THE PEOPLE WHO PUT THEIR HAND UP
The call from the next district
By Sam Marwood
Post 18 of 19
A farmer from another district put his hand up by ringing, and the phone went in the dairy while the cups were still on the cows.
The couple took the call between one row and the next, with the machines loud enough that he had to say his name again.
This is an illustration of how it could unfold when it goes right. The district and the people in it aren't any one place or person.
The couple are two farm workers who took the step here, and a farmer who has done well has stood with them from the start.
The man on the phone wanted to know how a district can keep farms in local hands, and he wanted it from people already doing the work.
They farm a community owned farm, the first place this district took on, and locals own the farm together, with a farming family running it.
They told him to come and see the farms, to talk to the people who have stood with this from the start, and then to take the step at home.
Unless you take the step, these opportunities don't arrive, and the couple said it to him the way one farmer says it to another.
Their own step had been a night at the kitchen table, when they decided they were going to try, and then they asked that farmer to stand with them.
The farmer who has done well here has stood with them, and so have Cultivate Farms.
One of the couple wrote the three things on a bit of paper held against the rail, and read them back so the man on the phone had them right.
He said he would come and walk the farms, and he asked which gate to drive to, and they told him the first place and the day.
They put the phone down after that, finished the row they had paused, and the visit was his to make in his own district.
Community Owned Farms is free at cultivatefarms.com/resources.