THREE FARMS

Three Farms

EVI, Inc. has leased land to three farms that demonstrate small scale organic farming and in the case of Groundswell serves as an incubator for new farm businesses.


WEST HAVEN FARM - Produces on 10 acres food to feed 1500 people


KESTREL PERCH - CSA Berry Farm on 5 acres


GROUNDSWELL - Hands on Educational Organization committed to enabling local small scale farming


Groundswell was incubated by Learn @ EcoVillage Ithaca as a program to address and promote local food and farming.  As of October 2014 Groundswell has become a full project of CTA and a partner of Learn and EVI, Inc.; the latter leases Groundswell land for its successful incubator farm. 

All about Groundswell

USDA Grant - Snapshot  --> Completed in 2014 Groundswell has received a follow up set of grants to continue its groundbreaking work in the region.


Goal, Objectives and Needs Addressed:

Goal. The long-term goal of Groundswell’s New Farmer Training Project is to increase the number, diversity, profitability, and environmental sustainability of beginning farmers in our region.  Our focus is creating effective and efficient training pathways that will enable new farmers to develop the knowledge, hands-on experience, business plan, and access to land and mentoring necessary to launch a successful business. Recognizing the diversity of beginning farmers in our community, we will establish three primary training pathways, each addressing the needs and constraints of a distinct Target Audience:

·       An Independent Start-Up pathway for those  recently started in farming on their own, yet needing further training, mentoring, and business planning support in order to succeed;

·       A Farming Internship pathway for those able and willing to spend two years working and learning on established farms, with the possibility of establishing their own farm business at our Farm Business Incubator site.

·       A Market-Garden pathway for urban gardeners (Project will focus on minority and immigrant gardeners) beginning with marketing surplus produce through one or more easy-access local markets, increasing their production-for-sale as they gain skills and confidence, and possibly establishing a larger market garden or other farming enterprise at our Farm Business Incubator site.

Objectives.  In support of our long-term goal, Project objectives are to:

1.     Actively engage 12 prospective market gardeners from local minority communities (African American, Hispanic and immigrant) and support their participation in this Project;

2.     Organize a two-year, structured Farm Internship Program serving 36 trainees in collaboration with the Mentor Farms of the new Finger Lakes CRAFT (Collaborative Regional Alliance for Farmer Training);

3.     Provide Mentor Training and ongoing support to 12 CRAFT Farmer Mentors to increase their effectiveness in training new farmers, including minority and immigrant trainees;

4.     Work with Farmer Mentors and other regional agricultural experts to conduct 8 day-long on-farm workshops (CRAFT Daytime Workshops) and 8 two-hour evening workshops (CRAFT Twilight Workshops) each year for trainees, in order to address their diverse scheduling constraints.

5.     Assist 18 beginning farmers in developing a comprehensive Business Plan and connections to local markets;

6.     Provide 5 start-up farms/market gardens with affordable access to land, production and marketing infrastructure, and ongoing mentoring through a Farm Business Incubator program.

Needs Addressed: This project addresses three critical needs identified by member organizations of the NY Beginning Farmer Coalition (NY BFC, 2008): 1) A consistent, reliable and effective pathway to take new farmers from a state of inexperience all the way through to successful launch of a new business; 2) Continuing access to a network of experienced farming mentors; 3) Access to land for those who do not own land.

..there is a major gap in the lack of programs that provide consistent, high quality, advanced experiential training and mentoring on real working farms.

In the development of new farmers, there is no substitute for the training and education obtained by working on a successful established farm and learning directly from the farmer. In our area we have more than a dozen working farms which take on one or more trainees each year (as paid employees) and provide them a variable amount and quality of on-farm education and training. However, here and across the US we lack organized farm internship-apprenticeship-journeyman training programs with coherent training curricula to systematically address the full range of skills and knowledge needed by beginning farmers. In addition, training through an on-farm internship is not a realistic option for those with day jobs, those who have already started farming on their own, and for minority trainees who may feel isolated and uncomfortable as the only person of color or immigrant in an otherwise all-white farming community. There is a need for training pathways that are appropriate to the trainee’s level of experience and commitment, scheduling constraints, and racial/cultural identity.

Another gap is the lack of a strong social support and peer-learning network for beginning farmers and their mentors in the Central NY area. This applies to the general population of beginning farmers, but in addition there is a lack of targeted, culturally sensitive outreach and support for minority prospective and beginning farmers to help them connect with other farmers in the area and gain access to training, land and other resources. Another gap in our community is the lack of an in-depth, guided business planning course for those preparing to launch their own farm business. Finally, our area lacks a mechanism for helping beginning farmers gain access to land, especially those with extremely limited financial resources