Ultra-local Agriculture As A Foundation to Local Food Resiliency: My Personal Farmer Research Concept

Thinking it out — Phase 1:

Would it be possible for a group of local community members to support a Personal Farmer with a sustainable income, while the farmer would serve the community members by specifically grow and raise food to support them and their family (farmer connected to group with personally curated harvests)? What would it take?

To answer the question of what would it take it requires that a “sustainable base (minimum) income” must be defined. In our current economic system I am placing that value at approximately $30,000 annually. It is an arbitrary number but roughly what an annual salary would be if the $15 minimum wage standard is considered. (There is political and social justice discussion about what a livable wage would be and the $15/hour minimum wage is a number being thrown around). So we have a starting point. An “income” net (in this model the amount is actually net profit) of $30,000 would calculate to approximately $2,500 per month or $577/week. This income (profits) would be the first expense, there would also be the expense of growing: land, water, power, seed, soil amendments, tools and equipment. This estimation of expense includes so many situational variables but for the purpose of laying out the logic and mathematical calculations of what it would take I am using an expense of $10,000.

So the total expense of a Personal Farmer would be $40,000 per year/$3,333 per month/$770/week.

Before I go further, I will state some assumptions:

• Additional labor is not a part of this calculation because this is looking to see if an individual farmer could reasonably feed a small group of people as the sole farmer and earn a sustainable wage doing it.
• Some of the numbers are speculative or broadly averaged.
• This is being filtered through my current land situation (I am currently purchasing a farm site) and its expenses.
• Currency to purchase food could be cash (self pay) or benefits like EBT or Healthy Bucks (supplemented by agency)

Each week the farmer would need to earn $770 to guarantee the income and expense needs.

Let’s assume we are looking at Average Joelette Family and they spend $200/week on food. For this consideration we are going to assume that ½ of their food spending is going to be with their Personal Farmer. The farmer is going to agree to provide year round production of foods for the family and they commit $100/week of their food budget to the Personal Farmer. Using these calculations, the Personal Farmer would need 8 individuals/families (let’s call them house units going forward) at that spending level to exceed the goal of $770. Could a single full time farmer grow and raise enough food for 8 house units? I believe this could be possible.

Obstacles:

• How does the farmer support him/herself before production begins? (How much time before the farmer will actually be able to provide food each week?) Seed money?
• What methods of communication will be used to query family units about production desires?
• Will there be weeks when the Personal Farmer cannot provide food?
• How will the farmer know what to grow?
• Safety net? What if a house group is not able to cover the expense of their food? Is there a long term commitment?

Thinking it out — Phase 2:

I have observed there to be many challenges and obstacles to finding solutions for local food sustainability. The two that I have focused on are the infrastructure and implementation. How do you combine the collective revenue spent on food with a system that ultimately supports connecting individuals passionate about providing growing and raising local food with local consumers such that both are supported well and in a manner that is sustainable. How do we support local farmers doing what they love, feeding us well, with the ability to be able to afford that life venture (that of sustainable small scale farming relying on organic permaculture principles)? Can such a system exist? Can we create a system that brings these factors together successfully for all parties? The farmer/producer? The processor? The end “user” eater/consumer? And all the players in between (production and distribution)?

What if we could bring together a tightly grouped (physical locale) collective of consumers that are not desiring to grow/raise their own food (in large scale) with a farmer that would dedicate a portion of their farming efforts to provide curated food for the consumers? What would that look like? The farmer queries the consumer to find out more about their eating habits and develops a plan to supply the items that can be sustainably produced locally. The farmer becomes your direct supplier for an estimated 50% of your food consumption. The consumer then exchanges food for value (money or services or product) with the farmer which completes the loop. The farmer has the resources to provide for the life needs/desires that s/he does not personally produce. How many consumers would be necessary to provide a safety net of financial resources, thus allowing the farmer to focus (their passion) on being a full time producer? Are there obstacles that would prevent this from occurring? Is there a developed plan for implementation available to test the theory and work through the obstacles that may evolve?

The development of a research/implementation program is what I am proposing. Upon an initial brainstorming session aided by RMC, the first initial obstacle is seed/development funding. There must be adequate time for a farmer to match production to the needs of the consumer collective. In the initial estimation that means that funds would be necessary that would allow a four to six month ramp up time before consumers would expect to receive food supplementation and therein be transferring portions of their food spending budgets directly to the farmer. In numbers an arbitrary estimation was made that $30,000 annual salary would be a starting point of income necessary for a farmer to devote a full time commitment to food production without sacrificing basic life needs/desires. In addition there is an estimated $10,000 to $20,000 of additional business expenses associated with the farming venture (land acquisition [purchase or lease], equipment, water, power, tools, seeds, livestock, etc) in the initial year and an estimated $10,000 per year in ongoing regular expenses. That would equate to a necessary capital commitment of $25,000 to initiate the first six months of ramp up. At that point the project would aim to be self supporting, or sustainable. This assumes that the initial seed capital is not debt but rather donated investment (in the research).

What would be necessary to give it a try?

Seed capital. A funding commitment would be necessary of $25,000 over a six month time frame to support a program that would actually be an 18 month research study. Approximately $10,000 of the seed capital would be necessary on the front and then the balance as a monthly commitment that would provide the regular monthly revenue/expense funds for the farmer. The initial $10,000 would be to ensure adequate land and land preparation and equipment/tools/seed/livestock necessary to execute the My Personal Farmer research program. The funding commitment timeline would look like:

The subsequent ongoing revenue needs would come directly from consumer purchases. In order to meet that income level ($40,000/annual need) here is sample consumer/spending breakdown (this is a subjective calculation to illustrate for the sake of demonstration):

Research/Analysis Deliverables:

• Research analysis of the process, post project
• Personal Farmer / Consumer training materials to allow the process to be replicable
• One year of supervised/supported Farmer/Consumer production and the associated research data from the process (pre-, during-, post-project)
• Possibly repayment of seed capital investment (if a revolving fund is used)

Necessary/Suggested Partnerships:

• Nonprofit agency or fiduciary partner (local possibilities: Golden Harvest Food bank or a newly developed Community Collaborative organization to be the lead agency supporting the project):
• ~A newly formed Community Collaborative (which could be the expansion of G.R.O.W. Aiken) would require adequate funding to cover the organizational expenses (state incorporating and 501(c)(3) application process and any necessary technical consulting services)
• ~These expenses have NOT been calculated into the budget of needed seed capital funding
• Personal Farmer (individual or couple/partnership) business entity
• Consumer Collective (group of family units participating in the initial year of the research project):
• ~Suggested Inclusion Partner: Aiken County Farmers Market (so that the research project would be open to individuals using SNAP and/or Healthy Bucks benefits). The farmers market upon last advisement has the necessary authorizations to accept both SNAP benefits and offers Healthy Bucks to SNAP participants for approved purchases.
• ~This could also be accommodated by the Personal Farmer business entity securing the necessary authorizations to directly accept SNAP and Healthy Bucks benefits/funds. This option has no additional cost. The application/approval process is free and could be a part of the initial 6 month development period.
• ~One of these options does not exclude the other. It can be “either/or” or “both/and”.

Problem to be solved: The development of a solution to the consumer inclusion level of a sustainable local food system. Provide a sustainable business model for small and sub-acreage farmers and urban farmers. Provide access to high quality affordable locally produced food to consumers. Provide a replicable model of how to increase the number of sustainable food farmers at the local community with sufficient income to commit to full time farming. The model is based on a previous MCMF3N2 model (graphic below).

Notes: Local community investment fundraising

LaRahna Hughes, 2019 (larahna@gmail.com)