The farming season is approaching and that means you’ll find more locally grown produce in the area.
Some people buy their produce for the season before its even planted.
Everyone goes grocery shopping.
Some do it every other week; some do it every week or more.
You run out of things or they go bad before you used them.
The more you eat the more you buy.
There’s a program that started in the 80’s that can help fill that constant demand of grocery shopping.
It’s called Community Supported Agriculture, or CSA.
It works kind of like a magazine subscription, except your paying a farmer instead of a publisher.
“The CSA model is based on this idea of a shared risk where farmers and consumers are sharing in kind of the uncertainty of farming especially here in southern Illinois where the weather can be really unpredictable.”
Reanna Putnam is the farmers market Program Manager with Foodworks.
There a no-profit organization dedicated to developing the regional food economy in Southern Illinois.
She says the CSA model is a great way to purchase some of the freshest produce in the area.
“It’s a form of subscription agriculture, where you can buy a share in a farm at the beginning of the season and then you receive an amount of produce every week through out the season.”
Just like at the farmers market, there’s more than fruits and vegetables.
“The CSA option was always really appealing to us and then that’s why we have started our own pasture meat CSA.”
Andrew Banks owns Five Hen Farm in Buncombe with Sara Newman.
They started out with 5 chickens that were a gift in 2011.
“That Christmas her father built us a chicken coop and presented us with 5 hens and that’s where we get the name of our farm from.”
Today they have over 100 hens.
"This helps our farmers a lot, it gives them an influx of cash at the beginning of the season" Reanna Putnam, Food Works
Their CSA includes chicken, eggs and beginning this year, pork.
“Last year we kind of dove in and raised 4 hogs on pasture.”
The addition of hogs added sausage, pork chops and many other pork products to their CSA.
And people who buy the CSA’s gives these farmers a head start on the season.
“This helps our farmers a lot, it gives them an influx of cash at the beginning of the season when most of their expenses are coming in.”
“It’s going to pay for the chicks, it’s going to pay for the feed and pay for some of the labor and stuff to start the season with and so it gives us cash up front when where frankly we’re a little low on cash when we’ve gone through winter and not had as many sales.”
Putnam says paying upfront helps the farmer all season and gives them a better idea of what to produce.
“So by having a CSA where its consistent customer base, farmers can plan better there’s less food waste and it’s more financially secure for the farmers.”
And also allows farmers like Banks to concentrate more on his farm than trying to sell his products.
“It simplifies things a little bit on our end logistically if we can do the majority of our sales through the CSA on the farm, that means less time traveling, less time spent at farmers markets, you know more time spent on the farm doing stuff, taking care of stuff.”
Putnam wants to remind people that it’s a shared risk that can also pay off by the end of the season.
“There might be a week or two where you only going to have two items because its early in the season and then towards the end of the season you might have these huge hulking boxes that have winter squash and all these other storage things.”
The CSA commitments also motivate the next generation of farmers like Banks to keep raising chickens and hogs and continue to do so for seasons to come.
“It encourages me at least to know that people care, that they’re interested in what we’re producing here, just starting out right now its kind of famine not so much feast for us but its encouraging. “
Multiple farms in southern Illinois offer CSA shares.
You’re encouraged to sign up as early as possible because distribution usually starts in May.
