Research & reports

Angelina Sanderson Bellamy, Ella Furness, Susanna Mills, Adrian K. Clear, Samantha Mitchell Finnigan, Elliot Meador, Alice E. Milne, Ryan T. Sharp · Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems · United Kingdom

This study analyzed interview data and food diaries from Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) members and the wider UK population, using the 2019 EAT Lancet Commission dietary guidelines. It found that CSA members consumed diets closer to the EAT Lancet recommendations than controls, with significant differences in daily intakes of meat, dairy, vegetables, legumes, and sugar. CSA members' diets emitted on average 28% less CO2 compared to controls.

J. Meyer, Markus Hassler · Sustainability · Germany

A qualitative study applied the "leverage points" concept, which holds that rethinking how knowledge is produced and used within systems is a key lever for transformation toward sustainability, to community-supported agriculture (CSA), an application not previously made. Semi-structured interviews were conducted at 22 CSA farms in Germany to gather detailed insight into the production and flow of knowledge among stakeholders and to analyze the degree to which these CSAs hold potential to leverage transformational change toward sustainability. The data indicate that CSAs bear substantial potential to leverage sustainability transformation with regard to rethinking agriculture, with a highly cooperative, participatory and transparent structure identified as the characteristic that allows the creation and exchange of information to flourish.

Laura van Oers, Giuseppe Feola, Hens Runhaar, Ellen H.M. Moors · Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions · Europe

This study qualitatively documents the conversion to a solidarity payment system at two Dutch community-supported agriculture (CSA) farms, combining conceptualizations of "organizational unlearning" from organization, business, and management theory with "pedagogical unlearning" drawn from postcolonial and feminist approaches to education, to build a fuller understanding of unlearning in sustainability transitions. The solidarity payment system increases CSA access for low-income members and fosters solidarity with farmers to secure fairer income. The results indicate a generative function of unlearning during processes of change, along with the strategic and pedagogical relevance of unlearning in this specific case.

Anni Turunen, Riikka Aro, Suvi Huttunen · Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics · Europe

A qualitative content analysis of semi-structured interviews, observation and visual material from a citizen-led Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) group in Finland examined the role of materiality in constituting food citizenship. It found that materialities such as the field, time and body play a central role in CSA activities, and concluded that food citizenship should be understood not as an individual human trait but as a collective, active form of doing produced through intra-action with material-discursive arrangements.

Caroline Verfuerth, Angelina Sanderson Bellamy, Barbora Adlerová, Amy Dutton · Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems · United Kingdom

Failures of the current food system are described as sitting at the core of multiple overlapping crises, shaping both consumption choices and food production, with low-income households disproportionately affected—their food security and access to healthy, sustainable food impacted as a result. Community-supported agriculture (CSA) is framed as a bottom-up response toward agri-food system transformation, an alternative food system built on locally sold, agroecologically grown food rooted in social values, and, alongside other food citizenship movements and alternative food networks (AFNs), driven by a vision of a democratic, socially and economically just, environmentally sustainable food system. Yet low-income households are underrepresented in the CSA community. This paper reports findings from a co-produced intervention between the research team, four CSA farms in Wales, United Kingdom, and two food aid partners, seeking ways to improve CSA membership accessibility for food-insecure households: 38 households received a weekly vegetable bag for two to four months, and 16 household members were interviewed at the project's start and at the end of the harvest season. Using a food well-being framework, the study found that CSA membership holistically improved food well-being by strengthening producer-consumer relationships, increasing availability of healthy foods, helping people care for their own and their families' well-being, and building place-based food capability and literacy—results the authors use to support calls for prioritizing food well-being interventions to benefit financially excluded, food-insecure households within localized AFNs.

Yunus KÖLEOĞLU, Ali SEYYAR, Mehmet AYSOY · Hak İş Uluslararası Emek ve Toplum Dergisi · Europe

This paper discusses the meaning and role of social solidarity in modern societies, based on Emile Durkheim's theory of social solidarity, focusing on solidarity-based agricultural cooperatives as alternative economic models against capitalist/liberal systems. The paper demonstrates that modern societies can successfully present solidarity-based alternative economic models, aligned with the spirit of social innovation, as a reaction to traditional capitalist production systems amidst eroding solidarity norms. Characteristics of solidarity agricultural cooperatives operating in Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) are introduced, confirming Durkheim's thesis that social solidarity can emerge through collective movements even within a capitalist-liberal system.

Felix Zoll, Caitlin K. Kirby, Kathrin Specht, Rosemarie Siebert · Agriculture and Human Values · Germany

A quantitative study (n=790) among Community-Supported Agriculture (CSA) members in Germany used a multiple regression model to identify factors predicting trust in CSA and its farmers. The analysis found that "reputation," "supply of information," "direct social interaction," and "duration of CSA membership" influenced trust. Conversely, "certification status of the CSA farm" and "attitudes toward organic certification" did not significantly predict trust.

Janina Wittenberg, Maria Gernert, Hamid El Bilali, Carola Strassner · Sustainability · Germany (Münster)

This paper explores the role of grassroots initiatives in the transition towards a sustainable urban food system in Münster, Germany, using questionnaires, interviews, and desk research. Results indicate that many initiatives in Münster focus on education and information, raising awareness, rather than offering material alternatives. Policy, education, networks, and communication were identified as key leverage points.

Anna Kapała · Laws · France

This study aimed to identify legal instruments implemented in France that support short food supply chains and local food systems. The research identified these tools from various domains and levels, including national laws, government policies, and local government initiatives, analyzing them in relation to forms of short supply chains like direct marketing, producer stores, basket systems, urban agriculture, and public catering deliveries. The French instruments were found to be multiple, diverse, mostly innovative, and to consider social, environmental, and solidarity values.

Beatriz Pineda Revilla, Sarah Essbai · · Europe

A chapter examines how community-led initiatives contribute to institutionalizing alternative food practices against a backdrop of urban-rural divide reinforcing growth-oriented food production and consumption. It analyzes two Amsterdam community-led food initiatives—a food co-op and a Community Supported Agriculture farm—in terms of their social, organizational, infrastructural, and institutional capacities, identifying two major organizational and institutional challenges, while arguing that the initiatives are increasing awareness of rural-urban interdependencies and laying groundwork for a shift toward a post-growth food system.

Marco Medici, Maurizio Canavari, Alessandra Castellini · Journal of Cleaner Production · Italy

This study investigated the status and evolution of Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) in Italy, examining its social, environmental, and economic benefits. Using CSA data, participant observation, thematic network analysis, and interviews with CSA representatives, it found that Italian CSA generally meets sustainability goals, though with varying levels of member involvement, economic viability, and environmental impact across communities. The lack of policy support is hindering further CSA diffusion and consolidation.

Felix Zoll, Kathrin Specht, Rosemarie Siebert · Sociologia Ruralis · Germany

To investigate drivers of transformation in alternative food networks (AFNs) in Germany, interviews were conducted with producers and consumers in three AFN models: Community Supported Agriculture (CSA), food co-operatives, and self-harvest gardens, followed by qualitative content analysis. Participants in CSA and food co-ops reported a strong reconnection between producers and consumers, indicating transformative potential, while self-harvest gardeners primarily sought individual capacity building and access to their own garden. AFN participation was suggested to foster incremental transformation towards more sustainable food practices and a respective value system.

Alessandra Piccoli, Adanella Rossi, Angela Genova · Sustainability · Italy

To understand the potential of the Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) model in Italy, two investigations were conducted in 2019 and 2020, analyzing structural and organizational aspects, and resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown. Findings indicate that CSAs represent a radically innovative experience capable of redefining production and consumption practices, demonstrating remarkable resilience due to their common value basis and strong interdependence and solidarity among members.

Hanna Weber, David D. Loschelder, Daniel J. Lang, Arnim Wiek · Journal of Marketing Management · Germany

An intervention study with 136 consumers, recruited at a fair for sustainable products and lifestyles in Germany, compared three experiential marketing interventions—a promotional video, an in-person presentation, and a mindful tasting experience—designed to connect consumers with the producers of Teikei Coffee, an international Community Supported Agriculture coffee partnership. All three interventions, to varying degrees, created connections between consumers and producers and thereby fostered sustainable consumption behaviour.

Cristina Grasseni · · Italy, United States (Massachusetts)

This chapter compares and contrasts context-specific notions and practices of 'solidarity' within collaborative networks organizing alternative food procurement in Lombardy, Italy, and Massachusetts, USA, based on unpublished ethnography from 2011-2014. It juxtaposes Italian Solidarity Purchase Groups with the US solidarity economy network in the context of the Boston local food movement and Massachusetts community-supported agriculture. The chapter demonstrates how the meaning of solidarity in collective food procurement is context-bound.

Tezcan Mert-Cakal, Mara Miele · Agriculture and Human Values · United Kingdom (Wales)

This article examines Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) projects in Wales as social innovation, exploring their emergence, innovative role, and transformative potential. Based on qualitative data from four different CSA case studies in Wales, the research showed that Welsh CSA cases play distinctive roles in the social economy, satisfying needs for ecologically sound and ethically produced food and empowering individuals at a micro level. However, the paper argues that for CSA initiatives to become 'workable utopias', they need to overcome barriers preventing replication, participation in macro-level policies, and scaling up, particularly concerning economic sustainability and resilience on a small scale.

Irene Antoni-Komar, Christine Lenz · · Germany

This chapter discusses community building in sustainable food initiatives in Germany. Empirical data was collected through semi-structured interviews, participant observation, and action research with 27 practitioners from local food enterprises and initiatives, while quantitative data was gathered from surveys of members and customers. Findings indicate how participation in transformative enterprises is based on new forms of creative doing and collaboration, along with associated barriers and opportunities.

Marie Diekmann · Bundesanstalt für Landwirtschaft und Ernährung · Germany

Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) is an innovative form of direct cooperation where farmers and consumers share costs, products, responsibilities, and risks. A research project conducted in Germany from 2015 to 2018 aimed to contribute to the limited knowledge on CSA as an alternative niche strategy for agricultural businesses. This paper presents the central results of that project.

Silvio Cristiano, Marco Auriemma, P Cacciari, Manola Cervesato, Domenico Maffeo, Paola Malgaretto, Francesco Nordio · · Italy

This case study describes an ongoing community-supported agriculture (CSA) project in the urban-rural sprawl between Venice and Treviso, Italy. Farmers and consumers co-design and co-manage food provisioning and crop planning, sharing risks, avoiding food waste, and addressing financial barriers. The project aims to meet community food requirements while addressing economic, environmental, and social aspects, presenting feasible paths for sustainable transition.

Poppy Nicol, Alice Taherzadeh · Sustainability · United Kingdom (Wales)

This article explores the potential of cooperative working methods to scale out sustainable and just food systems in Wales. Based on interviews with stakeholders in Wales and international case studies, it identifies opportunities and challenges. Findings suggest that cooperative and community-based approaches, including CSA and food hubs, have the potential for sustainable food production and distribution, emphasizing the importance of capacity building and community participation.

Jan Hassink, Angela Moriggi, Saverio Senni, Elisabeth Hense, Dries de Moor · · Europe

A 2020 paper uses care ethics as an analytical tool to examine caring, regenerative agricultural and food practices, including community supported agriculture, urban agriculture, care and social farming, and organic and biodynamic farming. Drawing on empirical cases in the Netherlands and Italy guided by social justice, cooperation, respectful relationships, inclusion, and education, it describes how care for the community, vulnerable citizens, the environment, farm animals, and food is practiced. It identifies challenges farmers face around access to land, budgets, and dealing with the conventional system, and poses as an open question the extent to which such caring practices can influence dominant agricultural and food systems.

Anna Pigott · Environment and Planning E Nature and Space · United Kingdom

Drawing on extended fieldwork with a Community Supported Agriculture project in south Wales, this article re-imagines soils as lively, complex, more-than-human ecologies by examining the largely sidestepped subject of spirituality in agriculture. It explores how care is cultivated through biodynamic farming, a non-conventional method incorporating astrological and spiritual principles, arguing that biodynamic narratives and rituals encourage attentiveness to more-than-human agency and energy, to depth both underground and in above-ground influences of air and celestial bodies, and to reciprocity between soil biota and humans — while also resisting drives to measure and map and leaving room for mystery. It also notes that despite biodynamic farming's growing popularity, its spiritual elements tend to be kept quiet, overshadowed by more familiar secular narratives.

Mirosław Struś, Magdalena Kalisiak-Mędelska, Michał Nadolny, Marian Kachniarz, Magdalena Raftowicz-Filipkiewicz · Sustainability · Poland

A survey of 400 agricultural holdings across nine municipalities of the Wrocław district in Poland examined the potential for Community-Supported Agriculture (CSA) to develop in the district, given its proximity to the Wrocław market in Lower Silesia. The research found that the CSA model opens opportunities for long-lasting cooperation between farmers and consumers, but that implementing it requires raising the prices farmers charge for their produce by about 50%, along with solutions to problems related to the cost of transporting agricultural products.

Fatih Özden · Turkish Journal of Bioethics · Turkey

This paper discusses the community supported agriculture (CSA) model in Turkey from the perspective of food ethics. It identifies the adverse effects of synthetic agrochemicals on human and ecosystem health, corporate dominance of the food supply chain, and intellectual property rights as issues on the food ethics agenda.

Kévin Bernard, Aurélie Bonein, Douadia Bougherara · RePEc: Research Papers in Economics · France

A study eliciting inequality aversion and risk preferences among 162 French community-supported agriculture (CSA) consumers through incentivized field experiments. Consumers were found to be concerned about payoff inequalities, showing advantageous inequality aversion toward CSA farmers but also disadvantageous inequality seeking. Consumers were risk averse and loss averse and distorted probabilities. The study observes that inequality aversion and risk preferences in the loss domain may complement each other in ways that strengthen consumer support for CSA farmers.