Innovative Financial Techniques to Encourage Landowners to Keep their Land in Production, Joan Snyder
This workshop, led by Joan Snyder, former Executive Director of Merrill Lynch International, is part of a longer-term Glynwood project to develop a range of innovative techniques for retaining the agricultural land base and encouraging food production.
In 1987 Joan founded Hollow Road Farm and Hollow Road Foods, the first commercial-scale creamery of its kind in the US, which achieved national wholesale distribution of sheep’s milk yogurt and cheese. Joan is currently the principal in Frog Hollow, Inc., an agricultural consulting firm that acts as a resource for institutions seeking financial capital to fund new technologies.
Joan was joined by Henry Tepper, Director of the New York State Chapter of The Nature Conservancy. During his six-year tenure, the Chapter has completed three of the largest conservation projects in the Conservancy’s 55 year history, including a 106,000 acre transaction that he described during the workshop.
Rounding out the panel was Philip Gottwals, an agricultural and rural economic development specialist and founding principal of ACDS, LLC, a marketing and economic development consulting firm. He is the co-author of Tilling the Soil of Opportunity: A Guide for the Agricultural Entrepreneur.
The workshop began with an examination of trends relating to agricultural land in the Hudson Valley and then considered how capital has been brought to bear to preserve the land base in other settings, in particular, forest land. Might these be adapted to agriculture?
To hear an excerpt from Joan’s presentation, click here.
For links to extended excerpts:
Introduction
Part 1 (21 mins)
Part 2 (18 mins)
Part 3 (16 mins)
Part 4 (11 mins)
Part 5 (18 mins)
Part 6 (16 mins)
Part 7 (14 mins)
