As we look back over 2014, we have so much to be proud of. It’s almost five years since a small group of volunteers started growing food on a patch of unused land. Slowly but surely we have grown our farm into a buzzing community enterprise.
The farm would not exist without you, our customers, volunteers and supporters. So this Christmas, we would like to say a huge thank you for supporting us. We hope that you have enjoyed eating your vegetables as much as we’ve enjoyed growing them.
Our vegetables are so much more than simple food items. Each one has been carefully nurtured by people in our community. For example, it might be a school pupil who sowed their first seed, a young adult coming to learn new skills that prepared the bed, and a retired person who nurtured and harvested the plant.
We’ve had an incredible and diverse group of volunteers over the year. Young and old, volunteers are coming to the farm for all sorts of reasons and it’s such a privilege to work together. Every volunteer has a fascinating story and we are grateful for all their contributions.
People often ask us what we do during these cold winter days. Well, we are still working hard outside, growing, harvesting and managing plants. We also do heaps of preparation work for the next growing season. This includes reviewing our last season, predicting demand and then planning exactly what we will grow next year – down to every last seed. We grow over 150 varieties of plants and planning each bed creates a beautiful set of spreadsheets! We design our growing rotations around our VegBags, planning for the varieties that people expect or request in the bags.
2015 is going to be a big year for us. We have some really exciting projects in the pipeline, kicking off with the launch of FarmStart in January. This is a food growing business incubator that supports new entrants into farming by helping them test out their food growing enterprise ideas at a minimal risk. This is important. The average age of the UK farm holder is now 58, and only 3% of farmers are under 35 years of age. If we want to see more local, sustainably grown food, then there’s a desperate need to invest in young farmers for our future.
As our farm matures, we are getting better at what we do and becoming more self-sufficient financially. However we do have great challenges ahead and we do need more customers. So we encourage you to invite others to try our VegBags and enjoy the pleasures of eating seasonal produce and become a member of our wonderful farm community.
I love these short winter days. Not only is it a great time for reflection and planning ahead, it’s a perfect time to invite friends over for warm winter stews and hearty soups.
We hope that you have a wonderful Christmas time and look forward to seeing you in 2015,
Sam and the farm team