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  • From: "Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>
  • To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Livingontheland] A farm manager's reasons for buying local: community, health and environment
  • Date: Mon, 03 Oct 2011 11:01:02 -0600


A farm manager's reasons for buying local: community, health and environment
http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/article/20110930/LIVING06/110929032/

A few years ago, I got to know a farmer who had been a conventional hog
producer growing thousands of animals a year, packed into his barns in a way
he knew was wrong. The pork prices swung wildly and he constantly fretted
about whether he was going to make it.

One day, in a fit of financial desperation, he threw some frozen pork into a
cooler and headed to a farmers market. There, he sold several hundred dollars
worth, enough to pay the grocery and gas bills that week, and he said he felt
the tension just slide away while he was there talking with customers.

Three years later, he has transformed his farm. He sold his animals keeping
just 100 pigs and adding chickens and turkeys. He moved all his animals
outside onto grass and into the sunshine. He stopped feeding them the
antibiotics he was forced to feed to keep his packed in herd healthy. Now he
grills sausage samples at three different farmers markets weekly, his son
built the farm a website for customers to order his pasture raised meats, and
his farm has been transformed into a financially sound, wholesome business
that includes his whole family, and of which he is proud.

I love this story because it highlights many reasons why supporting local
farmers is important. This is a farm that was about to go under and was saved
by selling locally. It’s also a farm that had been producing meat for the
commodity market, forced to raise animals in a very unhealthy way in order to
keep costs to a minimum. It’s also a story about a farmer whose life was made
much richer when he focused on growing food for his community. And in the
end, it’s a story about a farm that prevailed.

In the past decades farms have seen the price they receive for their products
fall — in particular dairy — while the cost of living continues to increase.
And every year we lose some of our farms. But some are changing gears, moving
to a different model. We are lucky to also be experiencing the growth of new
farms, nearly all of them intending to sell more directly, throughcommunity
supported agriculture shares, farmers markets, or direct to restaurants.






  • [Livingontheland] A farm manager's reasons for buying local: community, health and environment, Tradingpost, 10/03/2011

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