Member Spotlight: Mad Ag

From Soil to System Change: Elizabeth Candelario on Regenerative Agriculture, Finance, and Building a Better Future for Farmers 

Elizabeth Candelario has spent the past two decades proving that farming isn’t just about growing food—it’s about growing resilience, relationships, and a rebellion against business as usual. As Chief Strategy Officer at Mad Agriculture, she’s on a mission to transform supply chains into value chains, helping farmers break free from the industrial ag treadmill. From restoring salmon habitat in California vineyards to rethinking risk in finance and insurance, her journey into regenerative agriculture has been anything but conventional.

You’ve spent years at the intersection of food, climate, and agriculture. What was the moment (or meal) that made you say, “This is the work I have to do”?

I wouldn’t say it was a single moment—it was more of a journey. I’ve always been drawn to work with a strong social mission, but my path into regenerative agriculture really began almost 20 years ago when I was marketing director of a Sonoma County California winery. We were restoring steelhead and salmon habitat through a riparian restoration effort on our estate, and we felt it important to align our farming practices with our conservation efforts. That led us to pursue organic certification, so we brought in a consultant—the legendary Alan York (the film The Biggest Little Farm is an homage to him) to help us.

Alan didn’t just push us toward organic; he said, “You shouldn’t stop at organic, you should be biodynamic.” Over the next five years, I witnessed a profound transformation—not just in the health and vitality of the land, but in our employees, our customers, and the entire ethos of the winery. I saw how farming with deep respect for the land had ripple effects far beyond yield or quality. That was the moment I realized agriculture wasn’t just a business—it was a movement. From that point on, I was on the regenerative path, and I’ve never looked back.

Regenerative agriculture isn’t just a trend—it’s a full-on rebellion against business as usual. What are the biggest battles still being fought, and where are we actually winning?

The biggest battle is helping farmers escape the “business as usual” industrial GMO hamster wheel.  The current system keeps them trapped in dependency—on chemical inputs, limited crop rotations, GMO crops like corn and soybeans, and commodity markets that don’t reward conservation or resilience. Farmers who want to transition to regenerative agriculture face huge obstacles: from agronomic know-how, to securing capital, to finding markets that value and reward regenerative practices. Mad Ag, alongside our sister companies Mad Capital and Mad Markets, exists to break this cycle—providing farm and business planning, financial support, and direct access to organic and regenerative markets. Until we remove these barriers, the burden of change remains unfairly placed on farmers alone.

Where we’re winning is in proof of concept. Across the country, farmers and ranchers are showing that regenerative systems don’t just work—they outperform extractive models in resilience, profitability, and long-term viability. At the same time, markets are waking up. The demand for regenerative ingredients is rising, and pressure for supply chain transparency is forcing big food brands to rethink their sourcing. The momentum is shifting, and while the system is slow to change, the tide is turning.

You’ve described Mad Ag as working from “heart to head, poetry to science, financing to markets, and soil to shelf.” Which part of that equation do you think is the hardest for people to grasp, and how do you help them get it?

For a long time, I thought the hardest part was the business and science—that if we could just rethink farming practices, economics, and markets, we could engineer our way out of the food and climate crisis. But I’m beginning to realize it’s the heart that’s hardest. True change doesn’t start with a new policy or financial model—it starts within each of us.

Wendell Berry, whose Mad Farmer poems inspired our name, calls us to reimagine our relationship to the land and to each other. He urges us to resist a system that reduces land to an asset and farming to a transaction. Regeneration isn’t just about better practices—it’s about refusing to let industrial agriculture dictate our way of seeing and being. Until we reconnect with food, soil, and community at a fundamental level, we’ll keep looking for solutions in the wrong places.

Berry said, “Invest in the millennium. Plant sequoias.” That’s what we’re doing at Mad Ag—helping farmers plant for the future, even when the system suggests otherwise.

Farmers often get caught in a system that doesn’t serve them. But instead of just railing against the “bad guys,” you’re focused on building solutions. Who are the unlikely allies in this fight for a better food system?

Some of the most surprising allies are companies and institutions that weren’t traditionally part of the regenerative conversation—like policymakers, investors, and even multinational brands looking to de-risk their supply chains. They may not start out as champions of soil health, but when they see that regenerative systems reduce long-term risk, increase resilience, and create market differentiation, they can become powerful advocates.

Other unlikely allies include hunters, anglers, and conservationists—people who may not think about regenerative agriculture but deeply understand land stewardship and the role of biodiversity in thriving ecosystems. There’s an enormous opportunity to bridge the gap between farming and conservation—because at the heart of both is the same goal: restoring landscapes for all living things and ensuring they thrive for future generations.

The fundamental reality is that climate change is impacting all of us. Whether you’ve suffered through California’s wildfires, North Carolina’s hurricanes, or the derechos in Indiana, Kansas, Ohio, Oklahoma, and Texas, climate change doesn’t care about politics or profession. It’s getting personal.  And if we’re going to tackle climate change, we must address agriculture—but the impact of a healthier food system goes far beyond the climate. It means cleaner water and air, more nutritious food, thriving rural communities, flourishing ecosystems, and landscapes that are as beautiful as they are productive. No matter where you stand, that’s something we can all believe in.

Farming is risky, and insurance is supposed to help—but too often, it reinforces the status quo. If you could rewrite the role of insurance in agriculture, what would it look like?

Farming is inherently risky, and insurance is meant to be a safety net—but too often, it locks farmers into extractive systems instead of supporting their transition to regenerative practices. Right now, insurance is designed around conventional monocultures, leaving regenerative farmers exposed to financial risk when they adopt new practices like cover cropping, intercropping, or perennial systems. Without coverage for these innovations, farmers are forced to take on uninsured risks—making it harder to invest in the very practices that build resilience in the long run.

A better system would rethink risk entirely. Instead of penalizing regenerative farmers for not fitting within outdated models, insurance should recognize that healthy soil, biodiversity, and diversified cropping systems actually reduce long-term risk. Multi-annual insurance policies could give farmers the stability they need to transition, rather than forcing them to operate year to year. Parametric insurance—designed to trigger payouts based on specific weather events—could provide rapid support in the face of increasing climate volatility, rather than leaving farmers in limbo while claims are processed.

Insurance isn’t just a financial tool—it’s a lever for transformation. By closing coverage gaps for new crops and regenerative practices, the right insurance products could de-risk investment in soil health, water retention, conservation, and climate resilience. If we want regenerative agriculture to scale, we need insurance that works with farmers, not against them.

Premiums for the Planet is working to redirect insurance dollars toward climate solutions. How do you see finance—whether insurance, banking, or investment—playing a role in scaling regenerative agriculture?

Bravo to Premiums for the Planet for your groundbreaking work proving that insurance premiums can be channeled for positive global impact!  As you know, finance plays a critical role in the transition to regenerative agriculture. Farmers can’t shift practices without financial systems that support them, yet most capital—whether from insurance, banking, or investment—still flows toward extractive models that degrade soil, increase climate vulnerability, and lock farmers into cycles of dependency. If we want to scale regenerative agriculture, we need to rethink how money moves through the food system. 

Insurance can be a catalyst for change. As discussed, right now the system insures the past, not the future, reinforcing monocultures and chemical inputs while leaving innovative farmers exposed to uninsured risks.

Banking must evolve, too. Regenerative farmers need loan products that recognize the long-term benefits of soil health and diversified systems, rather than forcing them to operate under short-term financial constraints that prioritize yield over resilience. This work is the heart and soul of Mad Capital. 

Investment also has a crucial role to play in funding the infrastructure needed to support regenerative supply chains—whether it’s regional grain processing, perennial crop systems, or biodiversity-enhancing farming models that don’t fit within traditional funding structures.  We are so excited that just last year, Mad Markets made their first (of many planned) infrastructure acquisition with the purchase of Timeless Natural Foods, a lentil and chickpea processor in Montana.

The bottom line is: finance helps shape the future of agriculture. If we continue to fund extraction, we’ll get more of the same—soil depletion, climate risk, and farmer insolvency. But if we direct capital toward regeneration, we don’t just transform agriculture. We create a food system that restores land, strengthens rural economies, and builds resilience for generations to come.

If you could wave a magic wand and make everyone understand one thing about regenerative agriculture (or unlearn one big misconception), what would it be?

If I could wave a magic wand, I’d want everyone to understand that regenerative agriculture isn’t just about farming—it’s about relationships. We think of regenerative agriculture in terms of cover crops, reducing tillage, eliminating synthetic inputs, but it’s much deeper than that. It’s about rethinking how we relate to land, food, and each other.

We’ve been conditioned to see agriculture as an industrial process, where soil is an input, yield is the goal, and success is measured in bushels per acre. But true regeneration isn’t that—it’s something you cultivate over time. It’s about partnership, not extraction. Collaboration, not competition. Healthy soil, diverse crops, clean water, strong rural economies, and vibrant food systems don’t exist in isolation—they are interconnected, shaped by the financial, ecological, and cultural systems we choose to build.

The biggest misconception is that we can fix agriculture with a single practice or a better product. Real change happens when we stop trying to outsmart nature and start working with it.  Together.

The headlines about climate and agriculture can be pretty bleak. Can you share a recent story or moment that reminded you why this fight is worth it?

The headlines can be overwhelming, but then you step onto a farm where something different is happening- something you can feel in your bones- and you know that there is nothing more important to fight for.

Last summer, my team and I stood with a farmer on their land where prairie strips- perennial plantings of prairie grasses and wildflowers woven into crop fields- had replaced rows of commodity crops. Just a few years earlier, this land was like so many others: bare soil, high inputs, no life beyond the crop itself.  Now, monarch butterflies floated through the air, bees hummed, birds flew overhead, clean water flowed nearby, and the soil was alive again. You could see it.  You could hear it.  You could feel it.  The farmer told us that this was the spot where he always came at the end of a hard day.  You see, it isn’t just the land regenerating—it’s the people, too.

That’s the reminder. Regeneration isn’t just an idea or a policy—it’s something you can see, feel, and touch. No headline can capture that. But that’s what’s happening. And that’s why this fight is worth everything.

For companies that want to be part of this movement but don’t know where to start, what’s the first step? (And for consumers who don’t run brands, what’s their first step?)

Any company looking to make an impact can start by supporting conservation efforts on farms and Mad Ag can help.  For food companies, the first step is understanding your supply chain. Where does your food come from? Who are the farmers? What incentives or barriers do they face? From there, commit to supporting regenerative supply—whether through purchasing, investment, or partnerships.  And don’t forget to move your insurance to Premiums for the Planet  

For consumers, it’s about shifting buying habits and asking better questions. Support brands that source regeneratively. Cook with grains and ingredients from regenerative farms. Advocate—whether that means pushing policymakers to support better farm policies, holding brands accountable, or simply sharing what you learn

Every meal is an opportunity to invest in the future we want.