Challenges and potential solutions in developing community supported agriculture: a literature review

ABSTRACT

Community supported agriculture (CSA) is regarded as a model that can show directions for more sustainable food systems. Therefore, the progressing knowledge regarding challenges and ways to cope with these is crucial to sustaining this model. A literature study was conducted from October 2021 to June 2022 to explore these challenges. We found the challenges experienced by farmers are (1) the expense of conversion to and maintenance of more sustainable farming practices, (2) the danger of farmers taking on more than they can handle, (3) complexities in farm management, and (4) labor shortage and limited skills. The challenges for CSA members include (1) time for the working share contribution, (2) the expense of joining a CSA, and (3) changing their food consumption habits according to the CSA harvest. The organizational challenges for a CSA are (1) members recruitment and retention, (2) competition among CSAs and other marketing channels, (3) gender and generational problems, (4) the influence of government intervention, and (5) CSA sustainability. The four potential solutions are (1) Strengthening membership support of CSAs, (2) Improvement of CSA management, (3) Increasing external resources available to CSAs, and (4) Changing laws to support the development and spread of CSAs.

KEYWORDS:

• Community supported agriculture
• sustainable food system
• local food system
• sustainable farming
• sustainable agriculture

Acknowledgment

We would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers for their valuable feedback to improve the earlier version of this article and the editorial team for their patient guidance. We also thank Peter Rosset, Gwendolyn Hallsmith, and Steven McFadden for their comments and recommendations. Any mistakes will, of course, be our own.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.