Carbon Removal Partnership Upends Agriculture's Environmental Trade-Off Myth
The Leverage Shift: When Carbon Capture Becomes Profitable
In a boardroom in Toronto last month, executives from Farm Credit Canada (FCC) and carbon removal company UNDO finalized a partnership that reverses the traditional calculus of agricultural economics. The agreement doesn't just fund environmental technology—it restructures incentives across Canada's vast agricultural landscape. For decades, farmers faced a stark choice: maximize yields or protect the environment. This partnership dismantles that false dichotomy. FCC's financial backing will accelerate deployment of UNDO's enhanced rock weathering (ERW) technology across Canadian farms, delivering carbon removal while simultaneously improving soil health and increasing crop yields. The question isn't whether Canadian agriculture will address climate change, but who will control and benefit from the transition. This arrangement places farmers at the center of the decision-making process rather than merely making them subjects of environmental policy.
The partnership leverages Canada's geographical advantage—approximately 190,000 farms spanning 153 million acres of agricultural land—to scale carbon removal nationally. This massive agricultural footprint, combined with domestic access to an estimated 18 million tonnes of high-quality wollastonite from Canadian Wollastonite, creates a uniquely Canadian solution to a global challenge. The crushed wollastonite, when applied to farmland, accelerates natural weathering processes that remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. What distinguishes this approach is that the carbon removal technology simultaneously improves soil health and agricultural productivity, creating immediate economic benefits for farmers alongside long-term environmental gains. The leverage shifted when carbon removal became profitable rather than purely altruistic.
Following the Incentives Beyond Traditional Environmental Funding
This partnership represents a fundamental departure from traditional environmental funding models. While global investment in green technology is projected to exceed USD1.3 trillion in 2023, representing a 12% increase from 2022, the agricultural sector has often been positioned as a recipient of environmental mandates rather than a driver of solutions. The official position of many climate initiatives obscures the potential for agricultural innovation to lead rather than follow. FCC's involvement signals a recognition that farmers' economic interests can align with environmental goals when the right technologies and financing mechanisms are in place. The incentive structure has been reconfigured—farmers adopt carbon removal not primarily as an environmental obligation but as a business strategy with multiple returns.
With FCC's support, UNDO expects to scale their Canadian operations threefold from 2025 to 2026, using Ontario as the springboard for a wider national program. This rapid scaling reveals the pent-up demand for solutions that bridge economic and environmental imperatives. The partnership creates a pathway for farmers to participate in carbon markets while improving their core business of food production. This stands in stark contrast to environmental programs that treat farmers as either obstacles to climate action or passive recipients of sustainability directives. The procedural details of how farmers access the technology, how the carbon removal is verified, and how the financial benefits flow will determine whether this model can be replicated nationally and internationally.
The Power Dynamics of Agricultural Carbon Removal
Three things happened in the development of this partnership that weren't in the public announcements. First, the technology validation process established that ERW could deliver measurable carbon removal results alongside agricultural benefits, creating multiple value streams from a single intervention. Second, the domestic sourcing of wollastonite from Canadian suppliers secured a supply chain that keeps economic benefits within the country while reducing transportation emissions. Third, the financial structure developed by FCC created accessible pathways for farmers of various scales to participate, preventing the benefits from accruing only to the largest agricultural operations. These elements collectively reshape the power dynamics of agricultural carbon removal, distributing agency and benefits more broadly than many climate technologies.
The partnership emerges against a backdrop of uneven global climate investment. Less than 15% of worldwide clean energy investments go to emerging economies, which represent over half the global population. This disparity highlights how climate solutions often reinforce existing power structures rather than transforming them. The FCC-UNDO partnership offers a potential countermodel—one that builds capacity within a specific sector and geography while creating replicable approaches. By focusing on a technology that delivers multiple benefits, the partnership creates incentives for adoption that extend beyond carbon markets or environmental compliance. This multi-benefit approach stands in contrast to single-purpose climate technologies that often struggle to achieve widespread adoption without significant subsidies or regulatory mandates.
Beyond Ontario: The National Scaling Challenge
The initial focus on Ontario farms represents both a strategic starting point and a limitation. Ontario provides the proximity to wollastonite sources and the agricultural density to demonstrate the concept, but the true test will come in scaling across Canada's diverse agricultural regions. Each region presents distinct soil conditions, farming practices, and economic contexts that will require adaptation of both the technology and the financing mechanisms. The leverage for national scaling comes from demonstrable results in Ontario that can convince farmers in other provinces that the approach delivers genuine value. The partnership's ability to adapt to these regional variations will determine whether it remains a promising pilot or becomes a transformative national program.
The potential for scaling is substantial given Canada's agricultural footprint, but the barriers are equally significant. Farming practices are deeply embedded in regional traditions, economic systems, and knowledge networks. Changing these practices requires more than technology and financing—it requires trusted information channels, peer validation, and alignment with existing farm operations. The partnership's success will depend on how effectively it navigates these social and cultural dimensions of agricultural change. The official communications focus on technology and finance, but the unofficial story is about trust-building and knowledge transfer across diverse farming communities.
Global Context: Canada's Position in Agricultural Climate Innovation
Canada's approach stands in contrast to other national agricultural climate strategies. While China accounts for 40% of global solar panel manufacturing and installation, demonstrating how industrial policy can drive climate technology at scale, Canada's approach leverages its agricultural sector as both a carbon sink and an economic engine. This positions Canadian farmers as climate solution providers rather than merely adopters of technologies developed elsewhere. The partnership creates a framework where Canadian agricultural expertise becomes a valuable export alongside its agricultural products. The power dynamics of global climate innovation typically favor technology developers over resource providers, but this model potentially rebalances that relationship by integrating carbon removal into agricultural production systems.
The partnership also differs from programs like Costa Rica's Payment for Environmental Services (PES), which has successfully incentivized forest conservation, protecting over 1.3 million hectares of forest while generating sustainable income for local communities. While the PES model separates environmental services from productive economic activity, the FCC-UNDO approach integrates them, potentially creating more sustainable long-term incentives. The question isn't whether farmers should be compensated for environmental services, but who decides how those services are defined, measured, and valued. By linking carbon removal to agricultural productivity, this partnership gives farmers greater agency in that decision-making process.
The Implications Beyond Agriculture
The FCC-UNDO partnership offers lessons for climate innovation in other sectors. Major automotive manufacturers like Tesla, Volkswagen, and General Motors have collectively invested over USD100 billion in EV and battery technology development, demonstrating how industrial transformation requires massive capital deployment. The agricultural carbon removal approach shows how sector-specific financial institutions can accelerate adoption of climate solutions when those solutions align with core business interests. This suggests that climate finance should be increasingly channeled through sector-specific institutions that understand the operational realities and economic incentives of their industries, rather than through general-purpose climate funds that may lack sectoral expertise.
The partnership also demonstrates the value of domestic supply chains for climate solutions. By sourcing wollastonite from Canadian suppliers, the program reduces transportation emissions while creating economic benefits within Canada. This approach stands in contrast to climate solutions that create dependencies on imported technologies or materials. The power dynamics of climate technology deployment often favor technology exporters over importers, but this model creates more balanced relationships by building on domestic resources and expertise. Follow the incentives, and it becomes clear that climate solutions with multiple co-benefits and domestic supply chains have advantages over single-purpose imported technologies.