Community Supported Agriculture is a project, where you support small farmers in advance, rather than them having to sell out to supermarkets. You ‘invest’ in their harvest before it’s reaped, and they can then just get on with growing food, and you go collect your bumper crop (and can even help to harvest it, if you want).
You can buy a £20 guide to setting up a CSA at the website. See how to help our farmers, for tips on how to diversify income (and keep animals safe, from sheepdogs to barnyard friends).
A good example of a thriving community supported agriculture farm is Suffolk’s Oak Tree Low Carbon Farm. Members enjoy weekly harvests of local veggies. Most people in England eat eggs and meat. These chickens while alive are truly free-range and given vegetable trimmings, damaged veg and spent mash from local breweries. If you want free-range, then this is the best way to do it.
You don’t have to stick with vegetables. Yorkshire’s Handmade Bakery is a good example of community supported agriculture. You pay them in advance, and in return receive ‘bread bonds’. These can then be used to buy local good bread, and they use profits to run courses teaching others how to make good bread. All bread bonds have now been paid off.
