Community Supported Agriculture

10 Key excerpts on "Community Supported Agriculture"

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  Local Food

  How to Make it Happen in Your Community

  • Tamzin Pinkerton, Rob Hopkins(Authors)
  • 2009(Publication Date)
  • Green Books

    (Publisher)

  Chapter 8 Community Supported Agriculture In the UK and around the world, Community Supported Agriculture schemes (often referred to as CSAs) are fast becoming recognised as key elements of local food networks, and as efficient, resilient ways of feeding communities. CSAs come in many shapes and sizes but they are in essence farms (often set up as limited companies) in which community members become involved by buying shares, making decisions and even helping to grow and harvest the food they eat. Setting up a CSA can be a larger project than those described in other chapters in this book, requiring much groundwork, knowledge and community support before it can take off. But because the CSA model strengthens relationships between the farmer, the community and the wider environment, there are many benefits that come with the start-up and long-term effort it requires. For the farmers, there is a secure market for the food they produce. For the community members that support them, there is access to local, often organic food, the opportunity to develop their own growing skills and the space to have a say in what is produced and how. Because the food producers are growing for a defined, local market rather than for the unpredictable, global food market, the food miles that their produce travels are drastically reduced and they are able to support wildlife and biodiversity by growing a varied selection of crops. So although the term ‘Community Supported Agriculture’ implies a one-way relationship of support from the community to the farmer, the relationships are actually three-way (between growers, community and the environment) and the benefits flow in all directions. Gaps between the three recipients are closed, understanding is fostered, and each receives the nourishment it deserves (see Amanda Daniel’s article on page 105 for the Soil Association’s views on why CSAs have an important role to play in local food networks)

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  Selling Local

  Why Local Food Movements Matter

  • Jennifer Meta Robinson, James Robert Farmer(Authors)
  • 2021(Publication Date)
  • Indiana University Press

    (Publisher)

  THREE Understanding Community Supported Agriculture

  CSA is not just a clever, new approach to marketing. Community farming is about the necessary renewal of agriculture through its healthy linkage with the human community that depends upon farming for survival.

  —Steven McFadden

  As defined by the US Department of Agriculture, a CSA “consists of a community of individuals who pledge support to a farm operation so that the farmland becomes, either legally or spiritually, the community’s farm, with the growers and consumers providing mutual support and sharing the risks and benefits of food production.”1 The consensus emphasizes the collective, political, and economic nature of the arrangement, defining it as “an alternative, locally-based economic model of agriculture and food distribution” that involves a “network or association of individuals who have pledged to support one or more local farms, with growers and consumers sharing the risks and benefits of food production.”2 Our notion of a CSA most closely aligns with the one Indian Line Farm uses: an organization that “brings together community members and farmers in a relationship of mutual support based on an annual commitment to one another.… Members purchase a ‘share’ of the anticipated harvest and make payment in advance at an agreed upon price.” In exchange, the farmers grow, raise, and care for bounty that subscribers share. As the Indian Line website says, “In short, the farmer and members become partners in the production, distribution and consumption of locally grown food.”3

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  Organizing Eating

  Communicating for Equity Across U.S. Food Systems

  • Sarah E. Dempsey(Author)
  • 2023(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  CSAs have emerged as part of this alternative counter-industrial food and farming movement. A central goal of the CSA model is to shift the balance of economic power by reorganizing the relationship between owners and workers from one of exploitation to one of a more equitable and shared burden, blending and balancing the health and biodiversity of the farm with the health and diversity of CSA members.

  Origins and Types of Community-Supported Agriculture

  CSA is not only a food movement, but a specific way of organizing humans and capital. The CSA movement can be traced back to several geographical locations in the 20th century. One origin includes the teikei movement in Japan. Teikei translates to “partnership” or “cooperation,” but teikei members prefer the translation, “food with the farmer’s face on it” to describe the intimate connection between farmer, food, and consumer (Schnell, 2007 ). Teikei farming began in 1971 when a group of women concerned about widespread pesticide use, declining rural populations, and the increase in imported and processed foods started operating small farms to protect rural communities’ livelihoods and connect directly with local consumers (Henderson & Van En, 2007 ).

  Others tie the U.S. CSA movement to Black farming traditions of the American South (Bowens, 2015 ). For example, Dr. Booker T. Whatley of Alabama led efforts to champion “Pick Your Own” farms and “Clientele Membership Clubs” throughout the 1960s and 1970s. Whatley openly shunned the use of middlepersons in agriculture and developed a guide titled, “The Whatley Diversified Plan for Small Farms.” Still others have pointed to CSA origins being modeled after small cooperative farms in Germany and Switzerland in the 1970s. All of these farming models and movements likely influenced the American CSA model of subscription or membership farming which arrived in the United States by way of Massachusetts and New Hampshire in the mid-1980s (Schnell, 2007

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  Eat Local, Taste Global

  How Ethnocultural Food Reaches Our Tables

  • Glen C. Filson, Bamidele Adekunle(Authors)
  • 2017(Publication Date)
  • Wilfrid Laurier University Press

    (Publisher)

  The first documented community shared agriculture in the United States was established by Robyn Van En, Jan Vander Tuin, and John Root Jr. in 1985 in the Berkshire Mountains in western Massachusetts (Cone and Myhre 2000; Schnell 2007). Now there are more than thirteen hundred registered CSA farms in North America (Robyn Van En Centre 2009, cited in Sumner, Mair, and Nelson 2010). In 2007, 12,549 farmers in the United States reported marketing their products via community shared agriculture (Community Supported Agriculture 2009). In 2002, there were about five hundred CSAs in Canada (McAdam 2002, cited in Haranandani 2009) and there are many more now. The Structure of a Community Shared Agriculture In community shared agriculture, consumers pay a set price at the beginning of the farming season for a weekly share of produce in return. In southern Ontario, the shares are distributed during the growing season, which tends to be from mid-June to mid-Octo-ber (Ferris and Behmann 1994). The food may include vegetables, fruits, herbs, meats, eggs, and dairy products. Fish, grains, nuts, honey, jams, other preservatives, and flowers have been intro-duced recently to the community shared agriculture model. Still, vegetable production is the most common type of CSA (Schnell 2007). The consumers may also have a choice in the size of share they purchase. Usually a large share feeds a family of four, while a small share is enough to feed an adult couple (Ferris and Behmann Community Shared Agriculture and Its Impacts on Food Availability 113 1994). Winter community shared agriculture, consisting mostly of root crops, is becoming more prominent in southern Ontario. Community shared agriculture presumes that both the farmer and consumers share the benefits (crop output) and risks (various unpredictable aspects of growing food) of the season.

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  Urban Horticulture

  • Tina Marie Waliczek, Jayne M. Zajicek(Authors)
  • 2016(Publication Date)
  • CRC Press

    (Publisher)

  CSAs usually require an upfront payment that allows the farmer to have the resources and time to buy what is needed to manage the farm’s crops and sustain 278 Urban Horticulture the farm and family. Participants pay the same amount regardless of the success or failure of the crops, sharing the risk and reward with the farmer. Biodynamic agriculture , a holistic approach to agriculture combining spiritual, ethical, and eco-logical considerations to create a self-sustaining farming system, as practiced by the followers of Rudolf Steiner and economist, E. F. Schumacher, influenced the forma-tion of the first CSAs in the United States in the 1980s (McFadden 2014). The first CSAs were inspired to combine environmental and economic sustainability with farm production. In 2010, there were over 1400 CSAs in operation in the United States, up from 400 in 2001 and 2 in 1986 (Martinez et al. 2010). Federal government data puts the number much higher at 12,549 CSA operations in 2007 (USDA 2007). Most CSAs provide the personal connection with the farmer and farm that local food supporters desire. Visits to the farms, education events, field days, and on-farm dinner events increase the connection between farm and plate. Many CSAs also offer the option of working shares, where a member works on the farm for a portion of their share. This can not only relieve some of the financial burden of a share but also provide the connection with the land and food that many CSA members desire (Tegtmeier and Duffy 2005). CSA shares often include more than vegetables offer-ing fruit, meat, dairy, flowers, herbs, nuts, and value-added products such as jams, jellies, cheeses, and sauces. In recent surveys, both farmers and consumers felt they were being environmentally and socially responsible by participating in a CSA and the majority of CSAs practiced some form of organic or biodynamic agriculture (Lass et al. 2001; Strochlic and Chelley 2004).

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  Social Innovation and Sustainable Consumption

  Research and Action for Societal Transformation

  • Julia Backhaus, Audley Genus, Sylvia Lorek, Edina Vadovics, Julia Wittmayer, Julia M Wittmayer(Authors)
  • 2017(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  8 Community agriculture and the narrative construction of change

  Emese Gulyás and Bálint Balázs

  1 Community Supported Agriculture and direct food-purchasing groups in Hungary

  Farmers’ markets, food cooperatives, pick-your-own harvesting and other forms of short food-supply chains have a long history in Hungary and, despite their declining share in household food sourcing, they are still regarded as the good old, traditional source of food. Growing demand for local food is fuelled by environmental concerns, explicit patriotic (political) attitudes and state support. Product features like “local”, “regional” or “Hungarian” became values of their own in certain consumer segments. In Hungary, buying local and seasonal food is one of the most popular consumer behavioural forms to combat climate change (Eurobarometer 2014). Responding to open consumer attitudes, some forms of local food systems, like local food markets with strong sustainability missions, artisan food products and regionally labelled food, have been reinvented as well in the past decade. Their revival largely resulted from supportive governmental policies and the availability of public funds for infrastructural development, marketing promotions, and consumer campaigns.

  Other forms of alternative food systems, like Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) or direct purchasing groups, started to flourish around 2006. The first direct food-purchasing group in Budapest with a clear sustainability mission began to operate that year, and later it became a role model for several other initiatives. The first champion CSA in Hungary started in 1998 (Vadovics and Hayes 2010; Ángyán et al. 2003), but then it took more than a decade for others to emerge. A series of events and trainings organized by the Association of Conscious Consumers (ACC) and research organizations contributed to boosting a second generation of CSAs (Dezsény 2013; Dezsény et al.

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  On Feeding the Masses

  An Anatomy of Regulatory Failure in China

  • John K. Yasuda(Author)
  • 2017(Publication Date)
  • Cambridge University Press

    (Publisher)

  Local Governance, Local Challenges, and Local Solutions In the CSA system, the scale of governance is focused on the local degree- of-zoom, and actors go to great lengths to preserve the local orientation of the system. In direct contrast to the export sector, producers contend that the vast majority of food safety problems emerge due to highly com- petitive market pressures at the national and global scales of production and distribution. The strong emphasis on the local scale of governance is reinforced by a collaborative system of shared regulatory responsibility focused on pres- sures and processes unfolding at the local scale. First, CSA farms partic- ipate in risk-sharing in the interests of local producers. Consumers must commit to purchasing a certain volume of produce before the planting season. A portion of the purchase money is paid up front. In the event of a poor harvest due to weather conditions, consumers pay for a por- tion of the farmer’s loss. Second, food prices are not simply determined by the market, but also account for the challenges that exist in the local production context, including the amount of labor invested and the wel- fare of the farmer, reflecting a sense of shared burdens. In the case of small CSA farmers, organic production can be extremely labor intensive— consumer labor contributions are absolutely necessary: “my produce is still the cheapest in the organic market. We really need to build good relations with consumers . . . we depend on them to come out to help at harvest so things can be cheaper” (CSA 4). Third, farmers depend on their customers that operate in larger scale social networks to help them find additional buyers in the cities, which evidences a sense of shared opportu- nity. Despite operating at a continuous loss for three years, for example, one farmer observed that it was the social network that was important: “we really like the CSA model. It’s good for business and I get to meet a lot of new people .

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  Localizing Global Food

  Short Food Supply Chains as Responses to Agri-Food System Challenges

  • Agni Kalfagianni, Sophia Skordili, Agni Kalfagianni, Sophia Skordili(Authors)
  • 2018(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  et al., 2013: 66). Fruit and vegetables are only available on a seasonal basis and not all year round. In order to anticipate consumer demand, some manuals on CSA advise buying-in products which are not grown on the farm to ensure variety in weekly boxes (Wild, 2012).

  The unwritten rule of self-sufficiency can be interpreted as a relic of the concept of commune within social movements, where living and working together was a standard feature. CSA seems to intend to renew this idea on a networked scale, which comprises rural and urban actors.

  In German CSA projects participants are content with the quality of the food produced and only dissatisfied about the quantity of food to be shared (Bietau et al., 2013: 77) On the one hand, the supermarket somehow remains a model for consumer demand; it shapes the expectations of participants. Moreover, participants need to readapt to the logic of seasonal agricultural production and to new types and varieties of food. In this respect, it is obvious that the dichotomy between consumers and producers is not dissolved by CSA projects: first, because different roles persist in society; and second, participants’ expectations are shaped by the modern agri-food-system which not only disadvantages but also benefits the modern consumer. On the other hand, consumers embed CSA practices in their everyday shopping habits. Most CSA members buy the rest of the food they need as organic quality (Bietau et al., 2013: 67).

  The problems around sharing the harvest demonstrate the tensions created by different individual needs and experiences. These tensions arise because CSA projects are not a full-time community like a commune – they are not even a part-time community, but a sequential time community, where participants spend only a short part of their lifetime.

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  Multifunctionality and Impacts of Organic and Conventional Agriculture

  • Jan Moudrý, Kassio Ferreira Mendes, Jaroslav Bernas, Rafael da Silva Teixeira, Rodrigo Nogueira de Sousa, Jan Moudrý, Kassio Ferreira Mendes, Jaroslav Bernas, Rafael da Silva Teixeira, Rodrigo Nogueira de Sousa(Authors)
  • 2020(Publication Date)
  • IntechOpen

    (Publisher)

  Drawing on the literature, [35] defined a CSA as community-based organizations of consumers and producers. This collective of producers and consumers focus on using organic and sustainable methods to produce their products. 2. We also asked respondents to use a five-point scale anchored with “strongly agree” through “strongly disagree” to indicate the extent of their agreement with the following statements: Part of the duty of a good citizen is to buy locally grown farm produce. Vibrant community-based farming is more likely to keep family farmers on the land than large corporate farming (factory farming, large plantation). Community-based farming is more likely to do a better job of preserving the quality of the land than large corporate farming. Small farms are better for the environment than large corporate farms. These questions are based on the rationale presented above, in addition to the follow-ing considerations: A persistent critique of corporate commodity agriculture is that it has depleted the natural resource base and degraded the environ-ment from which it draws its support [2, 14]. The advent and growth of civic agriculture or community-based agriculture systems is seen as a response to Multifunctionality and Impacts of Organic and Conventional Agriculture 92 the socioeconomic and ecological concerns associated with corporate commodity agriculture or, more broadly, conventional food production systems [2, 14, 36, 37]. Community-based agriculture with its emphasis on holistic and locally based agriculture systems has catalyzed regionally based economic activity, the focus of which is to reinvigorate rural communities and economies and improve farmer income [13].

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  Local Food Systems and Community Economic Development

  • R. David Lamie, Steven C. Deller(Authors)
  • 2020(Publication Date)
  • Taylor & Francis

    (Publisher)

  1 ). The number of farmers markets grew from 1755 in 1994 to 5274 in 2009 (Martinez et al., 2010) and to 8268 in 2014 (Low et al., 2015), an increase of 371% over 21 years (over 16% average annually), and the rate of growth in demand for farmers markets is likely increasing, with the number of communities wanting to support farmers markets often outstripping the number of farmers able to fill them. The number of CSA enterprises grew from 2 in 1986 to 12,617 in 2012, indicating a truly remarkable rate of growth from this new business model (Martinez et al., 2010). The number of dedicated local food distributors, brokers, and aggregators intentionally serving these local foods marketing channels (food hub) increased by 288% between 2007 and 2014, to a total of 302 (Low et al., 2015). While farm to school programs have multiple objects, such as teaching youth about nutrition and the origins of their food, the latest census of these programs (2011–2012 or 2012–2013 school years) revealed some 4300 schools have some form of program in place, an increase of 430% over levels in 2006 (Low et al., 2015; Ralston & Benson, 2015). Many of these programs are now adapting their model to reach new institutional markets like daycare centers, healthcare facilities, prisons, and corporate commissaries. Many are experimenting with hybrid models that incorporate some elements from food hubs, CSAs, and farm to school approaches, indicating that the future will hold a plentiful array of new models (Woods, Ernst, & Tropp, 2017).

  Figure 1. Patterns in direct sales (local foods).

  The importance of localized food production and consumption is presented across an increasingly large literature from a variety of perspectives and academic disciplines. Early work on local food systems came mostly from the social sciences including anthropology, rural sociology, and community development (Hendrickson, 2009; Holt & Amilien, 2007). Much of this work focused on the fundamental interest in the ways food is produced, processed, and stored, and the manner in which it is shared within a particular cultural context. This work laid down important foundations of the deeper cultural aspects of food that arguably underlie much of the current interest in local food systems. In addition this work is likely also the reservoir that might feed motivations for changing any given food system to be more congruent with what is truly desired. The literature review, based on a graduate student seminar at UC-Davis, provides a rather comprehensive review and synthesis of these earlier works (Campbell, Carlisle-Cummins, & Feenstra, 2013).

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