The Farmer In the Valley

The Fraser Valley, as a whole, is the best agricultural land in Western Canada. This is precisely the reason that so many people settled in the area a hundred or so years ago. Today, this land is highly desirable for a number of uses other than agriculture—industrial parks, large warehouse retailers, housing subdivisions, and gated communities are all part of the picturesque, rural landscape in the Fraser Valley. These physical pressures coupled with long term economic and political trends—sagging prices, competition from California and Mexico, and a prolonged decline in the skilled labour pool—have created deep changes in the way farming is practiced here, and in many other regions throughout the world.

Alyson Chisholm is one farmer who knows this landscape very well. Amongst other things, Alyson is a former board member of FarmFolk/CityFolk. She is currently an active member of Glen Valley Organic Farm Coop and is involved with certification with BCARA, the BC Association for Regenerative Agriculture. She participated in FarmFolk/CityFolk’s Organic Internship Project during the Summer of 2001.

Is this degree of committee and Board work necessary to be a farmer? Alyson seems to think so. “I guess I thought I’d want to do only farming, but then, when you get into it, you cannot be an organic farmer and not be an activist. The two are just intertwined, whether it’s dealing with marketing boards over eggs or edu- cating the public on issues like GMO’s [Genetically Modified Organisms] and organic versus conventional farming. You’re always involved in issues at some level or another.”

A stall at the Public Farmer’s Market is where Alyson does much of her activism. Every Saturday morning, customers stop by, not only to pick up produce, but with questions—questions about their tomato plants, things they’ve heard on the news, and does she have any recipe suggestions. Discussions start up about food they remember from childhood, something they tasted in a restaurant, the latest food scare on the news. “There was a problem with spinach a couple of weeks back where people were getting sick. A lot of people were asking about how that happened.” This Public Forum nature of the market is an essential part of Alyson’s method. Glen Valley Organic Farm Coop is a sizable experiment in getting the gen- eral public involved with agriculture.

“Living in the city it’s very easy to become disconnected because you don’t really come in contact with dirty, messy farming. Food is packaged and you can get tomatoes whenever you want them and your coffees always there, I do think, though, that more people are becoming concerned and wanting to regain that contact. Glen Valley Farm has sixty-five shareholders, each of whom put $5000 of their own money into a farm only to ensure that it remains [a farm]. They’re not getting dividends or free produce. They’re just supporting their local food system the best way they can. That’s sixty-five people who’ve made the choice to put their money into a farm instead of cars and VCR’s and I think that’s very heartening.”

In order to survive and prosper, Alyson thinks that small farmers must support each other. Several of the organic farmers in the Fraser Valley share equipment and resources. There is also a healthy exchange of ideas and knowledge. Per- haps most surprisingly, farmers share each others market information and mar- keting ideas. If somebody needs help it is in the community’s best interest to offer support. “For example, my egg markets just went kablooey. One of my biggest buyers just decided to shut the business down for three weeks. So that’s almost 200 dozen eggs that I all of a sudden, in four days, have no home for. So I go to another organic farmer who handles large numbers of eggs and say, “Can you take on these extra eggs for three weeks?” Well, he doesn’t say yes because he’s going to make a mint out of it. He says yes because he wants to support another organic egg farmer.”

These three activities—public education, community involvement and cooperation with other farmers—are the recipe for success for the small farmer. For the individual farmer, this has the benefit of bringing her closer to the markets. For the farming community it creates an informed and open environment for trends and issues to be examined. Not that this doesn’t create conflicts.

Many organic farmers constantly struggle with the evolving ideal and hard practical reality. Alyson observes this in her own farming. “There’s things you want to do but there’s also things you have to do. You’ve got to get a return on what you put into the farm and make a living from it.” Currently, organic standards are minimum standards and they are continually evolving on both a local and national level. Both hard science and the farmer’s field experience shape the standards. “The certification system is constantly working with farmers, updating the standards just to be practical, so that people are able to farm and don’t find the standards so onerous they can’t do it. [If that happens] then you just get a bunch of hobby farmers that have a couple of sheep that are organic. What you really need is people who can make a living at it.”

Despite all the difficulties, there are good reasons to be optimistic. “I was excited to read a supportive article on organics in the Globe and Mail. [In] an article on Attention Deficit Disorder in children, one researcher noted that it seems to have something to do with diet. They said that because vegetables now are produced with chemical fertilizers they don’t have the nutrient content they used to have.” Alyson hopes that people will also get the message that it isn’t just the health of the individual that is important. “It seems like more people are buying organic, many for health reasons. I’d like it to be more than that. I would like people to think about how this impacts the environment. It’s easy to buy organic produce from California without considering the impact on our own local economy and our food security. The issues are bigger than just organic.”

Alyson finds a lot to be excited about and farming offers many challenges. What she is very passionate about is the con- nection farming gives her to the food we eat. “In so many ways food is the centre [of our culture]. And it’s just such a pleasure to engage in. It’s something we all have in common. It’s a great level to connect on. A relationship based around food is a very deep and strong one.” And, if there is one thing you can say about Alyson, her passion is infectious.

Michael Marrapese,
November 2001