Alumna Moie Crawford, organic farmer, to share story

Skidmore alumna Moie Crawford will discuss her career as an organic farmer when she visits the College Monday, Nov. 21. The program, free and open to all, begins at 7 p.m. in Davis Auditorium of Palamountain Hall. Skidmore's Sustainability Office is sponsor of the event.Jim and Moie Kimball Crawford own and operate New Morning Farm, a 95-acre certified organic vegetable farm in south-central Pennsylvania.

The Crawfords have farmed organically for over 37 years. Starting on rented land in 1971, Jim began growing a wide variety of vegetable crops on small acreage, with practically no capital and little experience. Moie, who graduated from Skidmore in 1969, joined the farm in 1974. From the start all produce was direct-marketed in Washington, D.C.

In 1976 the couple purchased the land they now farm. It had been a small, conventional dairy operation. With ambitious, innovative financing and much trial and error, they gradually built their soils organically, accumulated appropriate equipment, and designed and built various buildings for their specific purposes.

New Morning Farm now produces approximately 50 different crops, all certified organic. Annual sales of the farm's production have topped $500,000. Crops include berries and herbs in addition to most standard garden vegetables. In addition to the owners, the farm employs two or three year-round helpers and approximately 20 seasonal workers and apprentices. The farming apprenticeship program is well developed and has helped a number of aspiring growers to get started in farming.

Over the years the Crawfords have built a many-faceted, successful direct-marketing system. They have organized two now-well-established farmers' markets in Washington and, in 1988, helped found a wholesale marketing cooperative (Tuscarora Organic Growers), which now includes 22 grower-members and has annual sales of $1.5 million. Jim is president of the cooperative's board of directors.

In addition to produce, New Morning Farm markets (both wholesale and retail) locally produced foods year-round. The farm has a modern accounting system and employs a year-round bookkeeper.

New Morning Farm is equipped with a heated greenhouse, two high-tunnel cold frames, an extensive irrigation system, packing shed with refrigeration and implements, tractors and trucks. There is also a house and a fenced yard for a flock of 250 laying hens.

The Crawfords have been active members from the planning stages of the Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture (PASA) and Jim was a member of the first board of directors. They have presented workshops a number of times at PASA conferences over the years, and have conducted field days at their farm, attended by other local growers. For the 2002 PASA conference, Jim organized a series of workshops on family farm finances, which involved systematic financial profiles of nine farms in the Northeast.

Jim has been an active member of the Pennsylvania Vegetable Growers Association for 30 years and has made several presentations at its annual conferences. He was also keynote speaker for conferences of the Virginia Biological Farmers' Association and Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York.

The couple was honored in 2002 with the annual Leadership Award from PASA. In 2003 the Crawfords were chosen for the first annual Harvest Farmer Award from the Glynwood Center, a nonprofit environmental education center in Cold Spring, N.Y. Jim has also been profiled in a USDA/SARE book titled The New American Farmer: Profiles of Agricultural Innovation and both of them have discussed family farming and organic agriculture on National Public Radio and in numerous publications including the Washington Post and the New York Times. New Morning Farm was highlighted with a chapter in the book Organic, Inc.: Natural Foods and How They Grew written by Samuel Fromartz and published by Harcourt. In 2009 Moie was awarded the Golden Plow Award by Women Chefs and Restaurateurs, a national award given to a woman for excellence in growing or producing food.