Hello Sims Hill Members,

Once again, thanks to all of you who came out to the meeting in November exploring the future of Sims Hill Shared Harvest and thank you to all our members for continuing to support Sims Hill.

To recap, the board felt like it needed to consult with the membership as at the time we had not been able to recruit a Lead Grower for the 2023 season and needed to go over some options that would mean slightly changing what Sims Hill grows and provides to its membership. This, combined with high food inflation, has meant that there were many uncertainties facing Sims Hill.

We had to consider not operating this year, focusing on grants to just run community sessions or operate commercially but with less experienced growers on a smaller scale.

At long last, we believe we have a workable plan for 2023. The board has decided to go ahead with the proposal to downsize the acreage that Sims Hill grows on for this year, and to focus most of the growing effort on the Grow Wilder site, meaning that we will operate on more of a market garden scale than both a market garden and field scale. What this means practically is that Sims Hill will have to buy in more vegetables, always from organic farms as close to Bristol as possible, in order to make up the gap of not growing as many crops on the fields on the other side of the M32. The big field will be devoted mainly to green manures (to build soil fertility), growing squash and growing summer crops in the polytunnels. As the scale and expertise required in the growing has been reduced, the board has decided to hire two co-lead growers for a market garden operation. These two growers have less experience than the requirements for the full operation lead grower, however are capable of running a market garden operation, plus a few crops on the bigger fields. They worked on the farm throughout 2022, have a good working relationship and bounds of energy to make Sims Hill a success. Welcome Petra and Anna! We have also secured a day a month from a mentor to give advice, so that the growing team feels supported throughout the year.

Life, and especially farming, always has risk and uncertainty. The increased uncertainty of the year ahead (new, less experience growers, increased reliance on external costs of buying in vegetables and inflation) means that we have to be even more careful with our outgoings. Sims Hill Shared Harvest is a model based on sharing the risks and the rewards of the growing season and relies on the community to support it through the ups and downs (hence Community Supported Agriculture!). We will need to be mindful about how many vegetables we buy in, and if things don’t go to plan, will have to provide less in the shares. But if things go well then we all benefit and that is obviously what we are aiming for and expect. In 2022, the shares were sometimes more than their value, and it is possible that in order to stay afloat (if for whatever reason we don’t get the crop that we would expect), at times the shares won’t be as big this year. We need your support more than ever.

By supporting the adjusted version of Sims Hill this year, members are ensuring that the soil is being well taken care of, that young farmers’ skills are continuing to be developed, that the refugee and asylum seeker program continues and that our fields on the other side of the M32 have their fertility worked on (and used to dissuade any potential proponents of the park & ride proposals).

This model will continue to pay people, provide food locally, offer community and link society to agriculture.

Thanks as ever to all of our members for their support and engagement in the co-operative, be it through our meetings, volunteering opportunities or simply spreading the word to friends and family.

Wishing you a happy start to 2023,

The Sims Hill Shared Harvest Board