In the summer of 2020, RAFI’s Come to the Table program staff member Jarred White asked the question: what would it look like for faith communities to be in sustainable, mutually beneficial, and practical relationships with farmers?
Instead of one-time produce purchases or the occasional farm tour, how could a faith community financially support and enter into a relationship with a local farmer? What if this support could benefit a local farmer of color who has long faced systemic discrimination? Conversely, how could a farmer and their fresh produce benefit a faith community’s ministries, which provide food for many food insecure community members?
These questions led to the creation of RAFI’s Farm and Faith Partnerships Project. This project aims to address injustices in the food system that marginalize rural communities and farmers of color. It does this by creating partnerships between farmers who are members of RAFI’s Farmers of Color Network and faith groups in their local areas.
RAFI’s Executive Director, Edna Rodriguez, talks about the genesis of the project: “Now is the time to invest in the work of transforming local and regional food supply chains. Through leveraging existing relationships and the trust we have built with farmers and faith communities, RAFI is committed to creating that change.”
The Farm and Faith Partnership Project centers community supported agriculture (CSA) shares (a weekly food box subscription) among a group of churches with one or more farmers of color in the area. Come to the Table helps pair the churches and farmers together, then church members commit to purchasing shares for themselves and/or for their food ministries before the season begins.
What started with a handful of churches and a couple of farmers in Wake County, North Carolina, has now spread to include eight CSA projects made up of 20 congregations and more than 10 farmers.
The pilot project launched in April 2021 in Wake County, NC, (Raleigh area). After three years and eight seasons, the CSA has grossed more than $150,000 for the farmers and doubled its seasonal shares to more than 220 members.
Steve and Elke McCalla, owners and operators of Rocky Ridge Farm in Louisburg, NC, are original partners in the Wake County CSA. Previously selling produce at local farmers markets, the CSA has been a nice change of pace for them, allowing them to operate at their peak production and have reliable and stable market access.
“We would like to share our gratitude,” Steve McCalla said. “[Because of the CSA], we basically transitioned from a small farm to a medium sized farm.”
In the Wake County CSA, each farmer is paired with one to three faith communities whose members and ministries sign up for CSA shares before the growing season. After sign-ups, the farmers know exactly how much they need to grow for that season.
McCalla recounted experiences of his fellow farmers who faced hardships due to market rain-outs during the spring and summer seasons. He further explained how the CSA model can provide stability for farmers by minimizing the unpredictability of sales, which can often be affected by factors beyond their control.
“With the CSA, we know exactly how many shares we have, we know what to plant, it’s not hit or miss, everything that we harvest is already sold and the money is provided up front,” McCalla said. “So the supplies, input, equipment, and maintenance that we need to sustain ourselves, we have that budget up front each season.”
Patrick (Rick) Brown is a fourth-generation farmer in Henderson, NC, who is also a participant in the Wake County CSA. Brown sells a lot of his produce wholesale, but still sees the CSA as an added benefit to his farm.
“I feel like [a CSA] is one of the ways that farmers can have a secondary market for what they’ve already been doing in order to add diversification to their farm portfolio,” Brown said. “Through RAFI and the Farm and Faith Partnership Project, it’s easy for a small farmer to get set up to put this into production, because they’re already doing the work and it guarantees a market for their produce.”
One added benefit of the Farm and Faith Partnership has been that farmers can focus on what they do best — growing and harvesting food — and not have to divert their energy away from farming and toward marketing.
“Bless the hands that plant, prune, and propagate. Bless the seeds, the bugs, the animals. Bless the labor and the work. Bless the people who eat from the land, their bodies, their minds, and their hearts. Bless the community that dreams of sustainability and equality and creation justice. Bless the farmers. Bless their ancestors. Bless the churches. Bless the creative minds at RAFI. Bless our budding relationships and new friendships.”
“Our attention is off of trying to market for ourselves and the churches are actually supporting us by marketing our work,” McCalla said. “That frees up time for us to be able to look at buying plants or materials that we would normally not have had time for.”
Not only have the partnerships been unique market opportunities for the farmers, but they have been a way to build community.
For the last three years, farmers and shareholders from the CSAs have joined together at a participating farm and held a blessing of the land. For owner and operator of Singing Stream Farm, Ken Daniel, the blessing of the land was a selling point for joining the CSA.
“When I first joined the CSA, [the other farmers] were making preparations for the first blessing of the land event,” Daniel said. “And I thought to myself, ‘blessing of the land?’ Now that sounds like something I want to be involved with.’”
Brown said one of the most beneficial parts of the experience has been getting to know the shareholders at his partner church, St. Francis of Assisi, in Raleigh, NC.
“We’ve been able to go to the church and introduce ourselves, tell our story, and build a relationship with them,” Brown said. “Even though we’re not members of the organization, we feel as though we are.”
The McCallas echoed Brown’s sentiment, detailing the list of activities they’ve collaborated on with their partner church, including a presentation on Earth Day, a hands-on activity of transplanting cabbage with the children of the church, and volunteer days at the farm building a new fence.
“On Saturday mornings it’s not like we just drop the vegetables off and take off,” McCalla said. “We stand and chat, and people ask us all kinds of questions, so it’s kind of a warm and cozy place to be on a Saturday morning.”
If you are interested in learning more about the Farm and Faith Partnerships Project, or if you are a farmer in North Carolina who would like to be connected with a faith community in your county, contact the Come to the Table team at cttt@rafi.gameflow.design.
David Allen works as Come to the Table’s Project Manager, focusing on the program’s event, cohort, and communication efforts. David is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Duke Divinity School.