Economic impact is an important selling point for funding farmland protection and the whole array of work related to strengthening local food systems and revitalizing rural agricultural landscapes and communities. Reliable economic figures about the impacts of agriculture, food systems, and your specific programs can help coalesce support among local and state officials, expand your circle of allies and partners to include economic developers and the local business community, back up funding requests, and build public support.

There are go-to sources studies that help substantiate the economic value of what you do. These can be useful in helping you make your case, but it’s even more compelling to speak directly about the benefits of your programs, your locally conserved lands, your farms and local food systems.

You don’t need to hire an economist and wade through piles of complex data to understand these economic benefits. This course will help you learn to paint a broad, research and data-based picture of the economic effects of your farmland protection and food system programs. You will also learn how to tell that story to support advocacy, fundraising, agriculture-based economic development, and stronger community relationships. You will learn and adapt a proven approach that engages community resources without hiring an economist, consultant or communications shop.

In this course, you will learn:

1. Master Harbinger’s "engaged analysis" approach: Learn how to adapt Harbinger’s "engaged analysis" approach to craft an economic study for your protected farmlands, farmland protection program, and/or local food systems work.

2. Set strategic goals and align resources: Learn to identify and articulate specific goals for your programs and how to strategically align these goals with the right data sources, research methods, and resources essential for conducting a comprehensive economic study.

3. Update and interpret economic studies: Learn when and how to update or draw data from existing economic studies. Acquire the ability to interpret findings effectively, ensuring the relevance of your analysis for informed decision-making.

4. Evaluate and convey economic and community benefits: Hone your skills in assessing, articulating, and effectively communicating a diverse range of economic and community benefits. This includes creating realistic economic estimates and projections.

5. Harness data, analysis, and interpretation for compelling storytelling: Learn how to use data, analysis, and interpretation to craft a persuasive economic narrative that supports advocacy efforts and fundraising, informs agriculture-based economic development, and cultivates stronger community relationships.

This course grows out of our popular “Tell the Economic Story of Your Trails and Conserved Lands” class, fine-tuned specifically to focus on farmland protection and associated programs aimed at sustaining and strengthening local and regional food systems and working farms and farmers.

Good Words about our “tell the economic story of your conserved lands and trails” course

We covered it all in this course, from generating the “usual” economic data, to engaging our community to build support through the acts of research and data gathering, to personalizing the economic story for our audiences. I had never thought about these key levers before in the context of economic analysis and yet I think they are exactly what we need. Really wonderful stuff.

Ann Welz, The Trust for Public Land

Working with Michele was a pleasure. She and Harbinger were more than flexible, and went out of their way to do everything possible to make the Economic Benefit course financially feasible for our network members. On top of that, Michele worked with us ahead of time to ensure that the course included information and examples that were relevant to our state.

We started a weekly post-course discussion group (highly recommended), which allowed participants to share ideas and compare notes. As a result, we’ve been working on plans, both at our individual organizations and collectively, for putting what we learning into action. Michele has been supporting our efforts with follow up coaching.

Donna Bissett, Maine Coast Heritage Trust