Since 1985, Full Belly Farm has been a California Certified Organic farm and an industry leader. Its owners believe the diversity of crops grown on the farm – annuals, perennials, grain, native plant hedgerows, and animals – contributes to both its ecological and economic resilience in the face of climate changes or crop failures. The farm successfully utilizes diverse management practices and innovations that incorporate both conventional and sustainable agriculture including soil health, riparian and habitat improvement, agrobiodiversity, crop and animal product diversity.

The farm pioneered a variety of innovative enterprise, marketing and outreach strategies that allow the business to grow and support a year-round work force. A solar plant provides energy for the irrigation and cooler systems, and most row crops are irrigated with buried drip systems and orchards with micro-sprinklers. It pioneered Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farming and now serves 1,200 families each week. Products are also sold at farmers markets, in restaurants and stores, and to distributors.

With nearly 90 full-time employees, Full Belly Farm conducts highly effective sustainable agriculture education and outreach efforts in Northern California. Popular summer camps for youth and an adult internship program inspire and teach future farmers. Urban consumers are reached through social media, the CSA food box program, informational booths and food sales at farmers’ markets, and through tours and special events at the farm. More than 30 organizations benefit from funds raised at the annual Hoes Down Harvest Festival, and the farm owners actively participate in leadership roles of various agricultural organizations.

Thomas Tomich, Ph.D., University of California, Davis writes, “These remarkable farmers and the beautiful farm operation they steward jointly epitomize the ethical relationship between people and the land that Aldo Leopold articulated for us all, combining passion, purpose and science.”