Community Supported Agriculture

"CSA generally is the practice of focusing on the production of high quality foods using ecological, organic or biodynamic farming methods. This kind of farming operates with a much greater-than-usual degree of involvement of consumers and other stakeholders—resulting in a stronger than usual consumer-producer relationship. The core design includes developing a cohesive consumer group that is willing to fund a whole season’s budget in order to get quality foods."

- Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community-supported_agriculture)

Community Supported Agriculture comes in many forms but can be categorised in three main types.

Community Owned Farm

A farm owned by the community and employ a farm manager to manage the farm. The community group takes responsibility for set-up and running costs of crop development, and participates in production under direction of a farm manager. This is the best opportunity to see the real cost of food production

Subscription Farm

The farmer owns the farm. Subscribers buy an annual share in the produce and contribute some labour to the running of the operation. A lump sum payment is made up-front for the year’s supply of food. This method allows for the grower to set up the garden and survive the initial period before full production is reached.

Relationship Marketing

The farm is wholly owned by the farmer who also does all the work. The farmer delivers the produce directly to committed families and restaurants.

These approaches can eliminate marketing risks and costs for the producer and save an enormous amount of time. It allows farmers to do what they should be doing and that is to focus on producing quality, healthy, safe, nutritious food.