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SPECIAL TOWN MEETING - JANUARY 19, 2012 says "YES";  News on farming elsewhere in U.S.A. and new concept.

SPECIAL TOWN MEETING SAYS "YES" AGAIN...

Organic farming in the future?  Indoor farming...an idea from 2011...





SPECIAL TOWN MEETING JANUARY 19, 2012, 7:15PM, TOWN HALL MEETING ROOM TO SAY "YES" AGAIN!

LACHAT AGREEMENT REDUX;  JANUARY 19, 2012 SPECIAL TOWN MEETING AT 7:15PM, TOWN HALL MEETING ROOM...SELECTMEN INVITE QUESTIONS AT THEIR JANUARY 5, 2012 MEETING.
Planning and Zoning and Selectman Tracey do lawyerly work coming  to agreement on Lachat-Conservancy lease wording revisions at a special work session and approval of new wording, hoping to get to a point where Board of Selectmen can agree and a new Town Meeting can confirm lease document. 


Paintings by Georgiana Silk behind Selectmen and Margaret Wirtenberg (r)
WOULD IT BE A BIG "YES" FOR LACHAT?  STANDING ROOM ONLY CROWD IN TOWN HALL MEETING ROOM SAYS SO!!!
Special Town Meeting: "YES" by standing room only crowd after asking questions first at informational meeting...and then there was nothing more to say.   Selectmen discuss fundraising and grants possibilities, report on Lachat progress to date at their meeting..one artist's view of the scene (r).  P&Z 8-24 to come.


Main field at the Juliana Lachat Preserve, on a beautiful autumn day, rises into the woods and the Nature Conservancy's Devil's Den.

LACHAT AGREEMENT MODIFICATION SPECIAL TOWN MEETING;  INFORMATIONAL MEETING FIRST OCTOBER 20, 2011 BEGINNING AT 7PM, TOWN HALL
"About Town" wonders about these things...our three questions below - depending on the call of Town Meeting, some might be better suited for the info session - they were asked and answered - short version of answers below.

First question:  Who gets control and responsibility to maintain this field?  Ans.  Town
Second question:  Besides looking beautiful, are these barns in good condition and could they hold farm equipment?  Ans. Could be!
Third question:  will plans for renovation make this structure livable?  Yellow tape denotes unsafe condition.  Ans.  The looks are deceiving - actually in good shape, at least thru the winter, according to Bob Hatch.

Which Lachat Committee?  Lachat Building and Maintenance, or perhaps the latest version of the Nature Conservancy-Town Committee originally appointed?
Tuesday, April 26, 2011, Commission Room at Town Hall


Lachat Building and Maintenance Committee (last known name) - S.R.O. as all the chairs and horizontal surfaces are taken. 

Left to right:


[The Friends of Lachat would like to raise at least $255,000 to preserve the Lachat farmhouse, located on property now co-owned by the town and the Nature Conservancy. The Friends are holding a fund-raising event this Sunday, Oct. 2, from 5 to 7 p.m.. —Kimberly Donnelly photo]


Weston P&Z is still reviewing Lachat
Weston FORUM
Written by Patricia Gay
Wednesday, 07 December 2011 11:32

The Planning and Zoning Commission is working overtime hoping to issue a positive referral on the Lachat lease agreements. To further that goal, P&Z has scheduled a special workshop for Thursday, Dec. 8, at 6, at the Town Hall Annex.

The workshop was called because commissioners were unable to come to a majority decision at a public hearing on Monday, Dec. 5, on an 8-24 referral of dual proposed lease agreements between the town of Weston and the Nature Conservancy, who jointly own property deeded to them by the late Leon Lachat.

Commissioners had several concerns with the lease agreements, particularly with what would happen after the lease expires in 10 years if improvements are made to buildings on the property. They are hoping to work out those concerns at Thursday's workshop.

By state statute 8-24, P&Z is required to review leases entered into by the town. If the commission does not vote on the referral Thursday, it will vote at a special meeting on Monday, Dec. 12. If no vote is taken by Dec. 12, automatic positive referral is mandated by law.

Under the proposed lease agreements, the town will lease approximately half of the property — 19.01 acres of the meadow area along Godfrey Road West — from the conservancy.  In return, the conservancy will lease a 22.6-acre wooded portion of the land that abuts its Devil’s Den Nature Preserve from the town.  No money will be exchanged under the agreement.

Concerns

On Nov. 28, P&Z sent First Selectman Gayle Weinstein a letter listing all its concerns with the lease agreements. Because there has been talk of operating a farm on the property and because the non-profit group Friends of Lachat has been actively raising money to renovate the existing farmhouse, commissioners were concerned that language in the original drafted lease did not adequately protect the buildings when the lease expires in 10 years.

At the public hearing on Dec. 5, Ms. Weinstein told the commission that while minor changes could be made to the lease agreements, substantive ones could not be made because the leases had already been approved by a Town Meeting.

P&Z would usually be asked for its referral before a matter was sent to Town Meeting for approval. In the Lachat case, however, a Town Meeting was held on Oct. 20, and the lease agreements were approved unanimously. The Town Meeting approval was made contingent on a positive 8-24 referral from P&Z.

On Monday, Selectman Dennis Tracey, who drafted the lease agreements as chairman of the Lachat Building Committee, presented the commission with numerous revisions he made to the lease agreements based on the concerns in P&Z’s letter. Mr. Tracey said he was good with the changes.

However, the concern about what would happen to the buildings after 10 years was not resolved.

Commissioners Don Saltzman and Jane Connolly asked Ms. Weinstein if she was willing to withdraw the application to allow P&Z a couple weeks to finalize revisions to the lease agreements. “Let’s do it right. Why not look at a cooperative way to protect the town and make this in the best interest of the town?” said Ms. Connolly.

Ms. Weinstein said she was not willing to withdraw the application, so the commission has make a decision by Dec. 12, or an automatic favorable referral is mandated by law.

“All we want to do is what is best for the town. We just need a little more time,” said Commissioner Pierre Ratté.

After several hours of discussion and deliberation, a consensus of the meeting showed that the commissioners all agreed the lease agreements approved at the Town Meeting did not adequately protect the town's interests. However, they were split on how they planned to vote on the application — three said they were going to vote negatively based on the original unrevised lease agreements approved at the Town Meeting; two were going to vote positively with conditions; and one member wanted to vote for the application with changes presented that night by Mr. Tracey.

Commissioner Ken Edgar said he liked the direction of Mr. Tracey’s revisions and recommended having a workshop to hammer out the language in the leases in hopes of issuing a positive referral.  Notice of the Thursday workshop was posted with the town clerk’s office on Tuesday, Dec. 6.  That same day, Ms. Weinstein sent a letter to P&Z asking it not to vote on Thursday and to vote on Monday, Dec. 12, instead.

She said she is scheduling a special selectmen’s meeting for Sunday, Dec. 11, at 9:30 a.m. Changes to the leases, she said, need to be vetted by the town attorney and a verbal approval needs to be received by the Nature Conservancy. She asked P&Z to give her all revisions by Friday, Dec. 9.

Ms. Weinstein said the selectmen will determine if they “agree to the proposed changes, agree to certain changes, or wish to remain with the original application.” She said she would let P&Z know the board’s decision as soon as it is made.

Weston P&Z has questions about Lachat
Weston FORUM
Written by Patricia Gay
Wednesday, 30 November 2011 11:31

The Planning and Zoning Commission is not yet ready to give a positive 8-24 referral to proposed changes to the Lachat property lease agreement.  Commissioners had numerous questions about proposed dual lease agreements between the town of Weston and the Nature Conservancy at a public hearing on Nov. 21. The hearing has been continued to Monday, Dec. 5.

“I believe a lot of work has gone into drafting the lease agreements and this is the correct direction for the town. However, the commission was given incomplete documentation and we have important questions about some of the language in those agreements,” said Stephan Grozinger, P&Z chairman.

The Lachat property is owned jointly by the town and the Nature Conservancy. Under the proposed lease agreements, the town will lease approximately half of the property — 19.01 acres of the meadow area along Godfrey Road West — from the conservancy.  In return, the conservancy will lease a 22.6-acre wooded portion of the land that abuts its Devil’s Den Nature Preserve from the town.  The leases will expire after 10 years, but are renewable.

Because the Nature Conservancy wants to use its portion of the land for a narrow purpose while the town wants to allow the possibility of a broader use — namely agricultural — P&Z is carefully reviewing the leases and supporting documents to make sure the town’s interests are protected.

On Nov. 28, Mr. Grozinger listed the commission’s concerns in a letter to First Selectman Gayle Weinstein, who presented the matter to the commission, and to Selectman Dennis Tracey, who drafted the lease agreements as chairman of the Lachat Building Committee.

The commission’s main concerns are:

• What happens after the lease expires at the end of 10 years?

• Suppose the town has made improvements to the property at its expense. At the termination of the lease, will those improvements become the common property of the conservancy and the town? Will that also be the case if third party funds are invested?

•When the term of the lease expires, will the conservancy be in a position as tenant-in-common to prevent all agricultural activity on the property if it desires to pursue its mission of a nature preserve?

• In a previous cooperative agreement, P&Z believes the town and conservancy had a renovation fund, which was never funded, and an endowment fund that both parties funded. Use of the endowment fund was restricted to repair and maintenance. If buildings on the property are renovated, will the town be responsible for all the maintenance and repair costs going forward?

• Can the property be used for community gardens as well as other non-commercial agricultural uses?

• Is education-based agriculture, where a farmer or teacher cultivates or pastures the land through a sublease and is paid for those services, allowed or disallowed?

Mr. Grozinger said it is important that ambiguities in the lease be explained or cleared up before the commission votes on the referral.

Following the Nov. 21 public hearing, Ms. Weinstein said she was a little frustrated that the commission did not express its concerns sooner. She said she was not sure the town could go back to the Nature Conservancy and make changes to documents that were already agreed upon. She said Mr. Tracey plans to attend the public hearing on Dec. 5, to respond to P&Z’s questions.

Mr. Grozinger said the town’s application was incomplete when it was submitted and was initially missing an amended conservation easement — a necessary part of the package. The commission did eventually receive the easement, he said, but just three hours before the Nov. 21 public hearing, which did not allow members time to review it.

He also said there were two new members elected to the commission on Nov. 8, and their first meeting was Nov. 21, so they were in no position to ask questions in advance.  By state statute 8-24, the town is required to refer any lease of publicly owned land to P&Z for a report.  In the normal course of events, P&Z would be asked for its report before the matter was sent to a Town Meeting for approval.  In the Lachat case, however, a Town Meeting was held on Oct. 20, where the lease agreements were approved unanimously. The Town Meeting approval was made contingent on a positive 8-24 referral from P&Z.

Ms. Weinstein said she originally thought the town did not need an 8-24 approval because no money was changing hands in the lease agreements. She subsequently realized the approval was still necessary, but since she had already scheduled the Town Meeting she made the vote contingent upon P&Z’s referral.
Preserving a piece of Weston history: Fundraiser Sunday for Lachat house
Weston FORUM
Written by Kimberly Donnelly
Thursday, 29 September 2011 00:00

A grass-roots group, Friends of Lachat, would like to preserve one of the oldest homesteads in Weston, the Lachat farmhouse.

Dave and Alice Christopher, Carol Baldwin and Friends of Lachat are holding a “Tapas, Toasts and Testimonials!” benefit event, open to all, this Sunday, Oct. 2, from 5 to 7 p.m., to raise money to preserve the farmhouse once known as the David Godfrey House.

The house is located on property previously owned by the late Leon Lachat on Godfrey Road West. Mr. Lachat sold the farmland and its buildings to the town of Weston and the Nature Conservancy in the 1990s, with the hope that an education center would be built there.  However, the education center plans never materialized, and the farmhouse was allowed to fall into disrepair.

Earlier this year, the Board of Selectmen called it an attractive nuisance and discussed the possibility of dismantling the house.

Many objected to the loss of the historic landmark, and the Green Village Initiative said it was interested in running a community farm on the property. But the selectmen were not willing to commit town funds to renovating or restoring the house.  Ms. Baldwin stepped forward and agreed to try to raise interest and money to preserve the farmhouse. The Friends of Lachat was formed.

The Friends of Lachat would like to see the land returned to what it was for generations — a fully functioning farm — and to restore the 1770 house to its pre-Revolutionary War grandeur.

Ms. Baldwin said historic restoration expert Robert Hatch has estimated the cost of restoring the house to be about $255,000. The group needs to make “significant progress” toward reaching its goal within the next few weeks in order to prevent demolition, she said.

“With this amount, our goal is to shore up the house and stabilize it and make the second floor habitable for a farmer/caretaker/program coordinator for the town farm,” Ms. Baldwin said.

Sunday’s event, to be held at the home of Lachat neighbors Dave and Alice Christopher, 94 Godfrey Road West, is intended to raise awareness about Weston history while raising money to save the farmhouse.

Information will be available on the house and the town farm concept being proposed.

The benefit is open to everyone, including children. There is no need to RSVP. Food and drinks will be served.

A $20 donation is suggested, but any amount will be accepted.
Study: Healthy eating is privilege of the rich
NYTIMES
Associated Press
Article published Aug 4, 2011

SEATTLE (AP) — A healthy diet is expensive and could make it difficult for Americans to meet new U.S. nutritional guidelines, according to a study published Thursday that says the government should do more to help consumers eat healthier.

An update of what used to be known as a food pyramid in 2010 had called on Americans to eat more foods containing potassium, dietary fiber, vitamin D and calcium. But if they did that, the journal Health Affairs said, they would add hundreds more dollars to their annual grocery bill.

Inexpensive ways to add these nutrients to a person's diet include potatoes and beans for potassium and dietary fiber. But the study found introducing more potassium in a diet is likely to add $380 per year to the average consumer's food costs, said lead researcher Pablo Monsivais, an assistant professor in the Department of Epidemiology and the School of Public Health at the University of Washington.

"We know more than ever about the science of nutrition, and yet we have not yet been able to move the needle on healthful eating," he said. The government should provide help for meeting the nutritional guidelines in an affordable way.

He criticized some of the marketing for a healthy diet — for example, the image of a plate of salmon, leafy greens and maybe some rice pilaf — and said a meal like that is not affordable for many Americans.

Food-assistance programs are helping people make healthier choices by providing coupons to buy fruits and vegetables, Monsivais said, but some also put stumbling blocks in front of the poor.

He mentioned, as an example, a Washington state policy making it difficult to buy potatoes with food assistance coupons for women with children, even though potatoes are one of the least expensive ways to add potassium to a diet.

The study was based on a random telephone survey of about 2,000 adults in King County, Wash., followed by a printed questionnaire that was returned by about 1,300 people. They note what food they ate, which was analyzed for nutrient content and estimated cost.

People who spend the most on food tend to get the closest to meeting the federal guidelines for potassium, dietary fiber, vitamin D and calcium, the study found. Those who spend the least have the lowest intakes of the four recommended nutrients and the highest consumption of saturated fat and added sugar.

Hilary Seligman, assistant professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, said Monsivais' research is an interesting addition to the debate about healthy eating and food insecurity, her area of expertise.

A lot of people assume the poor eat cheap food because it tastes good, but they would make better choices if they could afford to, said Seligman, who was not involved in the Health Affairs study.

"Almost 15 percent of households in America say they don't have enough money to eat the way they want to eat," Seligman said. Recent estimates show 49 million Americans make food decisions based on cost, she added.

"Right now, a huge chunk of America just isn't able to adhere to these guidelines," she said.

But Monsivais may have oversimplified the problem, according to another professor who does research in this area. Parke Wilde, associated professor at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University, said it's not expensive to get all the nutrients a body needs to meet the federal guidelines.

What is expensive, in Wilde's opinion, are the choices Americans make while getting those nutrients.

He said diets get more and more expensive depending on how many rules a person applies to himself, such as eating organic or seeking local sources for food or eating vegetables out of season.

"The longer your list gets, the more expensive your list will be," he said.

Seligman said her list can get longer than Wilde's, but not everything is a choice. Adding to the cost of buying healthful food could be how far away from home a person needs to travel to get to a grocery store that sells a variety of fresh fruits and vegetables.

The government also affects food prices through the subsidies offered to farmers growing certain crops, she added.

Weston's Onion Barn is another symbol...
Roots: Westport farming traditions run deep
Westport News
Mike Lauterborn
Updated 10:07 a.m., Sunday, May 29, 2011

It was a story of indigenous people, hardy settlers, rugged farmers and bohemian artists, all of whom have called the Westport area home and are part of its rich agrarian history.

A new exhibit showcasing that legacy, "Back to Our Roots," opened Friday at Westport Historical Society, 25 Avery Place.

Its timeline begins in the "pre-contact" era when local land was forested and shared with wildlife, continues through Puritan and Colonial times, carries through the Civil War, when Westport was the largest supplier of onions to General Grant's army, and wraps with a look at modern-day Wakeman Town Farm. Additional exhibit features include a collection of photographs of area stone walls by Larry Untermeyer, vintage tools housed in the adjoining 1846 Bradley-Wheeler Cobblestone Barn, historic barn photos shot by Larry Silver and watercolor depictions of local landscapes by Hardie Gramatky. The exhibit opening was attended by several dozen people, who enjoyed wine and hors d'oeuvres as they browsed.

Society Board President Dorothy Curran spoke about the origins of the exhibit. "It started as a conversation between Molly Donovan, who recently passed, and Wakeman Town Farm," she said. "We quickly realized that the story about going back to our roots was bigger than Wakeman Town Farm alone and wanted to put it in a larger context."

Curran provided a synopsis of each significant timeline era. "In early times, pre-European contact, indigenous peoples grew corn, beans, peas and Jerusalem artichokes," she said. "They lived by the shore in the summer and inland in winter to be close to game. When Roger Ludlowe arrived during the Pequot War and found salt meadows, he established a foothold for farming, which was initially just to keep villagers alive. As they began to clear area land, lumber and fish became main exports."

In 1670, the Puritans divided a significant portion of the Fairfield/Westport area into "Long Lots," as a legal protection of land ownership against the crown, and more actively farmed. "Onion farmers would take carts to the shore, load up with seaweed and spread it on their fields as fertilizer," said Curran. "Try to find an abundance of seaweed now," she challenged.

In 1806, the first market boat from Saugatuck made its way to New York City. "These boats ran daily, taking farm produce to the city and bringing back goods to the farmers," said Curran.

However, because Westport was so favorably situated for sail-based commerce in general, by the 1840s, only 40% of Westporters were still farming. Maritime commerce then shifted to railroad commerce, which made it feasible to supply Grant's army.

"By the late 19th century, as farms in the Midwest expanded, local farms declined and were abandoned," said Curran. "At the same time, a new trend was happening that was unique to Westport and Weston. Artists, many from the Midwest who had moved to New York, took the train to Westport and discovered its great beaches, but also area barns that they converted to studios. As such, there are nearly 250 local barns that have been preserved. A large number of these, about 100, are concentrated in the greater Compo area due to the convenient location at the time of local trolley service and proximity to the train."

Exhibit visitor Robbie Barnes found the exhibit very complete and informative. "I grew up in the area and it's fascinating to learn about its roots," she said.

Mike Aitkenhead, program director of Wakeman Town Farm, took interest in the stone wall photos. "When you think about the amount of work involved in creating the walls, it's pretty impressive," he said. "When all of these houses fall down, the walls will be the remaining relics."

Liz Beeby, a Westport resident for the past 45 years, connected with much of the more recent lore. "I recognize many of the names here -- the Wakemans, and Fillows for example," she said. "I remember when there was a Fillow flower shop in town. I feel a huge historical connection to Westport."

The "Back to our Roots" exhibit runs through Sept. 2. For more information, visit www.WestportHistory.org.
Westport News


Udderly outdated data, but something to chew the cud over....
However note the importance of #1 Fairfield County, in blow-up with BIG lead over New Haven and Hartford Counties, (c) and further, that agriculture that isn't for eating is where CT does half its business (r).  What is "organic farming?"

Is this part of the proposal to be discussed at Board of Selectmen, perhaps, Thursday, April 15, 2010?
COMMUNITY-SUPPORTED AGRICULTURE:  In Connecticut, Community-Supported Agriculture Gaining In Popularity
Hartford Courant
By SHAWN R. BEALS
April 13, 2010

Once a week, people drive out to the farm to pick up their prepaid share — a bag or a box of fresh produce grown right there. They chat with the farmer who has planted the seeds and turned the soil that produced their tomatoes or peppers or squash.

These customers are partaking in community-supported agriculture, known as CSA. Ten years ago, there were fewer than 10 CSA farms in Connecticut. Today, there are more than 40.

There are organic and non-organic CSA farms. But all are evidence that this model of growing and selling and buying local produce has become more than a fad. As farmers sell shares of their farm in exchange for a cut of their products, it has evolved into a viable business model. CSA is helping farmers stay in business while responding to the national trend among consumers to eat more food that is locally grown.

With the 2010 growing season underway, state agriculture officials say it looks like CSA will keep its momentum.

"To me, it's the future," said Fred Monahan of Stone Gardens Farm in Shelton. "It's a good way to connect the grower with the consumer."

The CSA model is fluid. Each farmer decides what works best for his or her customers or community: Sometimes customers pay upfront for only a weekly or biweekly share; some farms require pickup, some will deliver; some sell half-shares while others sell only full shares.

But the crux of the system is that, as one University of Connecticut commercial agriculture expert explained, "The customers share the risk instead of putting it all on the farmer who, usually when Mother Nature strikes, takes it all on the chin."

Because customers are paying upfront for their vegetables, said UConn's Jude Boucher, the farmers are able to cover costs for the season.

Boucher said that farmers throughout the state are starting up CSAs to complement their other marketing avenues.

"There should be at least a CSA in every single town," Boucher said.

Monahan and his wife, Stacia, have been growing vegetables on their Shelton farm since 1998 and, after three seasons, their CSA portion of the farm is up to 400 shares, one of the largest totals in the state. Their shares cost $600 each; but prices each farm charges for a share vary. "I wish I did it sooner. We've doubled every year," Monahan said.

Beyond Organic

Monahan has also noticed a shift in the focus of his customers, who seem more enamored of the locally grown aspect of CSA shares than with the organic principles, which had fueled the CSA fire for years.

"We use organic measures, but we're not certified organic," he said. "It's more important [to some customers] to know that it's grown here and that you're protecting farmland."

The organic customers are still a vital part of the CSA structure, but the appeal has broadened in the past few years, said Steven Reviczky, executive director of the Connecticut Farm Bureau Association, an independent organization of farmers.

"There is a huge demand for consumers to know their farmer and know where their food is coming from," he said. "It's an amazing turn of events where people are willing and able to buy local."

The most recent tally in the state counted 42 CSA farms, Reviczky said.

"Clearly this is a growing way that agricultural producers can market their fruits and vegetables and other Connecticut-grown products," he said.

The Griffin family in Suffield started selling CSA shares last year to save its family farm for a few more generations. Sheri Mandirola, her brother, Jonathan Griffin, and her sister, Sarah-Jean Griffin, are the 10th generation to farm their family's land.

They aimed for 30 shares on the Oxen Hill Farm CSA, and ended up with 36 families buying $425 shares. This year they'll shoot for 100, and last week had 60 signed up.

"There was such a demand for it," Mandirola said. "It's a local way to sustain our open space and to keep it in our family name. Being the 10th generation is not something we take lightly, and this is a viable way for us to do that."

For those who remain loyal to the 100 percent organic farms, the list of options is growing as well. The Northeast Organic Farming Association of Connecticut keeps a list of certified organic CSA farms on its website, www.ctnofa.org/CSAs.htm. Other CSA farms can be found at www.buyctgrown.com."We're very supportive of anything that promotes economic viability for farms, and CSAs are an up-and-coming thing," said Don Tuller, farm bureau president.


When the Uprooted Put Down Roots
NYTIMES
By PATRICIA LEIGH BROWN
October 9, 2011

SAN DIEGO — At the Saturday farmer’s market in City Heights, a major portal for refugees, Khadija Musame, a Somali, arranges her freshly picked pumpkin leaves and lablab beans amid a United Nations of produce, including water spinach grown by a Cambodian refugee and amaranth, a grain harvested by Sarah Salie, who fled rebels in Liberia. Eaten with a touch of lemon by Africans, and coveted by Southeast Asians for soups, this crop is always a sell-out.

Among the regular customers at the New Roots farm stand are Congolese women in flowing dresses, Somali Muslims in headscarves, Latino men wearing broad-brimmed hats and Burundian mothers in brightly patterned textiles who walk home balancing boxes of produce on their heads.

New Roots, with 85 growers from 12 countries, is one of more than 50 community farms dedicated to refugee agriculture, an entrepreneurial movement spreading across the country. American agriculture has historically been forged by newcomers, like the Scandinavians who helped settle the Great Plains; today’s growers are more likely to be rural subsistence farmers from Africa and Asia, resettled in and around cities from New York, Burlington, Vt., and Lowell, Mass., to Minneapolis, Phoenix and San Diego.

With language and cultural hurdles, and the need to gain access to land, financing and marketing, farm ownership for refugees can be very difficult. Programs like New Roots, which provide training in soil, irrigation techniques and climate, “help refugees make the leap from community gardens to independent farms,” said Hugh Joseph, an assistant professor at the Friedman School of Nutrition at Tufts, which advises 28 “incubator” farms representing hundreds of small-scale producers.

Cameroonian peanut plants are growing at Drew Gardens in the Bronx, chronicled on the Facebook page of Angela Nogue, a refugee farmer. Near Phoenix, a successful goat meat farm and store was begun by Ibrahim Sawara Dahab, an ethnic Sudanese from Somalia. “In America, you need experience, and my experience was goats,” he said.

The Office of Refugee Resettlement in Washington formed a sustainable farming program in 1998, financing 14 refugee farms and gardens, including one in Boise, Idaho, where sub-Saharan African farmers have gradually learned to cope with unpredictable frosts.

Larry Laverentz, the program manager for refugee agriculture with the Office of Refugee Resettlement, said inspiration came from the Hmong, Mien and Lao refugee farmers of Fresno County, Calif., who settled in the late 1970s and now have 1,300 growers specializing in Asian crops.

These small plots of land can become significant sources of income for refugees, with most farmers able to earn from $5,000 to more than $50,000 annually, as the Liberian refugees James and Jawn Golo do on their 20-acre organic farm outside Phoenix, including sales to five farmers’ markets, restaurants and chefs.

In Burlington, a four-acre farm started by Bhutanese-Nepali, Somali Bantu and Congolese farmers is still reeling from the flooding of the Winooski River after Hurricane Irene, which ruined crops at the height of the season and caused an estimated $15,000 in losses.

“This is a significant supplement to our diet, and budgets are geared to it,” said Yacouba Jacob Bogre, 38, executive director of the Association of Africans Living in Vermont and a lawyer from Burkina Faso. “Emotionally, we lost a lot, along with fresh vegetables for our households.”

New Roots in City Heights, which Michelle Obama visited last spring, is a model for today’s micro-enterprise. (It is also a culinary education, where a Zimbabwean grower can discover bok choy.) It was started at the request of his Somali Bantu community, said Bilali Muya, the effervescent trainer-in-chief. “There was this kind of depression,” he said. “Everyone was dreaming to come to the U.S.A., but they were not happy. The people were put in apartments, missing activity, community. They were bored.“

They were also homesick for traditional food, grown by hand. In City Heights, where half the residents live at or below the federal poverty line, the three-year-old farmer’s market was the city’s first in a low-income neighborhood, a collaboration between the nonprofit International Rescue Committee and the San Diego County Farm Bureau.

One can hear 15 different languages there, amid the neat rows of kale, rape and banana plants — but body language is the lingua franca.

“If I see a weed, I pull it, shaking my head,” said Mrs. Musame, the Somali farmer. “We understand each other.”

The hub of refugee life, City Heights was largely home to African-Americans and Mexican immigrants until the fall of Saigon in 1975, when thousands of Southeast Asian refugees arrived to a massive tent city at nearby Camp Pendleton.

From 1980 through 1990, the population almost doubled with immigrants and refugees (most recently from Iraq). The changing demographics of the neighborhood resemble an electrocardiogram of international conflict.

But the exquisite fruits and vegetables for sale, lovingly grown, belie the life experiences of the growers. Mrs. Salie, the Liberian, was raped by rebels and hid for two years in the bush after reporting the crime, she said. Mrs. Musame, a Somali Bantu, came to San Diego as a widow after her husband and three of her sons were gunned down.

And Mr. Muya said Somalis had taken his father, who dug irrigation trenches for a local banana farm, and tortured him, his screams echoing through the village. His grandfather went to help and was beaten with the butt of a rifle. Many hours later, Mr. Muya said, the villagers were told: “Come pick up your dogs.”

“As a Somali Bantu, you don’t go to sleep really deep,” Mr. Muya continued. “You sleep awake.”

In addition to accepting food stamps, the market offers $20 a month to low-income shoppers to buy more produce (financing comes from Wholesome Wave, a nonprofit based in Connecticut, and a $250,000 grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention).

“Especially in tough times, farmers are becoming pharmacists — providing healthy fresh local fruits and vegetables to vulnerable families,” said Gus Schumacher, a former under secretary of the United States Department of Agriculture and now an executive vice president of Wholesome Wave.

Their produce is sold to restaurateurs like George and Samia Salameh, who buy the farm’s tomatoes and mint. Mr. Salameh, a former airline pilot, came to the United States from Lebanon 37 years ago. “This product is absolutely fitting for me,” he said.

The country’s pioneering refugee farm program, in Lowell, Mass., was founded by Tufts University and continues to thrive.

Visoth Kim, a Khmer refugee from Cambodia, now 63, farms land in Dracut, Mass., owned by the widow of John Ogonowski, the pilot of American Airlines Flight 11 that crashed into the World Trade Center on Sept. 11. Mr. Ogonowski, whose ancestors were Polish immigrants, made land available to Hmong and Cambodian refugees, teaching them modern irrigation techniques in exchange for fresh vegetables.

Mr. Kim, who witnessed mass starvation in Cambodia, losing a brother, refers to his two-acre plot as “my plenty.” His fellow farmer Sinikiwe Makarutsa grew up in Zimbabwe and now grows maize on land rented from a local church. She made enough money to buy a tractor and rototiller.

Ms. Makarutsa was inspired to farm, she said, after tasting supermarket tomatoes. She uses the Zimbabwean phrase “Pamuzinda” to describe her seven-acre plot.

Roughly translated, she said, “It means ‘where you belong.’ ”