubating financial tools that address systemic barriers in regenerative finance. A major systems review by TIFS and other partners in Minnesota helped crystallize what farmers, enterprises, and communities need to transition toward regenerative models – more adaptable capital, better coordination, and structures that reflect real-world conditions.

DiversiFund emerged directly from these findings as a bridge across the “missing middle,” aligning the needs of regenerative enterprises with investor expectations through a familiar yet redesigned model that provides fixed returns while allowing flexibility in capital deployment.

At its core, DiversiFund shows how finance can be rebuilt for system transformation rather than extraction. By pairing predictable returns with catalytic capital, the fund enables early-stage or unconventional regenerative enterprises to participate without forcing them into rigid financial molds. Its governance structure balances financial returns with mission alignment to ensure decisions are guided by community, ecological, and long-term system outcomes.

The result is a practical, investable fund that meets institutional standards while opening space for innovation, demonstrating how thoughtfully designed financial vehicles can channel financial resources to regenerate ecosystems, strengthen communities, and unlock broader investment in the future food economy.

The implications extend beyond finance itself. This isn’t just about getting capital flowing – it’s about ensuring that equity, resilience, and ecosystem alignment remain central as food systems transform. By supporting catalytic solutions like DiversiFund, philanthropy can play a pivotal role in unlocking the potential of regenerative food systems, ensuring they are not only sustainable but also fair and inclusive for generations to come.

For example, Green Acres Milling, a majority-female-owned oat mill in Minnesota, shows how DiversiFund’s investment approach can unlock regenerative food systems at scale.

Midwest farmers want to grow oats and other small grains to improve soil health and diversify rotations—but without regional milling, there is no market. Green Acres fills that gap, processing grains within 120 miles and connecting farmers to premium buyers. Farmers invested directly in the mill, retaining ownership, securing guaranteed markets, and capturing more value.

DiversiFund is participating as an investor alongside farmers, local businesses, institutional capital, and USDA-backed debt—providing flexible capital that helps de-risk the project while keeping ownership and benefits local. The result is a $60 million facility already backed by $15 million from farmers and local businesses, 40,000 acres of oats secured, and demand exceeding supply.

By anchoring regional infrastructure, Green Acres demonstrates how DiversiFund investments can strengthen farm viability, scale regenerative acreage, and ensure finance serves farmers, communities, and long-term impact.

The call to action is simple but urgent: let us move beyond efficiency toward resilience, beyond extraction toward regeneration. Together, we can redesign finance so that regenerative and agroecological producers and the ecosystems and economies they sustain are no longer left behind, but recognized as the foundation of a thriving global food system.