Our Principles & Practices

Grow healthy, bioregional crops—for the people, by the people

Sustenance for the body and spirit comes from the land. Our regenerative growing practices are informed by the call and response arising from conversation with the land, water, plants, and animals.

  • Grow crop varieties well-adapted to the ecology and climate of the Peaks Region
  • Respectfully and intentionally gather bioregional plants and mushrooms
  • Sell produce at local Flagstaff-area farmers markets and make crops we grow accessible to people across the income spectrum
  • Participate actively in growing the alternative land-based regional economy

 

Tend respectful, non-exploitative relationships with land, water, & human communities

We believe our relationships with each other are deeply connected to
our relationships with the land and with ourselves. Conversing with
human and other-than-human life cultivates kinships that inform our
co-creative, interdependent existence in the world.

  • Work against oppressive ideologies of domination and extraction in our relations with land and people
  • Create diverse local climates to support refugia for other species
  • Regenerate soil health by enriching soil organic matter and sustaining our earthly microbial kin
  • Reduce and eliminate non-reusable materials in packaging

 

Support Indigenous food sovereignty and land stewardship

Settler colonialism—a land-based project which seeks to eliminate Indigenous peoples and replace them with settler society—is not a past event but an ongoing process on the Colorado Plateau, entwined with dominant economic, social, and political systems that continue to devastate land and people. We believe that those of us non-Indigenous settlers have particular obligations to practice anti-colonial relationships with the land and Indigenous peoples who have long inhabited this region. Our work is not to re-settle the land; it is to un-settle oppressive structures within and beyond ourselves, while practicing thriving otherwise.

  • Indigenous Land Tax: A portion of sales made by settler growers is redistributed to grassroots Indigenous-led organizations protecting food sovereignty, land, and water in the region.
  • Build anti-colonial partnerships with Indigenous growers to support food-based initiatives and a justice-oriented regional economy

 

Increase land access for the landless

Lack of land access among poor, people of color, Indigenous, and young people is a historical symptom of the structures of domination. Land access issues prevail among peasant farmers across the world. Not having access to land or knowledge of gardening, farming, and gathering can make land-based work seem non-viable as lifework. Working together strategically for land access is necessary to build a just and resilient local food community.

  • Increase biodiversity and ecosystem health by encouraging and assisting people in planting wildlife, pollinator, and food gardens on land they have access to
  • Provide shared market booth space to support non-wealthy land tenders through Flagstaff Foodlink’s Flagstaff Grown Booth

 

Redistribute surplus equitably—in solidarity not charity

While dominant economic systems promote self-oriented accumulation, we believe that equitable redistribution is fundamental for a healthy and vibrant community that supports all of its members. In redistributing surplus food, seeds, knowledge, and otherwise, we engage in solidarity, not charity—struggling together in the practice of mutual aid.

  • Regularly donate surplus produce to local food access and redistribution initiatives
  • Cultivate and manage a communal, living seed library

 

Respond to the present crises (ecological, economic, and social) and build regional resiliency

Mutual aid and reciprocity are crucial components of community resiliency in times of crisis. Crises, like illnesses, can be chronic (long-term) and acute (short-term), and sometimes can be both. In cultivating grassroots resiliency, we work collaboratively to build regional food sovereignty.

  • Develop ecological solutions for our high mountain desert climate
    • Practice, adapt, and demonstrate rainwater harvesting and regenerative cultivation techniques appropriate for our locale
    • Conduct scientific research on soil health, biodiversity, plant productivity, and water catchment, in response to changing climate and ecologies
  • Actively respond in solidarity-based mutual aid to acute regional disasters, such as wildfires, floods, economic downturns, severe drought, and otherwise
  • Identify intervention points in the local food system to provide different, more sustainable avenues for just food acquisition, and assist in their execution