Inland Growers and Consumers Find Mutual Benefits
By Janet Zimmerman, the Press-Enterprise, published August 17, 2005
When Tony Barone digs into his box of fresh produce each week, he's not just boosting his health. He's helping out a farmer.
Barone's membership in Garden of Eden Organics gets him a share of the crops from two participating farms. The bounty is amazing, he said, with whatever is in season, from strawberries and herbs to avocados and zucchini.
The concept of directly connecting local growers and consumers is known as community-supported agriculture, or CSA, and it's catching on in the Inland area. Residents such as Barone get the organic produce they crave, while small growers get the capital they need to stay in business.
The advantages are many, supporters say, including better-tasting food and ecologically sound growing practices. Considering that grocery store produce can be trucked as far as 1,500 miles from the source, there is also reduced oil consumption with community-supported agriculture, they say.
At least three organizations deliver pre-packed boxes of fresh fruits and vegetables to members in Riverside, Murrieta, Temecula and Palm Springs. Members pay about $30 a week, which gets each of them their own box delivered to a central drop-off point.
Most of the growers are in San Diego County and are willing to drop off in new areas with 10 to 15 members.
A fourth group, based in Mentone, delivers citrus in San Bernardino County's East Valley and Riverside.
Many, like Barone, tout the health benefits of eating locally grown and seasonal fruits and vegetables, which they say help the body's systems perform better. He loves that the produce is picked at the peak of ripeness, flavor and vitamin and mineral content.
Barone, a Rancho Mirage artist and self-described foodie, picks up his box on Thursday afternoons at Oasis Natural Foods in Palm Springs.
"It's very exciting because you have no idea what you're getting. People go to the grocery store and they buy the same stuff over and over again. I pick up this basket and it's got things I wouldn't normally eat, then you have to figure out 'What am I going to do with all this stuff?'" Barone said.
"It's like being a farmer yourself. It's like you walked out to the garden and what came up is what you're eating."
Healthy Arrangement
Jennifer Gill launched Garden of Eden six months ago as a partnership with the 10-acre Budwood Farms and 90-acre Rodriguez Farms, both in San Diego County. The arrangement helps organic growers, who use the upfront money to expand their farms and sustain themselves during seasonal lulls.
"In turn, for customers who are committed to that, they get everything at wholesale prices," said Gill, who also sells at farmers markets and to caterers.
Gill charges $128 a month for a box that serves two to three people for a week, with discounts for prepayments. Paying a year in advance takes the price down to about $25 a week.
Renee Hill of Riverside gets her weekly produce from Tierra Miguel Foundation, which delivers to about 300 people in Riverside, Orange, Los Angeles and San Diego counties.
She started three years ago when her trainer told her to consume natural, high-quality foods in her effort to lose weight. Some Internet research turned her on to Tierra Miguel.
Hill then set out recruiting enough friends to garner a delivery spot by the farm's truck. "Their main hesitation was they didn't know how to prepare vegetables and they didn't know what many of them were," she said.
So Hill initiated a weekly e-mail on how to pair the produce with items on sale at the grocery store to make a meal, and held cooking demonstrations to teach members how to use the items.
"With a box arriving every Friday, it makes me eat more vegetables than I normally would," said Hill, who has lost 80 pounds since she joined.
Tammy Gingerella is another of Tierra Miguel's 14 Riverside members.
"It's encouraged me to try new things," said Gingerella, who searched for a recipe to use the kohlrabi she received in one box. A vegetarian and juicer, Gingerella has found herself eating healthier since becoming a member early this year, and said it's cheaper than buying organic produce at the grocery store.
Heady Ideals
Community-supported agriculture also connects her to where her food comes from, Gingerella said.
That's one of the goals of Tierra Miguel, said Charlene Orszag, a board member for the nonprofit, 85-acre farm in Pauma Valley, south of Temecula, that also provides educational programs for schools.
"We ask kids at the schools, 'Where does food come from?' And they say, 'Vons.' Their picture of how it's grown is lost," Orszag said.
Tierra Miguel serves as a demonstration garden where members can volunteer in the fields. It is also a place where students come to learn about sustainable agriculture, a practice that uses compost instead of fertilizer and emphasizes diverse crops to control pests and avoid soil-depleting pesticides, Orszag said.
Idealism is part of the equation with community-supported agriculture. Just ask Bob Knight, who last year started Inland Orange Conservancy as a way to preserve the fast-disappearing citrus groves of the Inland Empire.
With 1,094 members, Knight claims his is the biggest community-supported agriculture group. For $65 in dues, members get two 5-pound bags of oranges every week for the length of the season, about 16 weeks.
"It's like half the price you see in the supermarket right now, so it's a great deal," Knight said. "You're supporting local growers, you're saving your own open space and you're preserving your heritage."
Knight is a fourth-generation orange grower who returned from a life in New York and overseas and was shocked to see houses and malls where groves once stood. He was also surprised to find that none of the local oranges were available at local grocery stores.
"It's really difficult for growers, because these large global chains source globally and they go for the lowest price they can. The competition is extreme and that, in the face of also having your real estate values skyrocketing, makes it problematic for growers. They're asset-rich and cash-flow-poor," Knight said.
Inland Orange Conservancy harvests from 14 groves from Mentone to Riverside. Depending on the season, Valencia or navel oranges and grapefruit are distributed throughout San Bernardino County's East Valley and, starting this week, Riverside.
Proceeds from the conservancy will go toward buying groves so they can't be used for development. The money also helps the growers, many of whom are in their 60s and are trying to maintain their grove lifestyle, Knight said.
"They're making five times what they made the year before selling to packing houses," he said.