Comments on: Lessons From the Food Crisis: Patchwork Will Not Mend Our Vulnerable System http://jamie.com/2008/06/20/lessons-from-the-food-crisis-patchwork-will-not-mend-our-vulnerable-system/ your meaning here Fri, 05 Dec 2008 15:56:46 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.3.3 By: Roxanne Christensen http://jamie.com/2008/06/20/lessons-from-the-food-crisis-patchwork-will-not-mend-our-vulnerable-system/#comment-769 Roxanne Christensen Fri, 20 Jun 2008 14:16:17 +0000 http://jamie.com/2008/06/20/lessons-from-the-food-crisis-patchwork-will-not-mend-our-vulnerable-system/#comment-769 One solution to the global food crisis is to re-localize a significant portion of food production. What is needed to do that quickly and on a large scale is a franchise-ready sustainable farming system, and that is the concept behind SPIN (S-mall P-lot IN-tensive ) Farming. SPIN farmers utilize relay cropping to increase yield and achieve good economic returns by growing only the most profitable food crops tailored to local markets. SPIN's farming techniques are not, in themselves, breakthrough. What is novel is the way a SPIN farm business is run. Contained in the seven SPIN Guides, which can be purchased online and downloaded for immediate access, is everything you'd expect from a good franchise: a business plan, marketing advice, and a detailed day-to-day workflow. In standardizing the system and creating a reproducible process it really isn't any different from McDonalds. SPIN-style farming removes the two big barriers to entry – sizeable acreage and significant start-up capital. By offering a non-technical, easy-to-understand and inexpensive-to-implement farming system, it allows many more people to farm. Every day more and more entrepreneurs throughout the U.S, Canada and Australia are using the SPIN system as an entry point into the farming profession. They are using front lawns and backyards and neighborhood lots as their land base. Perhaps most importantly, this is happening without significant policy changes or government supports. This is entrepreneurially-driven. This is not subsistence farming. This is recasting farming as a small business in cities and towns and integrating it into the built environment in an economically viable manner. It is "right sizing" agriculture for an urbanized century and helping to make local food production a viable business proposition once again. One solution to the global food crisis is to re-localize a significant portion of food production. What is needed to do that quickly and on a large scale is a franchise-ready sustainable farming system, and that is the concept behind SPIN (S-mall P-lot IN-tensive ) Farming. SPIN farmers utilize relay cropping to increase yield and achieve good economic returns by growing only the most profitable food crops tailored to local markets. SPIN’s farming techniques are not, in themselves, breakthrough. What is novel is the way a SPIN farm business is run. Contained in the seven SPIN Guides, which can be purchased online and downloaded for immediate access, is everything you’d expect from a good franchise: a business plan, marketing advice, and a detailed day-to-day workflow. In standardizing the system and creating a reproducible process it really isn’t any different from McDonalds.

SPIN-style farming removes the two big barriers to entry – sizeable acreage and significant start-up capital. By offering a non-technical, easy-to-understand and inexpensive-to-implement farming system, it allows many more people to farm.

Every day more and more entrepreneurs throughout the U.S, Canada and Australia are using the SPIN system as an entry point into the farming profession. They are using front lawns and backyards and neighborhood lots as their land base. Perhaps most importantly, this is happening without significant policy changes or government supports. This is entrepreneurially-driven. This is not subsistence farming. This is recasting farming as a small business in cities and towns and integrating it into the built environment in an economically viable manner. It is “right sizing” agriculture for an urbanized century and helping to make local food production a viable business proposition once again.

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