Lauren and Mike have been farming and regenerating leased land in Australia for over 8 years. This campaign will finance the purchase of their very own farm.
Funded on 11/20/2024
Mike Layfield and Lauren Byrne are former chefs whose pursuit of incredible flavor and nutrition led them right into a career as farmers.
“It’s all about the plate of food,” says Mike. “I want to create the most delicious and nutritious plate of food. And that begins in the soil.”
Their shared passion for flavor led Lauren and Mike to create Felds Farm—a side project home garden on family land that has grown over the years into a full-time enterprise including a large market garden and at-scale production crops spanning across two land leases on the top and bottom of Tasmania.
Mike and Lauren have earned a reputation for restoring soil, producing high-quality vegetables for their customers and restaurants across Tasmania, and being incredible stewards of the land.
From the beginning, Steward’s goal has been to support agriculture around the globe. Since our launch, we’ve had inquiries from nearly every corner. But before we could set our sights abroad, we had to prove our unique financing model at home. More than 100 projects in, with positive economic and ecological outcomes, we’re finally ready.
Our first international project -- Felds Farm in Tasmania, Australia -- traces its roots years back. Steward’s first investment round was supported by Tripple, an impact-driven, Australia-based family office. Through their introductions, we’ve gotten to know leading producers and advocates for equitable food systems in Australia, such as Sustainable Table and Sprout Tasmania. It did not take long to recognize the similar challenges faced in the country. That is no coincidence, since U.S. policy is responsible for our globalized, commoditized, export-driven agricultural system. Fortunately, our purpose-built financing solution to counter conventional agriculture in the U.S. should apply well in Australia and beyond.
In 2017, Steward's first loan was to a market garden in Detroit. In 2024, our first international loan is to a market garden in Tasmania, 10,000 miles away but motivated by a shared purpose to grow delicious, nutritious food while regenerating the health of the land and surrounding community. Mike Layfield & Lauren Byrne, who run Felds Farm, have been farming since 2017, beginning as chefs and tracing their way back to the land. They currently operate on seven acres between two sites across the island from each other. Steward is providing a $350,000 USD loan for Felds Farm to purchase 100 acres and establish a permanent base of operations. The business is already cash flow positive -- an impressive feat on leased land -- and the purchase will allow them to expand production and improve efficiency while restoring native bushland.
I’m excited to bring our first international project to the Steward community. I hope the shared values are apparent, though on different sides of the planet. Small actions grounded in morals can have a profound impact. During his Salt March to restore sovereignty through food, Gandhi famously said: “In a gentle way, you can shake the world.”
Let’s start shaking.
Felds Farm will use this financing to purchase 100-acres of land in Forcett, Tasmania. The land they are purchasing is in need of soil rehabilitation and will benefit from Lauren and Mike’s expertise. This new farm will allow Felds Farm to eventually consolidate their two operations into one productive farm that’s near Hobart—Tasmania’s growing capital city.
Lauren and Mike are former chefs driven to produce the most flavorful, most nutritious plate of food possible. The best way to do that, they’ve found, is to grow food from healthy, active soil within an abundant and diverse ecosystem. They employ the following practices to make sure their farm ecosystem is producing the highest-quality produce available.
Low-till & no-till cultivation
No synthetic fertilizers
No synthetic pesticides, herbicides, insecticides ever
Crop rotation
Cover cropping
Animal Integration
Non-certified organic management
Pollinator habitat protection & creation
Sliding-scale CSA price model to not limit access to nutrition
This loan will be made to Felds Farm and Bakery, a registered Partnership in Tasmania Australia which operates a market garden and sells nutritious produce through their CSA program, wholesale channels, restaurants and other emerging sales channels.
This loan will be used to purchase the property located at 1321 Arthur Hwy, Forcett, Tasmania, Australia, 7173.
This is a secured loan with a first priority mortgage against the land and improvements and lien against all business assets. This loan is set at an 8.5% interest rate with a 8% net interest rate to lenders once accounting for a .5% servicing spread. The loan has a 60 month term with interest only payments for the first 12 months of the loan term followed by interest and principal payments on a 20 year amortization.
Note on Lending in Australia
This will be Steward's first loan issued to an Australian borrower. Throughout the diligence process and loan structuring an emphasis was placed on specific risk mitigation due to the nature of a transaction in a foreign country. Specifically, Steward worked closely with local counsel to ensure our loan documentation was compliant and perfection of our security instruments would be done in the proper manner to protect against loss. We worked with a local food system expert, Sustainable Table, for our site visit, agricultural review and local market study. Finally, the loan will be made in U.S. dollars - this means all documentation and the repayment schedule are in U.S. Dollars, placing the conversion risk onto the borrower.
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