Community Supported Agriculture: Putting the Farmer’s Face on Food
In late February, long before the peak growing season, baskets from Eatwell Farms in the agricultural town of Winters, California, were being filled with salad mix, spinach, green garlic, Arugula, walnuts, grapefruit, and seven other varieties of produce.
The 17-acre organic farm, 100 miles northeast of San Francisco, fills 170 baskets for subscription customers 50 weeks of the year. The baskets are picked up at drop off spots in San Francisco and Oakland, as well as in nearby Davis and Sacramento. In exchange for the basket of fresh produce, the customers pay $17 a week in advance or $15.70 a week if they pay for three months.
This arrangement, known as “community-supported agriculture” (CSA), has roots reaching back 30 years to Japan, where a group of women, concerned about the increase in food imports and the corresponding decrease in the farming population, initiated a direct growing and purchasing relationship with local farmers. This arrangement, called teikei in Japanese, translates to “putting the farmer’s face on food.”
