There are certain unmistakable signs that summer is finally coming to the Valley: the exquisite local asparagus. That certain, shall we say, organic odor in Hadley. And, in recent years, the publication of the annual Locally Grown Farm Products Guide.
If your 2011 guide feels a little heftier than those of years past, well, you’re not mistaken: this year’s guide—which includes lists of local farms, farmers’ markets, restaurants that feature local food on their menus, and other purveyors of Valley-grown products—weighs in at 74 pages, up from the 44-page guide published in 2008.
That’s just one way that Phil Korman—executive director of South Deerfield’s Community Involved in Sustaining Agriculture, or CISA, which publishes the guide—quantifies how local agriculture has taken off over the past few years. During the same time period, he notes, the number of farmers’ markets in Franklin, Hampshire and Hampden counties has grown from 25 to 38 (not counting four winter markets); the number of CSA farms, which sell shares to members, has risen from 22 to 36; and the number of farms that participate in CISA’s Local Hero program has grown from 167 to 200.
“We’ve had this continuing tremendous growth of farmers’ markets,” says Korman, who expects the trend to continue. “Our job at CISA is to make sure that those markets are well attended.” Farmers, he says, are working hard to respond to consumer demand for more market locations and days, and more diversity in the products offered. Similarly, farms that sell member shares are diversifying their offerings, adding things like meat, eggs and bread to the expected produce. “There’s so many places people can go,” Korman says. “But if we don’t show up and shop there, it won’t continue for a long time. Because farmers can’t stand there and not sell.”
In addition to the extensive listings, this year’s Locally Grown guide includes an article on ways to get started on what CISA calls a “local food journey”—or to travel even farther along that path, if you’ve already started your personal locavore journey. The suggestions range from the most obvious and immediate—buying local products wherever you can, growing some of your own food—to more political efforts, such as calling on elected representatives to “create public policies that build a more secure, decentralized food system providing healthy food for all.”
CISA is distributing 55,000 copies of the 2011 farm products guide, including copies tucked into recent editions of the Daily Hampshire Gazette, Amherst Bulletin, Greenfield Recorder (all published by Newspapers of New England, which also published this newspaper), and Springfield Republican and others available at local stores. You can also find an on-line version at www.buylocalfood.org, where you can search for markets, farms or retailers; check out the “What’s Local Now” link for information on what’s freshest from the fields right now.
