GROWING FOR PROFIT & SUSTAINABILITY
from Old World Gardens
Paul & Barb tradingpost@lobo.net
To be sustainable, growing must first sustain the grower. Market growing must be profitable and practical, or few will be growing - sustainably or otherwise.
Growers profit most with a combination of best practices, by producing more and using garden space more efficiently, and doing it with less work and lower cost without machinery. These methods make it more practical on a commercial scale. Beyond organic soil building, this includes permanent mulched beds, intensive planting all season, and season extension techniques. Some of these are time-honored techniques developed in the gardens of Old World countries and brought to the U.S. long before the modern organic movement.
The best yields and lowest costs are gained with:
1. permanent beds that use space much more efficiently than wide-spaced tractor rows, remain uncompacted by footsteps or machinery, and concentrate amendments, mulch, water, and labor in growing beds instead of walkways
2. deep, humus-rich soil that doesn't need annual tilling, absorbs rainfall, retains moisture, drains excess, and cuts irrigation costs
3. intensive succession planting that keeps something growing in all beds all season, reduces losses to pests and shades soil to reduce weeding and conserve moisture
4. no-till (or minimum tillage) that reduces need for weeding, protects soil biology, earthworms and structure, and eliminates the cost and labor for tilling equipment and moving drip lines
5. permanent mulch that continually fertilizes by sheet composting, reduces weeding and conserves moisture
6. drip under mulch or other irrigation that reduces evaporation
7. season extension techniques that further increase production without raising annual expenses, such as transplants, row covers, hoop houses
POINTS TO REMEMBER
We can transition from rows to permanent beds gradually by starting with a bed or two. Beds don't have to be raised or framed with most soil conditions.
The highest production gains with beds are with the smaller plants that typically go in six inches apart each direction, such as beets, turnips, spinach, onions, garlic. Carrots are even closer and more efficient in intensive beds. Beds can hold twice the plants of tractor rows in the garden space. Double the production, double the profit. However, larger vining plants in beds also benefit from not walking on the beds, from the ease of permanent mulch and drip, and the other cost and labor savings over row planting. Overall production can be far more than single row growing.
The cost of initial setup of soil, beds, and drip actually creates a fixed asset that grows in value and pays for itself each following year in much reduced costs and labor. This is still *very low* startup capital compared to conventional production, and far more realistic for startup growers. The cost of tillers (don't need it), land (less land), and labor (you have to pay your own time) can be cut drastically to turn a profit the first season.
While this system offers market growers a better living to stay on the land and produce healthy food, it's also ecologically sustainable. We stress that this system reduces water use and fossil fuel use beyond simple organic growing, and builds topsoil instead of depleting it.
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