Regenerative agriculture is generally understood to improve soil health, increase biodiversity,
enhance water quality, sequester carbon, and serve to replenish the land rather than degrade it.
The purpose of our research was to analyze how the current economic and political climate of
New York State encourages or discourages the adoption of regenerative farming methods,
especially given the polarizing federal administration changes of the last decade. Our methods
consisted of 22 semi-structured interviews, a policy analysis, an econometric data analysis, three
site visits, an online survey, and two conferences. Our research demonstrated a growing adoption
of regenerative agriculture statewide, largely due to state incentivization of these practices. Many
stakeholders expressed financial barriers surrounding land access, low profit margins, and
inaccessible grant funding. We discovered a complicated and volatile top-down funding system
for agricultural grants. Stakeholders generally had a higher level of trust in NGOs and the state
government than they did for the federal government. Most farmers we interviewed expressed a
desire for increased autonomy and less reliance on government funding, an ethos which guided
our recommendations. Our key recommendations were to transition grant funding towards
investments in permanent communal infrastructure, to develop markets for regeneratively grown
products and cover crops, to increase consumer-side subsidies for local produce, and to
strengthen institutional local food procurement programs.
