Untangling Climate Finance S4 E1: From Awareness to Action in Agriculture Finance with Maggie Monast
In this episode, Jay speaks with Maggie Monast, Senior Director, Climate-Smart Agriculture, Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), about how agriculture finance is moving from awareness to action on climate risk, and what it will take to scale climate-smart practices. Maggie explains why climate risk is now a material business risk for agriculture lenders and how better tools can translate climate scenarios into practical credit decisions.
They also discuss what farmers need from climate finance, how lenders and value-chain incentives can help drive adoption, and why blended finance can be a high-leverage way to unlock commercial capital - especially for proven dairy methane solutions.
Give it a listen to learn how ag finance can support farmers through climate volatility and mobilize capital at the scale the transition demands.
Resources:
- Climate & Sustainability in Ag Lending: A Survey of Global Agricultural Finance Institutions: https://business.edf.org/insights/agricultural-finance-institutions-are-building-resilience-through-climate-and-sustainability-action/
- Financing Dairy Climate Solutions: https://www.edf.org/financing-dairy-climate-solutions
- Climate and Credit Risk Web tool: https://business.edf.org/insights/managing-climate-risks-to-support-on-farm-resilience/
- Overall EDF ag finance resources hub: https://business.edf.org/farm-finance/
- LinkedIn - Maggie Monast: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maggie-monast-372a2218/
- Email: mmonast@edf.org
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About:
Untangling Climate Finance explores the dynamic field of climate change finance through conversations with industry experts about topics including climate solutions, global carbon markets, carbon projects, novel technologies, and much more.
If you have any questions, comments, a future guest recommendation, or are interested in joining Jay for an episode, please shoot him a message at: jtipton@gordianknotstrategies.com
Credits:
The podcast is produced by Gordian Knot Strategies.
It is written, narrated, and edited by Jay Tipton.
Music is by Diamond_Tunes.