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CSA stands for Community
Supported Agriculture. CSAs are de-
signed to provide a close connection between a farm, the
farmers,
and a community of shareholders. The farm and farmers
feed the
shareholders by providing weekly produce. The shareholders
financially support the farm and become an integral part
of small
scale, local agriculture. CSA is a life-affirming movement
that
redeems our inter-action with the earth by providing a
structure
within which we can personally determine the way we want
our
food to be grown and distributed. The
community farm is a
place to rekindle our vital connection to our food and
the
land on which it is grown.
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Evangeline
in the strawberry field
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everyone
BENEFITS IN A CSA
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the FARM
Sweet Land Farm is located in Trumansburg,
NY, an area rich in farming history and now enjoying
a farm-
ing revival. The native soil here is deep, dark,
and luscious. Sweet Land’s 34-acre farm
shares property
boundaries, a spirit of co-operation
and pleasant neighborliness with a
certified organic dairy
farm.
A third of Sweet Land’s 34 tillable acres
is in annual vegetables, with an acre or so in
perennial and bi-
annual fruit and the balance in cover crops. We
believe that the backbone of a healthy, thriving
farm is
healthy, thriving soil. To accomplish this, we
rotate annual crops every two years. A given field
is in
vegetables for two years, then put in a two-year
sod of clover and grass and back to vegetables
again.
Our long-term goal is to have animals grazing
on the sod.
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the SHAREHOLDERS
Shareholders receive fresh locally grown vegetables
and fruit. As CSA members, you
will know exactly
where your food comes from, who grows it and how it
is grown. Members can come out any time
and pick flowers and tomatoes with their children, or
show them carrot tops sticking out of the ground.
The shareholder has the satisfaction of taking an active
role in preserving farmland and supporting the
rare breed of family farmers. By supporting organic
agriculture, your are supporting a farm that does not
use chemical pesticides, herbicides or fertilizers.
the FARMERS
A CSA is a farmer-friendly model. The farmer develops
a stable, long-term relationship with reliable
customers.
This makes it easier for the farmers to plan each year’s
crops because they know what and
how much of each crop their customers want. The CSA
model also allows farmers to do most of their
marketing in the slow winter months, so that when the
growing season rolls around they can spend more
time producing excellent produce. The stability a CSA
provides allows the farmers time to run a truly
vibrant farm. It provides the farmers
with a viable business, an essential element in sustainability.
the SOIL
Don’t forget the soil that’s growing all
this bounty! Healthy soil grows healthy plants, and
healthy plants
grow healthy people. Just as plants grown on rich soil
have fewer diseases, pest and growth problems,
people who eat this nutritious food experience radiant
health. At Sweet Land Farm we rotate our crops
into land that has been cover cropped for a full two
years, allowing pest and disease cycles to be inter-
rupted and to allow roots, earthworms and soil microbes
to create a rich crumbling
soil structure.
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