Growing Local Food Networks

The Good Acre x Sharing Our Roots
LEAFF Program Supports Emerging Farmers

Ricardo, Commons Cohort farmer, Tierra de Esperanza Farm

Beginning and emerging farmers — especially those who don’t inherit a family farm – face an evergreen challenge: finding a market for their harvest. Local and metro area farmers markets are a popular choice but have an upfront setup cost, weekly time commitments, and no guarantee of selling all crops during a bumper week. Wholesale, the typical route of larger farmers, may be far more attractive, with contracted rates and guaranteed sales. However, those contracts are generally only available to growers with a proven track record for harvesting large yields of a particular, standard crop; there is no flexibility for unforeseen crop loss or damage. Thus, wholesale contracts can be initially out of reach.

Photo courtesy of The Good Acre

Our emerging farmers need a middle ground, a wholesale ‘practice round’ with more flexibility to build their experience, much like a recent grad in search of their first ‘real’ job after college. The Good Acre (TGA), a Falcon Heights-based nonprofit food hub, runs such an innovative program – and shares Sharing Our Roots’ values for supporting emerging underrepresented farmers and boosting food security in our communities. TGA has nearly a decade of experience building a sustainable food system by connecting local farmers with market access opportunities – “Food from Here for Here” – and their operations have grown rapidly.

Now, with funding from the State of Minnesota and Washington-Ramsey County Recycling & Energy, the Local Emergency Assistance Farmer Fund (LEAFF) is in its fifth season. The LEAFF program is not a grant, but rather a guaranteed market for which participating farmers receive small, wholesale-style contracts, in addition to training and technical support for wholesale readiness. Farmers are paid based on the quantity of produce they deliver, which must pass standard quality checks. Should produce fail to meet spec, farmers are given training and second chances rather than being dismissed, as a standard wholesaler might jump to.

The details of the LEAFF program are as impressive in practice as they are in theory. Starting this year, the program is operating on a hub-and-spoke model (think Delta or Sun County Airlines, for which MSP serves as a hub). In the LEAFF program’s case, TGA’s Falcon Heights facility serves as the center of operations, while multiple area "spoke" sites, including Sharing Our Roots, support and organize farmers, checking and collecting goods for pooled transport and offering technical assistance out in the field. This new model has already proven itself as a well-functioning logistics system to move produce quickly and efficiently, all while supporting local farmers effectively and getting fresh, healthy, and culturally-relevant crops into the hunger relief pipeline.

Receiving produce at the hub (photo courtesy of The Good Acre)

As one of three “spoke” sites along with Big River Farms and Kilimo Minnesota, the Sharing Our Roots farm serves to streamline operations in ways beneficial to TGA and our own cohort farmers. Produce from all our farmers is sent on a weekly van ride to the TGA hub in Falcon Heights, keeping individual farmers’ cars off the road and reducing loading dock dwell time on the other end – saving on time, money, and vehicle emissions. It arrives to them pre-sorted and pre-packaged, too, thanks to the infrastructure available right here on the SOR farm, like the pack shed and food safe storage supplies (available for farmers at bulk negotiated prices).

Food safe storage supplies store for farmers (at Sharing Our Roots farm)

For the 2024 growing season, five SOR cohort farmers have contracts with LEAFF, one of whom also participated last year. The flexibility and security provided by the program will be immensely helpful after recent flooding destroyed many tens of thousands of dollars of crops: farmers are not contracted to produce any particular crop and can work to deliver any produce on their extensive list of acceptable crops, many of which are culturally relevant. The contracts are for up to $5000 in produce, capped at $500 weekly.

Our Commons Cohort Program Manager, Lucia Possehl, calls the hub-and-spoke model LEAFF program “transformative,” and notes that it is an example of a consistently well-functioning system that benefits small farmers in a clear and replicable way. The stability provided amidst this unstable year is unmatched. Wins and losses are shared. This season, amidst the damage wrought by flooding, some twenty boxes of cilantro, kale, radishes, and zucchini have already made it out from SOR farmers.

Produce is routed directly to food shelves in the Twin Cities metro area and beyond through The Good Acre’s partnership with The Food Group. And it just makes sense – why should we be importing produce, just days away from spoiling, from California by long-distance truck when we’re surrounded by farmland and capable farmers here? 

Photo courtesy of The Good Acre

From massive investments made during the pandemic to support local economies in a time of crisis, we’ve learned how to do things – like creating a new kind of food system – better than the status quo. Continuing to strengthen hyperlocal food systems will benefit everyone, with high-quality nutritious produce for kids and families facing food insecurity and economic supports for farmers new to wholesale. As funding from the pandemic dries up, the LEAFF program is in need of renewed financial backing – which did not pass during the previous MN state legislative session. Currently, TGA is only able to accept 2/3 of applications it receives from farmers (which amounted to some $375,000 paid to farmers in 2023 for approximately 200,000 pounds of produce, all bound for hunger relief programs).

It takes an eternal optimist to plant a seed and hope for the best. The LEAFF program exists to give farmers hope—hope for a food system that equitably ensures the integrity of our food supply, the health of our environment, and invests in the strength and resilience of our agricultural economy. 

To support this mutually beneficial food system in the 2025 growing season and beyond, The Good Acre suggests calling your MN state representative and asking them to support state funding for LEAFF. You can also donate directly to The Good Acre, as the central hub of the program.