Sonset Farm: Self-Sustaining in Local Food Movement

Apr 08, 2015

As I drove up Sonset Farm's laneway, I noticed an odd structure sitting near one of their barns. There were stacks of straw bales forming four low-rising walls, and a wooden frame supporting a flat, plastic covering. While I could not see through the opaque film, I imagined greens flourishing in spite of the slush and snow that surrounded them.

My guess was right: farm owner Andrea Cumpson said they were growing spinach and arugula in the warmth of aged compost.

This is not an ordinary farm and Andrea and Orrie Cumpson are not ordinary farmers. While Sonset is a typical dairy farm at its core, over the years it has taken on layers, which have allowed it to be more self-sustaining and, ultimately, more resilient.

While it is common for farmers to buy inputs year after year from suppliers and then ship their products off, essentially leaving a clean slate for the next year, Sonset operates with principles that create loops rather than end points. In a nutshell, crops are grown to sustain animals, and animals, in turn, provide fertility to crops.

This is central to organic agriculture, one of several frameworks that inform how the farm functions.

Cumpson joined her husband, Orrie, 31 years ago on the land he then owned with his mother near Inverary and there sought to work towards organic practices at a time when few resources were available to help farms transition. When a course on ecological agriculture did emerge in the early 1990s, the pair enrolled and it gave them the confidence to begin.

"Orrie could see that the land was improving. It was plowing up so much more beautifully and the tilth was better," she says.

They had the land itself certified as organic in 1996, motivated in large part by their plans to market their spelt crop. Spelt has been more than an isolated addition to their farm's output. It provides much of the nourishment for their pigs and chickens, which they market from their farm gate, as well as providing bedding for cattle, which in turn adds carbon to compost.

The flour that the Cumpsons mill on the farm is another important addition to their overall income. "With the uncertainty of supply management, it's not putting all of our eggs in one basket," she says.

Supply management, a long-standing marketing system in Canada that requires that dairy farmers own quota in order to produce commercially, is another framework within which the farm operates. While supply management provides security of income for dairy farmers, it has attracted widespread criticism for inhibiting competition - controlling the amounts produced domestically and limiting imports with high tariffs. With a couple of trade agreements likely to take effect in the coming years - namely the Canada-Europe Trade Agreement (CETA) and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), neither of which has yet been ratified - farmers are anticipating changes in regulation and competition.

It is possible that supply management would eventually be repealed. Cumpson notes, "I've heard stories of people, before supply management, being sent back when they brought their milk to the local dairy."

The concern is that the downsides of pre-supply-managed farming, such as flooded markets and prices that don't account for the cost of production, could resurface, along with fierce competitions from countries like the U.S, New Zealand, and EU countries, where dairy farmers are subsidized by their governments.

This brings us to another of Sonset’s frameworks: Local Food.

One of the main challenges with trade agreements is how local and national governments balance honouring trade policy with citizens' social, environmental, and economic interests.

Cumpson, a former president of the local National Farmers Union (NFU), is concerned about the scope and lack of transparency of CETA.

"It's so comprehensive and could be detrimental to what a lot of farmers are doing. It's very secretive and there are suggestions that the wording is not in favour of farmers in general," she explains.

The NFU released a report in December 2014 outlining its views on CETA. It states, “From the farmer’s point of view, export market growth has not delivered promised prosperity,” noting that, over the past four decades, as agri-food exports have risen roughly twenty-fold, half of Canada’s farms have folded.

This reality has prompted some farms to go in the opposite direction - to a local focus. Cumpson is not only among the vanguards of the local organic community, she was co-chair of the Feast of Fields committee, which organized events to promote local food starting in 2004. Sonset has become one of the best-established direct-to-consumer farm operations in the region.

Local food remains a niche market, but while government policy has not been supportive of small, community-focused farms, a segment of the consumer population has grown wary of the food industry’s practices, seeking direct relationships with farmers in order to have more knowledge about how their food is produced. Cumpson sees this continuing to grow. “I feel strongly that we're just at the beginning," she affirms.

Meanwhile, the greens that were growing unseen when I drove in will serve as early vegetables in a spring that is about to begin, and with spring comes the green blades of spelt. There is a lively spirit to the farm, in spite of the weather, as it gears up for another season.

Jonathan Davies is a farmer himself, and operates Long Road Eco Farm near Harrowsmith with his partner X.B. Shen. Jonathan is contributing a series of articles called Frontenac Farming Life, which profiles the lives of local farmers who are trying to make a living through farming, navigating struggle and hope. If you would like to have your story considered, please contact Jonathan at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..