Support Your Local Farmer

This article expounds on the benefits of supporting local, organic farms. We have several great options to take part in this right here in Houston.

I'm on the board of Central City Co-op, a local organic farming co-op that provides shares of vegetables (a big box) every Wednesday for about $15. Just last fall Houston's Urban Harvest, a non-profit that creates organic gardens throughout the city, expanded to form a Saturday morning farmers' market in Midtown. Both of these organizations offer opportunities to volunteer for your vegetables, as well.

Win0405 earthwise: Support Your Local Farmer: "Leigh and Wenonah Hauter live and work on an eight-acre farm in Virginia's Bull Run Mountains. Every weekday between June and October, Leigh heads to one of five delivery locations in Washington, DC, and northern Virginia with bins of fresh vegetables, fruits, herbs, flowers, and eggs. Customers line up to fill their bags, exchange friendly greetings but no cash, and head home to prepare meals using seasonal produce Leigh picked just hours before.

The Hauter farm is an example of community-supported agriculture (CSA),a movement that has taken hold on more than 1,000 farms across the country. CSA farmers sell yearly shares in their harvests to consumers in neighboring communities (the Hauters' shares start at $295 each). This arrangement helps defray farming costs and provides farmers with financial stability at the start of the growing season, when it is most needed. In exchange, shareholders receive weekly deliveries of produce and other goods as they come into season. In the first week of July, for example, shareholders received garlic, potatoes, basil, lettuce, and kohlrabi. [...]"