Jonathan Mines of Crooked Vege, a small-scale social enterprise which is trialling "pay-as-you-can" vege boxes Photo: RNZ/Sally Round
The founders of a new vege box venture in Ōtaki will be telling people to just pay what they can for a weekly supply of leafy greens.
Crooked Vege will trial providing affordable, healthy food to about 25 families, in the hope those that can afford to pay more will do so.
One of the farm's founders, Jonathan Mines, said everyone deserved access to healthy, fresh food which was grown in a way that did not destroy the environment.
He admitted the pay-as-you-can idea was radical for New Zealand but he had seen it work in parts of Europe and the US, especially during the pandemic.
"There's a really large income gap across Ōtaki and so we're asking people, if you're able, maybe you could pay a bit more and support one of your neighbours or one of the other people who's involved in getting veges from this farm, as a means of spreading mutual aid."
Tae Luke-Hurley Photo: Supplied
Crooked Vege, a partnership between Mines and his friend Tae Luke-Hurley, aims to feed about 100 families from a half-hectare plot of land on the outskirts of the town.
They will have a suggested price for the boxes and their dream is to allow all subscribers eventually to pay what they can afford.
To offset costs during the trial, they will sell some of the crop wholesale and grow niche products for restaurants
For the past five months, the pair have been preparing the soil using minimal intervention, trialling cover crops and inter-planting different vegetables for maximum return.
"Capital is a big challenge for us but we're trying to do this socially radical thing," Mines said.
"We couldn't afford to buy land and we suspected around New Zealand, there's enough people with far more land than they need, sitting unproductively and it could be used in better ways."
Fortunately, the owners of an organic pear orchard and heritage rose nursery, stepped up.
A cover crop and tarp prepare the ground for spring planting at the Crooked Vege farm near Ōtaki Photo: RNZ/Sally Round
The search for land included using online sites like villageagrarians.org, which has a directory linking growers and landowners.
The lack of capital and the desire to grow crops using regenerative methods and minimal intervention meant they could grow things in a more intricate way, Mines said.
He showed Country Life a trial patch of chard and kale, interplanted with faster-growing rocket, pak choy and spring onions - a way of keeping the cash flowing from the small patch of land.
Crooked Vege is trialling planting systems to ensure cash flow, supply and healthy soil Photo: RNZ/Sally Round
Crooked Vege is a registered charity and Mines and Luke-Hurley plan to apply for grants to pay for more infrastructure, as well as workshops on the farm in future.
At the moment, they are farming by the smell of an oily rag and living on-site with minimum home comforts and hard work staring them in the face.
"I get into dumpsters and pull things out and build things out of scraps," Mines said.
Crooked Vege has also launched a crowd-funding campaign.
Ultimately, and by being close to the capital, Mines was hoping to influence change in the food systems of Aotearoa.
"Probably we need a whole social restructure to make proper food affordable for everyone, but I don't know how to do that so this is what we're trying to do."
