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EP34: Peter Michel - Follow the Signs: How to Build a 1000 Year Legacy
68 Plays10 days ago
“It’s very important that you be not only the change that you want to see in the world, but also finance that change that you want to see in the world.”
Regenerative design requires more than short-term fixes—it calls for long visions that outlast any single generation. At the core of this episode is the principle that farming is not ownership but stewardship, where land, biodiversity, and community are passed forward in healthier, richer conditions.
Peter Michel Heilmann shares his global journey through Africa, Europe, and beyond, where he witnessed both the harsh realities of inequality and the resilience of communities close to nature. He shares insights into creating a 1000 year vision for farms and land stewards to develop financing models like Earth Certificates showing how regenerative farming can move beyond debt and bureaucracy.
Peter Michel Heilmann is one of the pioneers in sustainability, founder of WholistiQ, a former Managing Partner of Nordic Circular Hotspot, and co-founder of Global Compact Networks in Finland and Greece. He has authored seven books and today dedicates his work to helping farmers and land stewards craft thriving, future-proof farms, estates and communities.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/pmheilmann/
Follow Peter Michel's regenerative journey:
Explore these valuable resources to further your journey in regenerative design:
Discover more about Regenerative design at Paulownia Landscape Architects.
https://www.paulownia-la.com/.
Dive into the Twelve Laws of Nature and unlock the secrets of harmonizing with our planet at https://www.12lawsofnature.com/.
Fulfill your garden aspirations with expert guidance from the Garden of Your Dreams masterclass at https://www.gardenofyourdreams.com/.
Ready to take actionable steps towards your dream garden? Book a complimentary 30-minute training session with Matthieu for immediate results: https://calendly.com/garden-of-your-dreams.
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Transcript
Vision for Land Stewardship
00:00:00
Speaker
My vision is for all farmers and anyone who stewards the land to have a 1000 year vision for their land. Once you have that on paper, you create a roadmap. What is needed to get there?
00:00:11
Speaker
Capital, people, planning permission, licenses, machinery, or you need maybe the money aspect then also needs a strategy of how do you do that?
Introduction to Regenerative Design Podcast
00:00:21
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the Regenerative Design podcast.
00:00:25
Speaker
I'm your host, Mathieu Mehuys, and in this show, I interview the leading authorities in the world of regenerative practices. People who do good and do well. Are you a person that cares about your environment and our planet?
00:00:39
Speaker
Are you a person that wants to leave the planet to our children to be something that we can be truly proud of? Something to enjoy for many generations to come. But are you also a person that believes we can do all of this and do good in business?
00:00:55
Speaker
Well, I have really good news for you. You're here listening to the podcast that is all about making our planet a better place and making your business more successful.
00:01:06
Speaker
Enjoy the show.
Introducing Peter Michel Hellman
00:01:08
Speaker
Hello and welcome to another episode of the Regenerative Design Podcast with your host, Mathieu. And today we have a really special guest. We are honored to welcome Peter Michel Hellman.
00:01:18
Speaker
He's a global pioneer in regenerative design, finance and sustainability. Peter Michel is the founder of Holistic, former managing partner of Nordic Circular Hotspot, co-founder of the Global Compact Network in Finland and Greece.
00:01:34
Speaker
And he was part of the founder circle of the B Corp community in Europe. He launched Eco Network in 1993, one of the first B2B sustainability portals, and later served as president of Eurocharity, growing it into a leading social entrepreneurship model in Europe.
00:01:52
Speaker
He's also the author of seven books in English and Greek. Peter Michel's work spanned continents from Africa to Europe, shaping how we actually think about circular economies, leadership and regenerative systems.
00:02:06
Speaker
And right now he's on a quest to support farmers in creating their own 1000 year vision, which is a bold roadmap that empowers them to thrive while regenerating the land.
00:02:17
Speaker
So, Pieter Mochel, that's a mouthful of information. Welcome to the show. how are you doing? Well, I wanted to use the same word mouthful the second that you said the word mouthful.
00:02:28
Speaker
So we are completely in synchronization and following the signs. And I'm doing very well. ah Greetings from the from a a ah beautiful farm, organic, not-for-profit farm ah called the Community Farm.
00:02:45
Speaker
here in the Chu Valley, overlooking the Chu Valley Lake in southwest England. That's incredible. Yeah, we'll talk more about your incredible journey as you are on the road ah with your own family, which is a beautiful thing. You're taking your son and and your wife too to amazing places ah to visit farms. I'm thinking that there's a big aspect to teach your son about what's happening in the world.
00:03:10
Speaker
and to learn from him as well. But I'm just super curious, like you've had so many accomplishments, like where did all of this start?
Hellman's Early Life and Influences
00:03:19
Speaker
How did you get into this? Yeah, that's a difficult question. I think it was started when I was born. ah Nice. ah I always say to people, well if they ask me, like where were you born, andt etc et etc., I said, well, I like to start like where I was conceived.
00:03:40
Speaker
That's a better question. that's I was conceived in Calabria in southern ah Italy and my already my parents were very ah adventurous and entrepreneurial and very traveling the world.
00:03:54
Speaker
they ah and my My father was ah ah ah doing research in Suriname, which back then ah was in in the forest, in the Amazon forest with the Indians, with the native people of the land.
00:04:10
Speaker
They went to Cote d'Ivoire, Ivory Coast, Calabria, and they were in their twenty s right ah doing ah research and ah ah yeah enjoying... And this is back in the what what years? We're talking about the 1960s.
00:04:27
Speaker
Wow, that's incredible. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so, ah you know, it was back then that my parents, they couldn't travel outside of the country if they were not married. So they first had to marry before they could even leave the country.
00:04:42
Speaker
that's crazy those Those were the times, right? So yes, and then when I was born, I was born in Utrecht and ah eventually i yeah ah came, there's someone at the door, but I'll try to ignore it.
00:05:00
Speaker
Someone looking at the camera, it happens very often. That's so cool. Yes. And I was born in Utrecht. And after two years, my father, mother, and my sister and myself, we went to Burundi in so in ah in in Central Africa.
00:05:19
Speaker
And that ah is a place that back then was a ah massive genocide happening with hundreds of thousands of people that were who got killed. It was very turbulent times in Africa.
00:05:33
Speaker
So, um yeah, I would say if you ask the question, when did it start? I think that Africa shaped me in a way that I felt so much. ah I thought that Africa, that this was the normal thing, what was happening around me in the nineteen seventy s right?
00:05:49
Speaker
ah You had ah wars, you had ah hyperinflation, you had like and massive difference between of extremely ah ah extreme wealth and extreme poverty.
00:06:03
Speaker
And actually there was so much abundance as well. um ah You know, the but the the money was worth almost nothing. But at the same time, people had this big smile on their face like that, right?
00:06:18
Speaker
And I saw my friends, they were, from my age, were creating their own little toys from wires, their own little Jeeps ah with the Coca-Cola lids and with a little rubber waste.
00:06:33
Speaker
They were creating their own little, and they were so proud of it. You know, you could see the smile and they hadn't, were not wearing any shoes, anything. anything So it was back then I was fascinated by by nature and by by the by the people and by ah growing my own vegetables in our garden, ah which had a big wall around it with glass and barbed wire.
00:07:00
Speaker
And we had ah a guy who was ah with a gun, who was ah guarding our house. We had people in our garden who were working for us in the in the kitchen. and So it was a ah a surreal situation whereby i couldn't even go outside.
00:07:18
Speaker
It was not allowed to go outside on my own without any anyone protecting me. i do it ah in in ah We were ah ah living in a uk UN, United Nations compound in Burundi.
00:07:32
Speaker
And later on, my father worked for the Ministry of Agriculture of Zambia. And next door was the Rhodesian Bush War. So what happened is that all of this has made me into the man who I am today.
00:07:47
Speaker
The formative years, which is your first seven years of your life, forms the rest of your life. So if you had like a turbulent ah youth and you have seen all of this social yeah inequality, economic turmoil, wars this and that.
Philosophy on Land Stewardship
00:08:06
Speaker
On the other side, you've seen the kids being very inventive and and ah nature shaping you and and and being close to nature and being also ah very close to ah people who i had a lot of influence.
00:08:22
Speaker
I thought, hey, that's kind of strange. you know If you have this influence, maybe you can do something with this influence, this influential connection. I remember I met with my father, took me to Mpongwe, where we ah ah met a very high delegation of of government ministers and in the president of ah of Zambia, um Kenneth Kaunda, the founding father of the country.
00:08:49
Speaker
ah with his helicopter and everything. And it was yeah it was kind of impressive as a child, you know, that that these people were actually calling the shots, you know.
00:09:01
Speaker
And if you needed anything, you just had to have those connections in order to make it happen. Well, a lot of people didn't have those connections and they couldn't make it happen.
00:09:12
Speaker
and So you have this this ah strange situation whereby if you have money and you have power and you have this and you have that, you can make things done, you can make things work. But if you if you are let's say, a peasant farmer or you are, you know, working the land and you have ah zero power, right?
00:09:34
Speaker
ah but you're doing something very good for humanity. You're feeding us, right? You don't have that influence or you don't have that you don't even have a time to do these things.
00:09:46
Speaker
So as a little kid, I so i was well all observing this. I was thinking, hey, this interesting the world is so strange. how how do How did we organize things like that? This ridiculous, right?
00:09:59
Speaker
I think that when I grow up, I want to change that. I want to do something, but I want to make impact. right Back then it wasn't even called impact, it was just called ecology, right from the Greek word, ekologia.
00:10:15
Speaker
Ecos, everything that's eco, economia, ecologia, ecosystems, eco this, eco that, right is the ecos, which is the house, the household.
00:10:26
Speaker
right So it is and the household that we live in, is the our house, right? It's this camper van, let's say, or it's the house we live, but it's also the house that we live on on planet Earth, that we live in one house. We live on this in the same house all together on this planet. We we tend to forget that sometimes.
00:10:49
Speaker
that It's not that if we let's go to the next planet because so I'm done with this house. We're all sharing this house and we have to make something which will last for a long time.
00:11:00
Speaker
It's not something that we're gonna, ah let's say, destroy this but planet and then leave it destroyed for the next generation. We are born in this land and we hope, at least I hope, to bring it in a better shape when I leave it.
00:11:17
Speaker
So actually we're like stewards of the land. you know instead of owning the land, we merely steward it. right It's like the Patek Philippe watch, remember that ad in the past?
00:11:30
Speaker
You remember that? It's like you don't actually own a Patek Philippe. ah You um you know care for it and you pass it on to your son or to your daughter, to new generation. You just care ah care for it and and give it to the next generation.
00:11:48
Speaker
Yeah, that's a beautiful thing. It's like you' you're not you don't own the watch, actually. you You can wear it and then pass it on. Pass it on. The same is with the land. Yeah, we don't own the land. We don't own Mother mother Earth.
00:12:02
Speaker
right We are part of Mother Earth. We are part of nature. And therefore, we should do something with ah nature rather than against it. like And we should do something which will make sure that that when we leave this earth,
00:12:18
Speaker
that we give that Earth in such a way that it's richer, it's more biodiverse, it's more beautiful, it's more harmonious, it's more peaceful, et etc.
00:12:33
Speaker
But you might you might think, well, that's you utopia, right? and and and ah Utopia in Greek, right? But yeah, if if we all do this as our aim in life, I think every generation will live in a in an even better world.
Gardening Masterclass
00:12:50
Speaker
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00:13:02
Speaker
Do you sometimes get overwhelmed by the lack of knowledge and time you have to actually do gardening? Then the Garden of Your Dreams Masterclass is for you. I love that and I just thought the the analogy with the watch is is beautiful but it's even better because a watch it will stay the same but when we care for the planet we can create something more beautiful we can make that watch even nicer and then pass it on when we care for the planet and and do that. So I i really love the the fact that you grew up in that environment where you so saw a lot of power, let's say, and how power plays are being used to shape the world.
00:13:42
Speaker
And then at the same time, you see that the farmers, the people that are the real people that are actually the most influential on our planet are the farmers, because they are influencing our environment.
00:13:53
Speaker
And you said, like, why why is that mismatching? Was that what drove you to do the work you're doing today? Well, it it's a process. You know, I was, as a child, I was a member of the Djungololo Club of Zambia, ah which is a sort of a nature club.
00:14:11
Speaker
I think it's important for children at a very early age to be ah playing in nature. Is that like the Scouts or or similar to Scouts? It's like a sort of a club whereby you have you these little creepy crawlies and you do everything. You start inspecting nature. You go in nature and you start to discover the names of things.
00:14:35
Speaker
ah Right. And back then there was no Internet. We're talking about the second half of the nineteen seventy s Yeah. So you have a situation whereby fellow and and kids, ah either from school or from the neighborhood, they also start to get enthusiastic about nature.
00:14:54
Speaker
yeah And even though ah maybe your parents are very busy doing other things, maybe they're working or they maybe they're cooking or they maybe they're shopping. Right.
00:15:06
Speaker
ah ah ah maybe once every weekend we do a little ah forest ah ah walk or something, right? But this was something, was a club that was it was a daily habit of doing something with nature, right? At school, but also at, say you know, yeah ah we were doing homeschooling,
00:15:25
Speaker
and So we didn't have that many kids. um But I think it's so important that you start very young to be sensitized and be conscious about the world, right?
00:15:41
Speaker
And about nature and about our relationship with nature. right and and and and have start to create a ah worldview of the world and also be close to things that you, you know, every day I learn new things.
00:15:59
Speaker
Even today, i we just came back from Jersey, right? ah I learned everything about the Jersey cows, for example. I found that so fascinating, right? How are they...
00:16:12
Speaker
you know, ah how the history of that cow is and and and ah what amazing ah ah stuff they do ah for for for for the for the grass and for the the milk, this that. It's like, I just thought a Jersey cow is a Jersey cow, right?
00:16:31
Speaker
yeah But if you actually go and see the Jersey cow on Jersey, right There's no other cow on Jersey than a Jersey cow, right? Because they want to keep the breed as pure as possible.
00:16:44
Speaker
But apparently there are more Jersey cows outside of Jersey than inside of Jersey, which also shows you we are in you know in a globalized world whereby you know you don't have just a local situation, but you have a global situation whereby you can get a lot of, how shall say it, a lot of input and each place you go to, you learn new things.
00:17:12
Speaker
see i that That fascinates me ever since I was a child. yeah that's uh that's true yeah it's it's very fascinating and then let's go still a little bit more in history like you grew up in in africa you got all this this inspiration there and then what was like the driving force to to go and actually do something with that in the world because a lot of people they think like oh yeah of course we needed a better planet of course we need to do ecology but hey, I have my job, i I'm an accountant or I'm doing other stuff. its kind
Sustainable Development Movement of the 90s
00:17:44
Speaker
of
00:17:44
Speaker
I don't have time to think about it. What was the driving force for you to to make a career in that that space? I never see it as a career, actually. I think it's an intrinsic motivation.
00:17:56
Speaker
you know ah There were a lot of people in the early nineteen ninety s that were talking about sustainable development as it was called back then. I don't know if you can remember the Earth Summit of 1992. lot of people were... was one year Earth, so that was hard. Yeah, in Rio de Janeiro, in Brazil, right?
00:18:16
Speaker
And um it was a situation whereby I think that was a wake up call for the world. Also before that actually, but ah more and more countries and and and businesses and started.
00:18:28
Speaker
you know i I remember there was this company called Ecovair from Belgium. Yeah, i know and the the the founder's son, I know him, yeah.
00:18:39
Speaker
Yeah, oh. ah yeah yeah yeah it's um Is he called Pauli? Yeah, Pauli. Pauli, right? good Remember Gunter Pauli? Yes, yes, yes. In the 90s. I read his book. to me exactly It's Exactly. He's a ah visionary on blue economy, right? Exactly. But back then he was it was ah involved in you know as a director of that Ecovair factory.
00:19:03
Speaker
That was massively... ah innovative, was a sort of a green factory in your country. yeah yeah And ah i I made a newspaper called Eco Network, every two months published a newspaper with all the articles and things that were happening around the world with environment and and sustainable businesses. And and I just got excited about these things.
00:19:31
Speaker
like and and and And I even today you know have connect ah contact with ah with with with those pioneers of of that period.
00:19:42
Speaker
right I remember there was a and ah one of the first and impact investment companies in 1995 called Pymwimic. called panomicck I put your money where your mouth is, community.
00:19:54
Speaker
right You know, what the but most absurd names were were starting to pop up, right? so cool And it was like, wow, you know, ah ah John Elkinson created the People Planet Prophet, the triple bottom line. and and and and has ah created the first ah ah environmental and a corporate social responsibility report in 1997.
00:20:23
Speaker
and you know, people like Paul Hawken, I ah ah read his book on the ecology of commerce. I think the 1990s were one of the most exciting years for the pioneers of the movement of of creating something better for the world, right?
00:20:43
Speaker
Not just do business and make profit and make money and finito. No, make money, do business, but also do good for the world. and do good for the people, do good for the planet, right?
00:20:57
Speaker
And do good for the profit. That was a new thing. You know, it was almost unheard of that you that these things were important, right? But I was, let's say, part of that that new generation of of of creating businesses but or or actually linking also businesses. That was my my task in the 90s, was linking these businesses so that they could empower each other globally.
00:21:23
Speaker
That's amazing. We had representatives as far as New Zealand, Argentina, Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands, United Kingdom, all over the place, right, ah that were werere distributing these newspapers and we had or like a website and, you know, the ball started rolling back then.
00:21:42
Speaker
Yeah, that's so cool that you were part of that early pioneers group of people that said like, hey, We have to be careful with our planet. like the The evidence is there and since probably since the 60s, but not much had happened. And maybe some political things, try people try to do some political changes. It's like it doesn't really look work. like i'm ah I'm an opponent. I'm a believer that it's not the government's job to take care of our planet.
00:22:09
Speaker
It's the the entrepreneurs, you and me and people. I mean, at a certain degree, we should set the... the the the rules of the game, that's what the government has to do. I think that the government can help big time when it comes to the legal framework and making it incentivize.
00:22:29
Speaker
yeah For example, if we talk about farming, to incentivize ah farmers to do good for their farm, for nature, for the people, for the planet,
00:22:43
Speaker
for the health of the animals, the soil, the people. I think the government has ah very big role to play on that. Where the government shouldn't be ah playing a role is to make farming so bureaucratic and so, ah how shall I say it, that you become almost a bureaucrat rather than farmer.
00:23:07
Speaker
Yes. Whereby you start to have rules on this, that, that and everything else that you start to have over regulation, right? Over bureaucracy.
00:23:18
Speaker
And ah that ah you know like that you have to spend hours, days, weeks just to fill in forms to get a subsidy on something. that's That's a nightmare. So I think that there should be a middle way.
00:23:35
Speaker
Yeah, i think wasn I see that with my my brother and my father are farmers and unfortunately they spent way too much time behind the desk rather than being out on the on the farm doing the the actual work.
00:23:47
Speaker
Yeah. So I can see that. the Your country is is ah is a is ah is a situation whereby you don't even know ah who who to knock the door with, right? It's like... yeah It's crazy. So many governments. there's You ah don't have one government. You have all sorts of captains on the ship, right? We have 11 governments. Can imagine that? Exactly.
00:24:06
Speaker
For such a small country and then you have to... figure everything out. And every two months, there's a new law. And so farmers have to study the law as well. Because if they don't do it, they get punished or they don't get the subsidies.
00:24:18
Speaker
yeah That's crazy. Yeah. yeah But you know, I am a very big believer that you can do things also without subsidy as such. Yeah, I agree.
Creating a 1000-Year Farm Vision
00:24:29
Speaker
A lot of things can come from the private sector, can come from and having a healthy business, but that would need a few things to get there because in these these days with so many things happening right ah ah like for example a debt is a big problem for ah for for for farmers and in in general that is is a big burden ah and on the cash flow and on them but also things like succession right yeah if you have
00:25:05
Speaker
people who want to, um yeah, carry let's say that you want to carry on your business for many, many generations. I was, last week, I spent, ah ah ah actually was not even last week, it was three days ago.
00:25:22
Speaker
I spent a ah ah very long and ah day with together with a, ah with a a farmer from Jersey, we just came back from Jersey by the way, we spent there five days, who ah his family is the 16th generation, but his family is from the 1500 on the
00:25:45
Speaker
island, he is a potato farmer, but he also has ah recycling business for pellets, So all the pallets that are coming to the island, you know he recycles them or he he makes new products out of it.
00:25:59
Speaker
So instead of shipping those back to the mainland, right ah there's no really factory, recycling factory to do that. He mike he made this micro factory ah whereby he chips them or he makes a ah firewood from them or he makes ah ah you know all sorts of ah products from them, which are again useful to use. And even the the good palettes, the really almost mint palettes that are not so much damage, he resells them back to, for example, a major dairy a company on the island and and then to reuse it. So it's reuse it, recycle it, you know upcycle it, downcycle it, whatever.
00:26:45
Speaker
But you do something with those pallets. And this is a this is a ah Jersey Royal potato producer. right who just got this innovative idea to make money outside of his farming business and and do something good for the world, of the planet, the island.
00:27:03
Speaker
And instead of him saying, hey, give me a subsidy because I'm doing good, he's making a ah good living, but he's saving a lot of money, a lot, for the government every year.
00:27:17
Speaker
yeah So why shouldn't, I would say, such businesses should be incentivized yes ah if you if you ah and If you save a lot of money for society and do something good for the environment and and for the island in this in this case, right?
00:27:37
Speaker
Why not say, hey, you know we we reward you for that? Nothing wrong with that. i have I have this big vision that I did some studying on on insurance companies and how much more expensive insurances are becoming and how less profitable insurances are becoming for insurance companies.
00:27:57
Speaker
And I'm thinking this is like billions of billions of of dollars and euros that are being spent on um because of climate change that is damaging houses, flood floods everywhere, that if the insurance companies would give money to the farmers to become more regenerative, then that would actually reverse climate change.
00:28:15
Speaker
And that would reduce the amount of damage that's being done globally. Like if we could use the resources that we have to have a positive impact on a global scale, it becomes like yeah a no brainer to invest in that. yeah To invest in what? Sorry?
00:28:31
Speaker
So to invest in regenerative farming. ah That's what you mean. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah understand. Look, I find it... ah ah Look, one of the big problems of farming at the moment is the rising cost of the land and the property.
00:28:49
Speaker
who and You know, ah a ah farmhouse that would cost maybe a million or two million and 10 years later is 2 million, 4 million.
00:29:02
Speaker
It's double. And therefore, the cost of insuring that house and and that estate is also going up. for right So insurance can become a problem ah in a way that certain things cannot be insured anymore yep because of the disasters that are happening or or you know ah that the farmer is unable to pay for that insurance anymore.
00:29:28
Speaker
This is also something quite a thing. But I wouldn't focus too much on that aspect for now because at least in our conversation, I think it's very important to create, first of all, a 1,000-year vision for your farm.
00:29:47
Speaker
So my vision is like and for all farmers and actually anyone who stewards to land to have a 1,000-year vision for their land. Mm-hmm.
00:29:57
Speaker
Why is that? Because once you have a very long-term perspective on your, and let's say, on your, or what the next 40 generations want to do, right, and can do,
00:30:14
Speaker
Because of course, you're not gonna be around in a thousand years, right? But you can't set ah certain dot on the horizon. So, hey, this is where we wanna be going, right? and We spent almost two months in in Ireland And we've seen a lot of so beautiful and farms, estates, et cetera.
00:30:35
Speaker
We came across ah one one farmer who wanted to make a regenerative farm school, right, on his estate and so that the people who can come from Ireland or even all around the world to his school can then ah practice at the farm that he runs, right?
00:30:54
Speaker
Which is so a regenerative farm, organic. ah It has polytunnels. It has... ah it has 400 chickens making ah organic eggs.
00:31:07
Speaker
He's got a box scheme. he sells to ah local bakeries. It's like thriving... you know is's like a thriving community around him.
00:31:18
Speaker
but And yet he doesn't have the money to make that farm school a reality, but it is part of his vision. So we sat down, said, hey, what what what happens if we all set sat down, right? The whole family and anyone who is on the farm and say, hey, what do we envision for this farm?
00:31:39
Speaker
Where do we want to go to? Even if we know that certain obstacles will need to be overcome. Let's forget about the obstacles. Let's forget about the money issues or this, the other, all the other issues, legislation, et cetera.
00:31:55
Speaker
Let's just set that as a vision and we put it on paper. So we we ah do a session together. can be with the fire, maybe with food and with drink and, you know, and and nice with lots of ah post-its and and and newspaper articles that you can cut out and ah photographs or, you know, and and and have a creative big piece of paper.
00:32:21
Speaker
We did that in Northern Ireland ah ah with with with ah in a building that was almost falling down with no roof on it. So the nighttime with a nice fire and and they had a vision to for that for that building, a part of the bigger vision.
00:32:36
Speaker
So like what happens then is that once you have that on paper, you create a roadmap. So you say, okay, here we are today and this is where we want to be going in a thousand years. So how do we get there?
00:32:49
Speaker
ah You make a roadmap and that roadmap, then you see, okay, what is needed to get there? Then you say, okay, part of it is maybe that you need capital or you need people or you need ah and planning permission or you need whatever, right? Or you need ah certain licenses or you need the maybe certain machinery or you need maybe extra land or A lot of things can be needed to to get that picture right. yeah In this case, he's a top 50 farmer actually, in one of the top 50 farmers, regenerative farmers in Europe, ah the only one in Ireland, we visited him.
00:33:33
Speaker
He said, my dream is to make ah a farm school whereby everyone can work the land and really know how to farm regeneratively and organically and naturally properly.
00:33:46
Speaker
So, wow that's an amazing vision, right? But how do you how do you do that? He would need an X amount of money. He he even had the designs from a Hong Kong school and he had, ah he had ah let's say, it took him five years to get the planning permission, which he got.
00:34:03
Speaker
well ever yeah He even put the the first stone in the ground to to to show people this is not just a vision, this is this is real. building I want to do this.
00:34:14
Speaker
right But this was um lacking, a good business plan was lacking, a good team was lacking, various various elements that I then help the farmer or the land steward too to ah get that right.
00:34:30
Speaker
And then often it is that the money aspect then also needs a strategy. of how How do you do that? you know how do you How do you create and not only ah thriving farm, but also a thriving farm school and and all of these things, right?
00:34:48
Speaker
I don't know if that if that ah um resonates with you or if I need to further deep di down dive into how that would then work. No, yeah, that's super valuable and I can clearly see what how how would that plays out and how it's yeah a really good thing to do to not just think in a harvest or two harvests or five years.
00:35:09
Speaker
to set the bar like far, because then it's way easier to make decisions today. And I love what you said about that, that it's, I think for farmers, maybe people in general, it's like we have big visions, but then we have to put it in reality and making a business plan, financial, finding fun, capital, all those aspects are really instrumental. And oftentimes people don't have the financial education to do that.
00:35:33
Speaker
So how how did you learn all of that and and why did you decide to to use that for farmers? Yeah.
Balancing Ethics and Business in Sustainability
00:35:41
Speaker
Well, first of all, i I have been an entrepreneur myself, so I was very much involved in setting up businesses and financing businesses. and I ah have helped many other ventures, sustainable companies, regenerative, et cetera, to raise capital and I helped raise capital for a circular economy fund in the in the United States, ah a ah major solar, disruptive solar company in in the Netherlands.
00:36:15
Speaker
You know, it's been a long journey of than 30 years of ah more than thirty years of ah you know, trying, ah tried and tested things, right? Starting a business from scratch and then ah scaling it into a international enterprise and then moving on to the next venture.
00:36:38
Speaker
I have a question around that. Oh, yeah, thank you. and I just want to jump in there because that's super valuable that you went through that. But for you, what was the the hardest part of of being in business and what were some of the biggest ops obstacles that you had to overcome?
00:36:57
Speaker
personally in that journey.
00:37:00
Speaker
well you I love your deep questions just and and the timeframe we have is like very short probably too to tell you all of these things, right? yeah Yeah, but maybe one that stands out the most in your career.
00:37:15
Speaker
Well, you know, there have been times whereby i have been raising capital for sustainable ventures, for example, and helped through, but ah for example, crowdfunding, private equity or venture capital or, you know, people putting money in.
00:37:31
Speaker
into things and that the management team or the leadership didn't have the ethics. So it was sustainable, the product and and and and the vision and everything was amazing, right?
00:37:44
Speaker
But then the people who were involved in the company I found them you know as if they were like almost too much focusing on ah on the green and the sustainable and the this and that and not so much focusing on actually making money with a business model or how to you know, have a good team around you.
00:38:08
Speaker
and and And, you know, so it's a very good balance that you need between your ethical ah beliefs and your, you know, your your purpose that you have, e etc.
00:38:21
Speaker
With that, with the with a world that is like big and quite brutal and vicious, yeah you know, if you don't make money, you're you're done, you're out.
00:38:34
Speaker
right yeah ah and And therefore, if you have a great sustainable product or regenerative product, like for example, if ah if a farmer has, for example, one client, which is then ah a ah factory or a supermarket, but or the milk factory or whatever, yeah and that company goes out of business,
00:38:57
Speaker
you're so dependent on that one company. or and And then to change that model into becoming a community-focused company whereby you do you sell directly to consumer or you ah ah make it into a community-owned company or you or you become but diversify your business, right?
00:39:21
Speaker
that can sometimes be scary because you're you're used to a certain model that probably your dad did or or, you know, that the system tells you this is the model.
00:39:33
Speaker
Guys, right? yeah The model is make money and and sell your products, make profit, go home, right? But if you are in farming, you do this because you have a passion, you're passionate about it, right?
00:39:50
Speaker
So most of the entrepreneurs I meet, right, are passionate about their work and about food and healthy food and regeneration and and sustainability and all the beautiful things, right?
00:40:05
Speaker
But then often they need like a mentor or people around them who can then guide them into things like, you know, if you're a farmer, for example, you're your're most of the time not really a marketeer or ah someone who knows other skills. So you need to complement these skills that you don't have, right?
00:40:26
Speaker
And surround yourself with people or make a team. that can it can really bring that into a success, right? And not think, okay, you know, i have a business and it's and and ah and i I don't know anything about that.
00:40:42
Speaker
And therefore, yeah. It might, at the end of the day, if you don't make enough money and then you have your your siblings, let's say your children, they see you struggling and say, well, you know, I'd rather go to a to the city and have a ah great successful job because the farming doesn't make any money.
00:41:00
Speaker
No, that's why most of kids get out of farming from farmers. Actually, there is a big trend that is changing. It's changing that young people, ah millennials, ah Gen Z, etc. They like to make impact.
00:41:17
Speaker
They love They love farming in a way because ah ah they start to more and more become into this. Why? Because they're they're excited about making nutritious food, protecting nature, biodiversity, and animal welfare, wildlife.
00:41:35
Speaker
All of these things is coming together if you start making a farm of the 21st century, which is like goes beyond just, you know, ah making money. its it has It has so many other elements that are very exciting to do.
00:41:54
Speaker
And that's why I'm getting that myself very excited if I see young people say, well, you know, You have a guy called like Jeremy Clarkson. I don't know if you you know him, right?
00:42:06
Speaker
He brings a lot of young people into farming. like You need like role models. You need success stories. You need people who say, wow, I go to this farm and it's so exciting.
00:42:17
Speaker
I'd like to be become a farmer. i like to I want to be part of this because it makes me here in my heart, not here, but here. i ah It makes me tick.
00:42:29
Speaker
I finally so feel i have a purpose in life rather than ah going to work for a yeah ah company which is um very... ah multinational or or in a financial world or this and that, that all they want is shareholder value and the rest can go out of the window.
00:42:49
Speaker
And it doesn't make me tick here. Okay, it pays my salary, but I don't have a purpose in life. No, that's when people burn out and then they question why. But I really love what you said about the... People should burn in, not burn out. yeah It should be burning.
00:43:06
Speaker
flame should be burning, right? And if the flame's not burning, what happens? You get a burn out. I love that. That's very that's very well put. and And I love what you said because this is a really valuable lesson for for our listeners and and in general people. I feel like we have a clash of two worlds a little bit in our world today like you have the people that are purely driven by profit and there there's a space for that and it it works it's what most of the economy has been doing and then there's a new world where people want to do good for the environment ecology they're passionate about things they're purpose driven but oftentimes we think like oh it's one or the other
00:43:48
Speaker
We have to choose between profit or we have to do really good for the environment. and And with the work that you've done, because it's instrumental to be really sustainable in in the terms of, okay, we can do this not just one year with funds, we can keep doing this and we can keep growing it, is that we bring those two worlds together, that we have profit part of being impactful because one doesn't go without the other.
00:44:11
Speaker
If we only focus on on profit, then we're going to destroy the planet that we are on. If we only focus on on doing something ecological, good for the environment, then it's not going to last because we're in and the system we are in today, it's an economic capitalistic model. So bringing that together is is very valuable, I think.
00:44:31
Speaker
ah I'll tell you a story that happened 10 years ago. Actually, and ah exactly 10 years ago today. so Actually, it was the 4th of September, to be honest.
00:44:44
Speaker
and And so it's, ah let's say, 10 years ago, more or less, and a week, let's say. there was a shop that opened in Utrecht, where I was born.
00:44:59
Speaker
It was the the one of the first packaging-free supermarkets in the country. So you go there with little pot and you give it and you can, you know, you have these dispensers ah You could get honey and you could get nuts and you can get your even even peanut butter. you could You could put your own peanut butter into your your little flour.
00:45:23
Speaker
right Very important for the Dutch. Very important, right? And you had wine and you had liquor, you had you know all sorts of things, bread, etc.
00:45:34
Speaker
was a small shop. Don't think that this is a big supermarket, but it was in the central location. The next supermarket was a yeah ah a yeah ah conventional supermarket and they had also a small organic ah store in it, right?
00:45:49
Speaker
So the location was excellent. Top, right? Location, location, location. The idea was phenomenal. The crowdfunding was a big success. I was the one who helped the entrepreneur and and make that into like success, right? to to To guide him because he had no idea how the crowdfunding worked, right?
00:46:09
Speaker
It was the second most successful and ah crowdfunding campaign that year in the in the country, yeah ah ah voted by some magazine. It had all the yeah elements of success, right?
00:46:22
Speaker
It was a team, young people were in the store. There was like thousands and thousands of people wanted to go to that store to shop there. The media was there, the the national TV, radio, everyone was there at the opening on the 4th of September.
00:46:37
Speaker
yeah For a shop, we're talking tiny. ah the the the The media value was in the millions, right ah with with zero budget on marketing.
00:46:49
Speaker
yeah In the millions. yeah And yet, the guy who was standing there in that shop, he he wanted it, but it wasn't his thing.
00:47:01
Speaker
He was a wholesale guy. right He had never done retail in his life. but So he did something that was out of his sort of normal ah ah comfort zone, so to speak. right And it started to become ah a situation whereby people were driving around from all around the country to that store just to make that little little selfie on the internet, right? say On Instagram, say, hey, I was at the first but first or second packaging-free, there was one in Groningen as well, and ah store, and look at me, and little jars with peanut butter and nuts and little ah bits and bobs, right?
00:47:40
Speaker
And then put that on Instagram and and Facebook, and they would good go back to their town and they say, oh my God, it's a very far away, this store. I just did it once, I don't never come back again.
00:47:51
Speaker
and And it was also difficult to park there, it was a small shop, it didn't have the whole range of things, you know, convenience, people want convenience, they don't want just a few things, they want to have everything in one supermarket, right?
00:48:05
Speaker
Which that couldn't do it because of the size of the store was not big enough, right? And slowly, slowly, slowly, that store within within you know and not so long later, right it it closed down.
00:48:20
Speaker
It it ah shut down, it went bankrupt. right So you say to myself, you know you have the investors, you have the public, you have the need, you have the idea, you have the media, you have this, you have that, you have everything that you can dream of, right? It's all there.
00:48:38
Speaker
And yet the store was making more expenses then it was making income. In that case, you're going down because, you know, yeah the the people, he couldn't hire the people anymore. He couldn't pay the rent anymore.
00:48:53
Speaker
he couldn't do, ah he couldn't, you know, it was it was a ah spiraling going down, down, down, down. And not Not so, it didn't take that long, I believe it was ah ah just over a year that he survived it, right? And then he had to shut it down.
00:49:09
Speaker
and So it's sustainable concept that everybody needs and yet, and the other store in the Groningen also shut down, right? ah There is one in Antwerp actually that is a massive success and one ah in your country, right?
00:49:24
Speaker
You should go there one day. It's it's an amazing store, right? That's great. They they survived it, but it's in a very small scale. I'll just give you one simple example in a very small scale of how even if everything is right, right? Or almost right, that things still can go wrong, right?
00:49:45
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. Because of it just doesn't make any business sense. or or the model is not right, or the prices are too high, right the or ah the the location is good but it doesn't have all the products, it's not convenient.
00:50:00
Speaker
I can give you a list of 50 things that went wrong there, yeah but that the eye of the beholder says everything is looking like Disneyland here. There were people saying that that they said we are in Disneyland.
00:50:11
Speaker
well And I said, why why do you think I'm in Disneyland? Because he said I've been dreaming for of this store. I'm sick and tired of this plastic packaging around the cucumbers and the this and that.
00:50:22
Speaker
I want the whole country, the whole world to be packaging free. That's what the head says. right But then the pocket says, yeah, but I also want that for the same price or maybe even cheaper than the one that has the packaging. right So it's more complicated, the sustainability thing, than just simply, dualistically saying it's either the ecological side or it's the profit-making side. right ah or it's either a regenerative or it's conventional farming, or it's either organic or it's non-organic.
00:50:58
Speaker
i I believe that's very dualistic to look at it that way. I believe there can be a lot that can be done to for these two to actually be working together.
00:51:11
Speaker
And with a longer vision of 1000 year ah vision, then you make decisions today, bearing in mind the future generations. for rather than looking at the very short term, like how can I make a quick buck or how can I make a pretty quick profit or how can I and um ah have my shareholders feel good or how can I have my venture capital or vulture capital company you know fill the pockets very soon so they can flip the the the company around and and after three years exit.
00:51:46
Speaker
That's short term thinking. yeah And that often those kind of mentalities destroy the planet. And not the planet, also the people. A lot of these companies go out of business because of the ah financial mismanagement or because of very rogue um investors who are who are only thinking of the short term.
00:52:09
Speaker
Yeah, it destroys people if you're only driven by profit. It's it's quite known that people that that go into these high paying jobs and they get all the money they want, them that and but they're not satisfied with the impact they're getting.
00:52:22
Speaker
they'll turn to other things like drugs and alcohol to feel something. So it's really an unsustainable life, even if you have all the profits in the world. Obviously, it could change if you then use that money to do good. that That's another discussion to have. But I feel, Peter Michel, that in in the more recent years, youve you' you've been in that world since the 90s, you've seen a lot of things come and go.
00:52:46
Speaker
And that more in your, I don't know in the and how many years now, but you've kind of shifted. your focus to farming. Why is that? Why did you go into that realm today?
Supporting Farmers to Become Debt-Free
00:52:58
Speaker
Well, i it started about two, two and a half years ago in the Netherlands. I started ah ah helping farmers, a movement which I called and Farming Without Bank.
00:53:11
Speaker
Boeren zonder bank. brightness In Dutch, the word boeren can mean either farming or farmers. this like It can be ah either a verb or it can be a noun, right which is kind of confusing.
00:53:27
Speaker
Yeah, but it works both ways. Farming without bank or it can be farmers without bank, right? If you translate it. It was a ah concept that ah that you um create.
00:53:41
Speaker
um Let's say that you have a need for X amount of money ah to... buy out the debts that you have at the bank, the mortgage, let's say. yeah And ah the bank usually takes the land ah ah ah as as a security, right? yeah i In order for you to pay back. And often,
00:54:04
Speaker
it's The security is more land if you look at the actual loan. It wants, most cases, to take either all the land or a bigger proportion of the land, ah and and and that needs to be paid off, right? Paid back.
00:54:20
Speaker
It needs to have and ah interest that has to be paid back. And that's, ah ah in a lot of cases, we have very big bank in the Netherlands called Rabobank, right?
00:54:32
Speaker
the blue bank from the city where I was born, Utrecht, again. It seems to be ah quite a central place where there's lot of happening in that city, right?
00:54:43
Speaker
And has many tens of billions of of euros outstanding to the farmers, in ah and not only in the Netherlands, but also globally. It's a global bank, yeah.
00:54:54
Speaker
And there are many other banks, Triuros Bank, there's, you know, in this country, yeah ah in an England, Lloyds Bank, there's a lot of banks who who provide ah ah loans to farmers.
00:55:07
Speaker
And there's nothing wrong with that, except that if you cannot pay back and it becomes a cash flow problem, then it's good to pay off those loans. and then to to become debt free.
00:55:21
Speaker
i And if you're debt free, you can with that cash flow extra you can it can have, you can invest in and enriching biodiversity, ah you can plant trees, you can ah enrich ah ah nature, you can you can ah have more regenerative farming or or you can do things that normally you you don't have the resources for because you don't have the cash flow because that money has to constantly every month to go back to the bank with interest.
00:55:53
Speaker
yeah So no this is a model that now several farmers is actually and I've helped quite a few fell farmers in the Netherlands create what I call and ah Earth certificates.
00:56:09
Speaker
like Earth certificates is ah in a sense a perpetual bond, which is ah um ah a bearer bond, which doesn't have ah your name on it, right?
00:56:21
Speaker
And it's let's say that you need 500,000 euros, right? Or in this country, pounds. You cut that amount into 500 pieces and you create a ah certificate of 1,000 euros or pounds or Swiss francs or whatever currency it is that that you are in.
00:56:43
Speaker
And that certificate has then a coupon of, let's say, 2%, very low discount. ah very ah low ah interest rate. and And it is something that can ah last for forever, that bond. It's not something that you necessarily have to pay back, but you have to provide the 2%.
00:57:05
Speaker
There is another model whereby it's not perpetual where you pay back your interest let's say, the ones who finance you, but usually they are around in your community.
00:57:16
Speaker
So, either in your village, your customers, your partners, you know, the people who buy things from you at the market, maybe, right? and For example, there's a yeah and in Drenthe, is a ah province in the north, northeast, there was a farmer, he he was farming with horses.
00:57:38
Speaker
Can you imagine that? Farming with horses and and no tractor. He had one tractor, but he he he was doing a lot with horses and his wife had sheep and they went to the market every ah Saturday and they are organic and they do everything regeneratively. they do They have a farm shop and they have everything.
00:57:56
Speaker
And yet they needed capital to grow the business. ah And so they they they they they issued, they they did this concept called farming without bank.
00:58:07
Speaker
and So instead of knocking the door, knock, knock, bank, give me the money, they found that money within their ecosystem. So from their market customers or from their box scheme ah customers, they didn't have a box scheme customer. It was like a self whereby he was doing the farming and then you could come with your with your and with your scissors or with your but or with your ah ah you know your tools and with
00:58:38
Speaker
ah you know anything you need to do the harvest yourself yeah So in Dutch it's called self-oogstown, right? So you ah you do you harvest yourself.
00:58:50
Speaker
In other words, you those customers, we were one of those customers, by the way, ah we were paying 350 euros person per year. per person per year So if you have ah two people, two adults, it's 700 euros, and that 700 euros, if you do that times multiple, you have a sort of ah an income, a basic income for yourself, and those customers can also then finance you, can help finance you, say, hey, you know, I'd like to...
00:59:19
Speaker
give you loan and that the interest of that loan can either be in money, but it can also be in goods. It can be in fruit, vegetables. It can be in having a nice at a big table where you have a dinner ah once a year, or it can be, ah we got a 10% discount of on getting his ah products from the market every Saturday.
00:59:42
Speaker
yeah Yeah, that gets very interesting. There's no bank that's going to say, hey, dude, I'm giving you a 10% discount on your next loan. Or, you know, if you buy my insurance company, I will give you a 10% discount.
00:59:54
Speaker
No, and that's not how it works. Right. So you you build a relationship with the farm. right So
Local Financial and Food Ecosystems
01:00:02
Speaker
you can either do it that way, which is more small scale, right or you can do it a little bit more larger scale, whereby you make trust next to your farm, and that trust can receive philanthropic capital,
01:00:16
Speaker
catalytic capital, it can receive in-kind donations, ah it can you can even ah ah ah have those earth certificates, for example, ah it can have ah grants, ah subsidies, it can have multiple things going to that foundation ah and for doing the things that the farmer cannot afford. You can even own land could even transfer land into the trust, right?
01:00:44
Speaker
For example, people who have stopped farming or have no siblings, have no children or who are ah stopping with farming. They don't want to sell it to someone who is going to put a villa and a swimming pool on it or to the government or to ah the highest bidder, but wants to keep it local, keep it regenerative with or or organic or with the principles that he backs.
01:01:09
Speaker
And that foundation, that trust can can then guarantee that. So what you're creating then is you have your commercial business, you have a nonprofit entity that are next to each other,
01:01:21
Speaker
or even the for-profit entity being under the trust, under the nonprofit foundation, you create a steward ownership model. And that trust can then also have other companies under it or other land holdings.
01:01:37
Speaker
So you create an ecosystem, right? Ecosistema in Greek, right? Ecos and system. You create the system of your house on a local and regional scale. but You create a sort of a regenerative region or a bioregion whereby that ah region can thrive and stays local rather than selling that those carrots or whatever and is exporting that to the other side of the planet.
01:02:01
Speaker
You're creating your own ecosystem, financial ecosystem for the food and good and nutritious food, but also the ecosystem whereby you have a relationship with the land and the farmer.
01:02:14
Speaker
you know How many people do you know in your circle of friends who have a relationship with a farmer? Very little. But they probably have a relationship with their health club, their their gym, ah maybe their school ah friends, ah maybe with a library or maybe with a sports club. and All of those relationships exist.
01:02:36
Speaker
But how cool would it be to make a relationship with the farmer that lives you know close to you and that you support also financially or maybe ah that you buy his or her products or that you go to some feast or that you start to become part of that the the ecosystem of the community that that that and farmer has.
01:02:58
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's a brilliant idea. And even if you could if you don't have the money to to go and help a farmer, I agree. I have a friend in Canada, he's an accountant, so he's mostly behind his desk and he was tired of it.
01:03:11
Speaker
So now every week he spends three to four hours on an organic farm and works with his hands. In exchange, he receives some some produce and it really helps to the farmer because because the labor is extremely expensive.
01:03:25
Speaker
So I think that's another model that could be discovered. But the one you're saying is brilliant because let's say you give a farmer a thousand euros And for that thousand euros, you get a variety of benefits that that you receive over a longer period, which you can afford to not have that two thousand euros.
01:03:42
Speaker
And by giving that thousand euros to the farmer and still benefiting from it in many years, whatever the agreement is, you're helping that farmer solve his cash flow problem because cash flow is is the biggest problem in farming. I i know it from my own experience.
01:03:55
Speaker
Father, they have a ton of machines and land and all the capital is locked in debt and they don't have the money to keep investing in newer things. so Exactly. And especially not nature and biodiversity, animal welfare, ah the quality of the soil, right? do experiment you may You might experiment with things and it might go wrong.
01:04:19
Speaker
you You should be able to cushion that. Yes. Because if it goes wrong with the bank, they the take your land and they they sell it. yeah you sell That's the big problem.
01:04:33
Speaker
You sell this family silver, I call that. right yeah And if there's one thing that you really should be careful about is to sell your family silver because of the financial problems that you have.
01:04:47
Speaker
I think that's totally criminal because if you are doing something good for the benefit of of of humanity, yeah maybe humanity doesn't pay the real true cost of that food that we eat.
01:05:02
Speaker
yeah ah Maybe it's subsidized in the EU, for example, is heavily subsidized. Maybe it is something that it's cheaper to buy potatoes from, ah let's say, yeah South America rather than potatoes from, ah let's say, yeah Jersey.
01:05:19
Speaker
But you can ask question like, OK, okay It comes from the other side of the world, right? It needs to be flown over here. You have no idea who is that farmer who created it.
01:05:32
Speaker
ah It needs a lot of pollution to get over here. ah You don't know what the quality is and also what environmental credentials this this potato has. You have no idea what the nutritional value is, right?
01:05:44
Speaker
ah And while there are at the moment, for example, in the Netherlands and in many countries that they don't can't get rid of the potatoes right now. And this potato is just one example. It can be other things. right um i I'm telling you this one, but it can be and it can be other things too.
01:06:05
Speaker
It can be any sort of crop. Yeah. What's imported, for example, we just came back from Jersey, 98% of the food in Jersey is being imported to the island.
01:06:16
Speaker
what 98% and 2% is from the island itself, right? that That creates a sort of something of a very big problem if of your food sovereignty.
01:06:28
Speaker
like If you don't have food sovereignty, that can be very, very problematic for your for the people, for your future and and for the future generations.
01:06:39
Speaker
I think it's very important to be self-sufficient. And ah let's say if there are problems out there, you could You have seen it in Spain, for example, not so long ago with with with with with the natural disasters that were happening.
01:06:55
Speaker
Suddenly, a big chunk of Europe didn't have the produce coming from that region and there were like empty shelves. And I think How crazy are we? happening what's What's happening here? It's this globalized world that we are so dependent on this region, that region, that region, that if that region has a problem, but suddenly we start to panic.
01:07:17
Speaker
Oh my God, there's ah I can't get my paprika and my yeah my onions, my this or that. My dear, you can get it and from around the corner. except you are not aware of what is happening in your own area.
01:07:31
Speaker
And if you were, you you wouldn't have to be so dependent on getting the food from from from other countries. And you also eat things in season rather than ah trying to demand ah strawberries in December.
01:07:44
Speaker
right ah you know You know that the that the asparagus ah is is not for sale in ah in ah September, October, November, not even January, right? yeah but But the asparagus, if you get it, you know i I love the fresh asparagus when it comes out, right?
01:08:03
Speaker
I love it regeneratively made, et cetera. It's a feast, right? yeah it's like It's a feast that lasts for an X amount of weeks.
01:08:14
Speaker
And then it's finished. yeah But that that is something also that consumers and and people like you and me and other people need to understand is that we cannot demand 24-7, 365 convenience for our food, but we also have to be much more supporting the farmers and also thinking in terms of seasons and thinking in terms of local ah ah rather than thinking that the whole world could supply us with food whenever I want it and and have it delivered in plastic bags and then I can buy it from the supermarket and I go home and I ah pack my car full of stuff and then, ah yeah, thinking that everything is normal.
01:08:57
Speaker
Yeah, no, I fully agree.
Inspiration from Groundswell Event
01:09:00
Speaker
And it's very interesting that you're focusing on farming because that's where where I would say all the magic is happening. And then so it makes a lot of sense that you're going there.
01:09:10
Speaker
So but currently part of your mission to to create those thousand year visions for farmers and helping farmers to to raise capital in ah in a healthy way, let's say that is healthy for their business.
01:09:25
Speaker
and for the next generation. what what are What is the biggest roadblock, the biggest problem that you're facing to to push fit this forward so that more and more people are are doing it?
01:09:38
Speaker
Look, every farm, every land steward has a different situation. It's like a suit, right? It's like a custom-made suit, right? Every person, like your body is different than my body, right? Your needs, your country has different rules than this country, right?
01:09:55
Speaker
your your Your region has maybe a different culture, and problems, ah different situations, taxation, ah succession.
01:10:07
Speaker
ah There's a big thing in, for example, UK now is next year that they're going to start to ah create the inheritance tax will change for farmers, right? There's a big up uprising on that.
01:10:20
Speaker
It's going to become a ah big earthquake that can have a major effect on the on survival of farmers, right? So it's important to understand to actually not go to a farm and say, guys, you have to do this, this, this, and this.
01:10:36
Speaker
and fin needto No. First you're gonna walk the land, feel the land, speak with the farmers, speak speak with people who steward the land and then feel okay.
01:10:50
Speaker
This is who you are, this is who your ancestors are, is where you come from, this is your history, these are your pain, this is your problems, this is what you what you have nightmares about, or this is what you're struggling with.
01:11:01
Speaker
And then start to understand that more and to have a dialogue. it can Sometimes it can ah be days that we do this. can be maybe a week, maybe longer.
01:11:13
Speaker
right And then to fully grasp that, we we stayed, for example, two months in Italy, almost two months we stayed in Italy. We spent more than a month on one regenerative organic farm of 35 hectares.
01:11:27
Speaker
And it was it was very hot. It was ah quite, so was a lot of mosquitoes there. It was crazy, right? But we stayed there with, ah you know, my my wife and I and and our son, we're traveling around with our camper van to go to all of these, we call it Follow the Science. We have a website called followthescience.earth.
01:11:50
Speaker
And ah so we went to Italy, we went to ah ah to to two regenerative farms there. And we noticed that the farmer was so stuck with the survival modus that he was, he was ah they had this big and house that he was renting out to air for Airbnb.
01:12:10
Speaker
He was serving breakfast, he was doing ah weddings, he was doing this, he was doing that. He said, I have to run now because I have to make money in the summer that brings me through the winter so I can survive.
01:12:22
Speaker
So a lot of farmers are in the that they need to do other activities, other businesses. They have to rent their ah their houses out or there they need to start ah creating a glamping on their land or they have to make a restaurant, right?
01:12:39
Speaker
And so they need to diversify and and yet they are doing things that they're not really have no knowledge of or they have no experience with. they don't have the capital for, right? yeah so So that needs a 1000 year vision first. What do you want to achieve?
01:12:55
Speaker
what do what Where do you see this going to? And then you make a plan, an action plan, right? A roadmap plan of that, that you okay, a thousand years is great, but you also have to to look at the first steps, the first years, right? And how to get out of that,
01:13:16
Speaker
It's almost a rat race, right? You're stuck in a sort of system that you cannot easily get out. And a lot of farmers, they need a job outside of the farm to survive, right? This is ah in many cases in certain countries, it's quite normal that the cost of living is so high that you need a job to, or the wife of, sometimes both of them or the whole family is working outside to make a living because the farm is not making any money.
01:13:43
Speaker
right So it's very complex in order, you can't generalize the the question you answer you're asking. It needs a custom-made situation whereby each one needs to look at, hey, how do I do it? And if you make a benchmark, like a precedent right with SC,
01:14:04
Speaker
yeah then in one country, then many farmers and land stewards in that country can then go there and rather than reinventing the wheel, they can copy paste that model and then ah make sure that you customize it for your own situation.
01:14:22
Speaker
that That would be a really cool thing to do, two to set that precedent in each country on planet Earth in order to to to then have the ripple effect.
01:14:34
Speaker
That's a beautiful mission. So first it's the goal to select, well, anybody can join, but to select some, some farmers that are already open to regeneration that are are already somewhat advanced.
01:14:47
Speaker
So you mentor them to really nail it financially. And then the neighbors who are maybe still conventional, or they're just starting to think they're going to look over the fence and be like, Oh, it seems like things are going well there or,
01:15:00
Speaker
This farmer, he's smiling. he was like He wasn't smiling three months ago, now he's finally smiling. Something must have changed. He's a bit like you. you're you're You're smiling all the time, right? Your friends say, oh what's wrong with you?
01:15:14
Speaker
They don't say what's right with you. They say what's wrong with you because they're not smiling, right? so Yeah. I like that, that you are, you know, with your podcast as well, you know, you try to spread the word and to spread the good news of of how it can be done.
01:15:30
Speaker
and and And that's so important is to and not only do it one on one, but also that you start We're creating now and a documentary, there's a documentary makers from the Netherlands who are following us and they're making a documentary called Follow the Science.
01:15:49
Speaker
yeah And each so each episode they're gonna go to a farmer or or a number of farmers to zoom into ah ah their problems and what's what's happening and then how they transform into a 1000 year vision and how they do that in practice so that other people in the world, not just farmers, but also people who who want to know what what farmers are struggling with and how they can can ah transform that into a successful future for the next 1000 years.
01:16:22
Speaker
They're following us in in in now in UK and in Ireland. They're gonna, later this month, they're going to make film ah yeah film We're gonna film here on this farm where we are now.
01:16:38
Speaker
And ah they're gonna go to Ireland and Northern Ireland and ah other countries as well. ah This is just the beginning, right? We we can even go ah to Africa or or Asia, Latin America,
01:16:51
Speaker
We started in our backyard, so to speak, right? In the countries in the Netherlands and then the countries around the Netherlands and then we'll go for further out to where we are called to.
01:17:05
Speaker
So we don't plan where we are going. We are called to go to the place. That's called the follow the signs. We feel that the intuition and the signs that come to us and based on that, we we follow those.
01:17:18
Speaker
That's why it's called follow the signs. That's so brilliant. I wanted to ask you to explain it more, I think. But ah you've you've ah completely explained it very well. And thats that's such a cool thing that you said, OK, I'm going to have my camper, I'm mobile and I'm just going to start driving, meeting people.
01:17:35
Speaker
you went uh to the most important event in regenerative farming in the uk where you met a lot of people and then that opened a lot of doors um help me out with the name again of the event that's where people should definitely go yeah when they want to what is it called again help me out um the the biggest regenerative farming event in the UK?
01:17:59
Speaker
Groundswell. I think it it could be globally. They had 10,000 visitors this year. Wow, that's incredible. It started with a small gathering of, I believe, 500.
01:18:11
Speaker
Last year, it was 8,000. and ah There were two royalties ah walking around there. It's like a whole delegation from Israel was ah was there.
01:18:22
Speaker
ah I don't know if you if you ah remember that it was that period where where there was this ah the massive attack, so to speak, right? ah ah There was this friction with Iran and with the whole geopolitical ah instability.
01:18:39
Speaker
There were no flights, there was no no no nothing going out of the country. It was exactly that period just before that. ah And what happened is that ah ah that delegation couldn't go to Granswell, right? And at ah together with Gadi from ah regenerative Israel and I, we we kind of helped the situation to to get everyone back in. So so one when everything was done, ah they wanted to re-come to the event.
01:19:12
Speaker
So it was going from the one extreme of not being able to go, to boom, the other extreme, like everyone could go. It was a whole delegation of people from from Israel who wanted to go there.
01:19:23
Speaker
and yeah and And that's how... You know, a country, ah at one place, a small farm from the Cherry family in Hitchin, right, in Hertfordshire, can have such a massive ripple effect of people coming there, inspiring each other.
01:19:43
Speaker
And, you know, by walking around there with with my wife, Mika, and our six-year-old son, Rafi, we thought that if we are 8 billion people, right? if If that eight or 10,000 people on that far on on that farm are representing, you know can can have that ripple effect but to inspire and influence that 8 billion to do the same thing what's happening on Groundswell, then there's hope for the world.
01:20:11
Speaker
Because it's just, you know it was ah almost as if you were living on a different planet. on that groundswell. you You were thinking, wow, is this happening all around the world?
01:20:24
Speaker
And if not, why not? Why not? What what holds us back two yeah to actually, you know, is it is it is it the money? Is it the scaling? Is it the the legislation? is it the Maybe it's the big forces that are don't want this to happen.
01:20:40
Speaker
What is it, right? So there's this really upbeat, positive vibe. You know yeah you had even ex-CEOs from major corporations, like I saw that Paul Pullman from the former CEO of ah of ah of Unilever walking around there and his son Christian. you know There were so many people that you know you thought, wow, you know this is...
01:21:03
Speaker
what I didn't see very much ah people walking around was were actually children and young people that actually also should be having this, you know, also be educated and and and and inspired by this, right?
01:21:17
Speaker
Not just the adults in the room, right? And the business people and the and the farmers and everything, but also that that there's more involvement of young people. I think I'm going to...
01:21:28
Speaker
through this through this podcast to and to to tell the Cherry family, hey, guys, ah also look at the the the younger generations that are not yet adults to get them ah inspired by by by by Groundswell.
01:21:45
Speaker
maybe Maybe do a Groundswell Junior or something like that as side event next to it or something. That's really good idea. Rafi was six years old. I don't know if he was the youngest for this child, um but...
01:21:57
Speaker
But he was walking around, he loved it. you know It was just phenomenal. That's so cool. So Peter, Michel, we're going to start yeah wrapping up the interview, but I still have an important question for you. Tell me. So all the people that are listening that are like, I have this burning desire. I feel something in my heart that I want to contribute to to this being farming, regenerative design, regenerative entrepreneurship. What is your single most important piece of advice for them?
01:22:26
Speaker
and Yeah, I would say ah stay grounded. ah and Create a 1000 year vision for your business, your family, your farm, your estate.
01:22:42
Speaker
right ah Collaborate, don't compete. right Work together as much as possible and and find and new instruments for financing your business or your your your farm. or Don't only look at the classical ways of ah of ah of of doing things. right that ah My family and our family offices is part of a European agri-food co-funding alliance.
01:23:17
Speaker
We had our monthly call yesterday and it's 25 families and foundations who banded together to provide catalytic capital to regenerative initiatives and ventures and businesses and farms ah ah for for things that normally other capital providers wouldn't be interested in or would need that that at first mover, right, up to 4 million euros we invest.
01:23:42
Speaker
and then yeah others will follow. So it's very important that you be be be be be not only the change that you want to see in the world, but also finance that change that you want to see in the world, right? and love that And inspire others to to to to to get get ambassadors and people around you who are like-minded, soul-minded and hard-minded people to make it happen.
01:24:07
Speaker
and and and And then I think things will move. Yeah, and I think it's a perfect moment to start wrapping up because I hear people are knocking on your camera. people I get phone calls from people, there are people knocking on the door, it's crazy.
01:24:23
Speaker
But I have been having a great time speaking with you. and'm i'm very ah I see that your heart is at the right place. your heart is at the right place Yeah, thank you. I really appreciate that, Peter Mischat. And I want to thank you from that same space, the depth of my heart, to have you take an hour and a half of your time to spend here. Is it already an hour and a half? Okay. Yes, it's been that long.
01:24:48
Speaker
All right. yeah It's hard to imagine, but thank you very Thank you. Have an inspiring day and thank you for having me on the show.