The surface of woody crops increased by 9% between 2012 and 2022 according to the "Analysis of surface changes in woody crops" prepared by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. The almond tree, the olive grove, and the pistachio are the most prominent crops, for which not only individual farmers or business societies are betting, but also investment funds.
However, according to a report from the crowdfunding platform Fellow Funders, (active since 2016 and authorized by the CNMV), since they are long-cycle crops, access to traditional credit is sometimes more complicated and it is there that new participatory financing formulas appear.
"Regulated crowdfunding via equity fits with real asset agriculture in a way that no other instrument achieves: it fractions the ticket so that hundreds of investors enter where only a bank or fund used to enter, accepts land, harvest, or machinery as collateral, and tolerates the long terms required by a crop like the almond or olive. At Fellow Funders we have channeled 7 M€ in eight rounds of agro, and we are clear: this is not a temporary alternative, it is the financing infrastructure that the Spanish countryside lacked", explains Gonzalo Albero, CEO of Fellow Funders.
According to data from the Cajamar Observatory, the Spanish countryside is gaining weight in the Spanish economy in such a way that its Gross Added Value (GAV) grew by 3.9% in 2024 while in the whole of the EU it fell by 2.9%. Despite this increase, projects of woody crops like almond, olive, and pistachio face difficulties in financing their investments, as they involve long maturation periods, until the plantations enter production and find their place in the market.
The Fellow Funders report states that although Spain has a specific ICO plan to improve financing in the agricultural sector, the public bonus does not cover the part of the loans that exceed 100,000 euros, which limits access to credit for those medium-sized farms.
This entity has shown that crowdfunding can become a good alternative to finance agricultural projects through "Alboris Mancha" which in the last eight years has raised nearly three million euros from 199 individual investors to develop more than 40 hectares of olive grove, almond, and pistachio without resorting to traditional bank financing.
“Today we structure operations from the beginning with mechanisms that guarantee the repurchase of shares with returns above the market and on optional terms for the investor. In the coming years, we will see more structured operations in this way. This has come to stay,” concludes Albero from Fellow Funders.