New Information Flows for Better Decision Making
McHenry County Conservation District
Interested in shifting its 6,000 acres of farmland from traditional agriculture to regenerative, the McHenry County Conservation District (MCCD) engaged Foresight to lead a co-design process for identifying the fundamental information feedback loops that were missing to inflect better farmland management decisions.
Working closely with MCCD staff, we mapped all of the decision-making processes—from field to boardroom—that impacted management practices. From there we prioritized critical information feedback loops that could be built, with minimal staff and resource investment. New feedback loops included an index that quantifies the conservation value of conservation-focused farming practices as a tool to negotiate land leases with farmers. This growing season, MCCD will implement the “low hanging fruit” indicators to leverage their newly-found understanding for transformational change.