Community Supported Agriculture  is thriving as it moves into its third decade of bringing together farmers and consumers in relationships based on mutual respect, trust and an appreciation for fresh food. Since its inception in 1986 through its 20th anniversary in 2006, CSA has grown to an estimated 2,000 farms. And those who have been involved in CSA throughout that time see a continuing bright future.
    Steve McFadden, co-author with Trauger Groh of Farms of Tomorrow, the first book about CSA,  spoke at a CSA conference in Michigan in November.
    “I must say I was impressed with the energy and enthusiasm for CSA at the Michigan conference,” he said. “In my view it surpassed the enthusiasm I witnessed back in the 1990s at the first CSA conference ever, a gathering held in western Massachusetts.”
    Jo Meller, one of the organizers of the November conference and the coeditor of The Community Farm newsletter, was also impressed by the enthusiasm of those in attendance.
    “The room was full of young people, and young women in particular,” she said.
    Elizabeth Henderson, a CSA farmer and activist, has just finished revising her book Sharing the Harvest: A Guide to Community Supported Agriculture, due out this fall from Chelsea Green Publishing. In updating the book, she contacted almost all of the 300 CSA farms mentioned in the first edition in 1998.
    “After 20 years of CSA development, there are many CSAs that have become important local institutions with members who have made CSA eating their way of life,” Elizabeth said. “Some of these are farmer-led and organized, others are part of a wide variety of nonprofit organizations – antipoverty and community food security groups, land trusts, state parks. Although I have found the traces of many failed CSAs, even more new ones continue to form.  Regional CSA support organizations – Just Food in NYC, Equiterre in Quebec, MACSAC in Madison, WI – are helping strong networks of CSAs to spread and thrive.”
    Roxbury Farm in Kinderhook, New York, is one of the largest CSAs in the country with 990 members, many of them in New York City. Jody Bolluyt of Roxbury Farm explains how the organization Just Food helps with the CSA:
    “We really enjoy working with Just Food.  They help match up farmers and groups in New York City in order to start the CSA relationship.  Both sides of the relationship are required to fill out applications stating their needs and abilities.  From these applications Just Food determines who would be a good match and it helps Just Food to make sure that the community group can do the work needed on their end and that the farmers will be able to produce the vegetables that the CSA members want.  I am part of the Just Food farmer advisory panel.  We read the farmer applications and discuss how well a farm will be able to meet the demands of a CSA.  We also go on farm visits to follow up on the application.  Just Food wants to make sure that the relationship is a success on both ends.
     “When Just Food put us in contact with the site in Harlem they had one of their Vista volunteers help set up the site and run the CSA until a Core Group of members formed.  The Just Food Vista Volunteer ran the site for two years and then the Core Group took over.  Just Food offers manuals for the Core Group on how to run the site with everything from how to recruit new members to how to take in payments and communicate with the farmer.  They also have produce books with cooking tips and recipes for all the vegetables you can find in a CSA share.
    “It is really helpful for farmers to have someone making sure that sites are well run and to have someone to go to if there are problems.  It is also helpful for the community group to have someone to go to if their farmer isn’t holding up their end of the deal.  I think it takes some of the risk out of the idea of paying for food up front and then waiting for a few months before you begin to receive any produce at all.   For farmers the drive to the city is at least 2-3 hours, for others much longer, so it is reassuring for a farmer new to the CSA to have a trusted organization in the same city as the customers.  Just Food then fades into the background once the relationship is up and running smoothly.  
     “It would be great to have this type of organization in other cities.  The thing is I don’t think that we as farmers really have the time to take on this kind of work.  It is needs to be an organization that has bringing local, fresh produce into cities as part of their mission.”
    Another veteran in the work of CSA support and promotion is the Madison Area CSA Coalition (MACSAC). The group has 23 member farms that offer CSA shares in southern Wisconsin, Milwaukee, Chicago, and Minneapolis-St. Paul. Farms that want to be formally promoted by MACSAC must complete an application and peer review process, and pay a membership fee of $20-50 per year. Sponsored farms are then promoted on the web site, in the farm directory and at an annual open house where CSA farms share information with potential members. Sponsored farms can also offer $100-200 cash back on the share price for members who have health insurance through Physicians’ Plus Insurance Corporation.

Low income support
    Increasing opportunities for low-income people to participate in CSA is one of the biggest trends, Elizabeth Henderson said.
    “ There are many more CSAs finding many more ways to include lower-income members using revolving loan funds, multiple payment schedules, support funding, and sliding scale payment fees,” she said.
    MACSAC, for example, has a Partner Shares program that subsidizes 50% of the share price for low-income households. In return, sponsored CSAs must allow fundraising for the program from their shareholders.

Mentoring
    Beginning-farmer programs are increasingly reaching out to those who want to do CSA through mentoring programs. Michigan is starting a mentoring program this year, Jo Meller said. MACSAC pays veteran farmers a stipend to work with new CSA farmers throughout the year. Ten farms are matched up this year.
    These efforts to support farmers, expand services to low-income people and help beginning growers all point to continuing success for the CSA movement. In addition, Elizabeth Henderson sees a social trend that also suggests a bright future for CSAs: “Belonging to a CSA is ‘in’ with the younger generation of people who care passionately about building sustainable communities and living more lightly on the world.”

Resources
The Community Farm newsletter – www.csafarms.org
Just Food – www.justfood.org
MACSAC – www.macsac.org
ATTRA publications on CSA – www.attra.org
The Robyn Van En Center – www.wilson.edu/wilson/asp/content.asp?id=804