CT NOFA’s Farm Share Program reduces the cost of a local CSA (community supported agriculture) share for individuals in need of financial assistance, while ensuring farmers are fully paid. A CSA is a subscription (usually weekly) from a farm for a regular supply of farm-fresh veggies, dairy products, meats, bread, and more.

CT’s changed landscape (from meadow to lawn, from farmland to subdivision) poses a threat to the food production that remains in farms and gardens. Crops rely on a robust population of pollinators to bring them into existence. The pollinators rely on native plants. With 19% of CT’s native plants listed as endangered and the remaining populations in declining numbers, we are facing a precipitous decline in our pollinator populations.

We must restore the native habitat to safeguard our food system. Our initiative exists at the intersection of farms, gardens, land trusts, and public lands: we aim to increase the number of native plants growing in our region. To do this, we are growing seed crops of Connecticut’s native pollinator plants, wild-collected from our open-spaces, and bringing them to our nursery growers and homeowners so that we can produce the plants to restore native pollinator habitat.