UC Davis

Community supported agriculture (CSA) is a values-based, direct-marketing farming model in which community members share in the risk, cost, and benefits of crop production in exchange for a regular share of the harvest. In the past decade, grocers and food delivery services emphasizing the sourcing of local food products have created a more competitive environment for California-based CSA farms. However, food supply chain disruptions and shelter-in-place mandates resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic led to unprecedented surges in CSA enrollment in 2020, leading many farmers to adopt the CSA model or absorb more members into their existing CSAs. In this thesis, I explore how farmers have used and adapted the CSA model amidst changing market conditions throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, and how CSA farms are faring as the pandemic wanes. The research consists of data collected through 13 semi-structured interviews and a survey with 29 respondents capturing the perspectives and experiences of CSA farm owners and managers in 15 Northern California counties. Findings reveal innovative solutions undertaken by CSA farms to accommodate increased demand for CSA, a focus on increasing access for low-income populations, and a peak in CSA enrollment in August, 2020, followed by a general decline into August 2022. Farmers generally noted increased stress and anxiety tied to decision-making about how best to keep their employees healthy early in the pandemic; emotional exhaustion from absorbing the stress of customers, the effects of which had begun to subside when the research was conducted in 2023; and burnout from the compounding of challenging circumstances alongside the pandemic – wildfires, drought, inflation and the economic downturn, and the racial reckoning and social injustices – which remained as an issue for some study participants. CSA has been described as a form of a community economy because of its emphasis on care of the environment, social well-being, and ethical reciprocity. However, the pressure felt by CSA farmers to provide for their communities and resulting feelings of mental exhaustion and burnout suggest that there may be a misalignment with the community economy and CSA in its current form.