Scenario planning took center stage in a recent Food Finance Institute webinar, “Managing Risk in a Time of Uncertainty,” which examined how food and farm businesses can operate amid sustained economic uncertainty. A video of the webinar is embedded below.
Hosted by Tera Johnson, FFI Founder and Innovative Finance Expert, the conversation featured Eric DeLuca, FFI Strategic Foresight Expert in Residence, and focused on moving beyond reactive decision‑making toward structured preparation for multiple possible futures.
Rather than framing uncertainty as a temporary disruption, both speakers emphasized that volatility has become a defining feature of the current economic landscape. Johnson reflected on how the moment echoes the early days of the COVID‑19 pandemic, when traditional planning models failed many businesses.
“It feels like we’re back in that moment—for a bunch of different reasons—where people couldn’t figure out how to plan,” Johnson said.
DeLuca added that this reality makes scenario planning not a luxury, but a core management discipline. He stressed that the practice is often misunderstood as prediction, when its real value lies in helping businesses prepare for multiple plausible outcomes and recognize decision points before they become emergencies.
“Scenario planning isn’t about having a crystal ball,” DeLuca said. “It helps you perceive options before you need them.”
Throughout the webinar, the discussion tied scenario planning directly to day‑to‑day business decisions facing food and farm enterprises: when to raise prices, whether to absorb or pass along cost increases, how dependent is too dependent on a single customer or channel, and how much risk is being quietly carried in capital structure and operations. Johnson emphasized the importance of regularly interrogating the assumptions behind those decisions, particularly in fast‑changing conditions.
“Is this an assumption, or is this something we actually know?” Johnson said.
The conversation concluded with a clear message: while uncertainty may be unavoidable, unexamined assumptions are not. By pairing financial clarity with scenario planning, food and farm businesses can move from bracing for the next shock to actively shaping how they respond when it arrives.
For those interested in going deeper, the Food Finance Institute is offering an upcoming training led by Eric DeLuca, Navigating Uncertainty, which focuses on scenario planning tools and strategies for food-focused businesses:
Listen to Tera Johnson and Eric DeLuca’s conversation on Managing Risk in a Time of Uncertainty: