The 411 on CSAs

The summer I belonged to a CSA (community supported agriculture), our evening meals often featured purple potatoes, kale and just-picked watermelon–all organically grown. That’s because a CSA membership is a “subscription” to a local organic farm that allowed me to a weekly pick of fresh, organically grown produce.

According to Local Harvest, a website devoted to connecting people with organic and locally grown food, CSA farms are becoming increasingly available and popular to people who want to know where their food is being grown. Fifteen years ago or so, there were only 50 such farms in the United States. Today, there are more than 1,000. The map above, courtesy of Local Harvest, shows the concentration of CSA farms in places like the East Coast and the Upper Midwest. (Click here to visit Local Harvest’s search page for a CSA near you.)

If you’re unfamiliar with how a CSA works, here’s a brief primer.

For starters, though the growing season begins in the spring, many people sign up at the end of the previous growing season (late fall). In fact, because we moved last year, my CSA membership information from the farm we used to belong to never made it to my new address. Once it dawned on me that I needed to sign up, it was too late–the season was sold out. So now I’ll probably join another farm nearby, which only has 10 slots left for 2008. Previously, I would get a half share, which was cheaper (about $400) and provided just enough produce for my family. With this new farm there are only full shares left ($795), so I’ll probably try to split things up with a friend or two.

You see that’s how it works with CSAs. You sign up in advance, you pay in advance, and the farm limits how many folks can join–probably to ensure that everyone gets his or her fair share of fruits and vegetables, and to manage crowd control on pick-up days. While this fee covers the price of the fresh produce you’ll take home during the 20-week season, that money does much more for the farmer who owns and runs the CSA. It covers his production expenses, including seeds, water, equipment, labor and much more. Since most CSA subscriptions sell out long before a single seed is sown, this guarantees a farmer a living wage for the crops to come.

Some farms, though, expect that you’ll pay to join and volunteer as part of your membership. Many of my friends don’t find this additional requirement to be too much of a burden. One, a local real estate agent who joined the CSA I’m considering and did so with another realtor, would bring boxes of onions with back to the office, and divide them into individual share bags during slow times. Once done they would bring them back to the farm.

The farm I used to belong to gave you two subscription options. I could drive 25 minutes to the farm, where I was able to choose produce based on what had been harvested that week and what I thought my kids’ picky palate could handle. Or, for an additional fee, I could pick up my box of produce at a satellite location near my house. I chose the former option, because I thought a weekly visit to the farm would be a good learning experience for my children. It was–they enjoyed walking in the fields amongst the eggplants, peppers and lettuce and then creating their own “salad bar” when they got home. One week, they were able to pick their own raspberries and sunflowers. Some CSAs also offer fresh eggs, herbs and whatever else they “grow” on the farm.

As far as satellite locations go, they are popular with city residents I know who are able to belong to a CSA despite their living miles away from an actual farm. Other CSAs allow for pick-ups at a local farmer’s market.

You may be wondering how someone like myself, who proclaims her frugality nearly daily, can justify spending this kind of money on a CSA subscription. Well, I can tell you from personal experience that organically grown and freshly picked produce lasts a lot longer than the stuff you find in the supermarket–even the organic items. That means that we rarely have produce that ends up in the composter because it went rotten before we could eat it. (Just today, I tossed rotten celery and carrots–both organic from the supermarket–into the compost because they were all gushy. And don’t get me started on the strawberries that has turned white and fuzzy, and which ended up in the composter yesterday.)

Then there’s the issue of how much I spend on produce each week when grocery shopping. In looking back at old receipts, I would say I spend between $30 and $40. Multiply that by a 20-week season, and yes, it comes out to be more than I would have spent otherwise at ShopRite. But so much of my produce spending is replacing things that went bad before we finished them. That means that if I were to take that “rotting” part out of the financial equation, I’m confident I would come out ahead with my CSA subscription.

I can also think about things this way: if I have to volunteer to help work the fields as part of my subscription, I’ll be getting exercise for free–and communing with Mother Earth at the same time.