By Kenzie Love
The Greek term metanoia refers to a shift in one’s orientation, one Winnipeg’s Metanoia Farmers Workers Co-operative chose to highlight the processes its members were seeking to incorporate when the farm was founded in 2011.
“They chose the name because they wanted it to reflect a turning of orientation towards how we interact with land,” says Co-op member Kay Drudge. “So caring better for the land, learning from the land, rather than just extracting resources from the land.”
Greek might seem like an apt language for the term’s origin in a society where agriculture is indeed a foreign concept for many people. But that’s something Metanoia has worked hard to change since its founding. With its community-shared agriculture (CSA) program, the Co-op seeks to build relationships between its members and the farm’s customers, while fostering a greater sense of connection to the land for everyone. According to its website, the Co-op “grow(s) only open-pollinated varieties using organic practices. Valuing the relationality and care for the soil that comes with using their hands and simple tools, they seek to minimize mechanization.”
Metanoia’s founders were drawn to the worker co-op model by its flat structure and use of consensus decision-making, says Drudge, who’s in their fourth year with the Co-op.
“We have the freedom to sort of make decisions together without one person kind of holding the power in that way,” they say. “So that has its challenges, but has been overall a positive thing for the Co-op.”
Drudge joined Metanoia after they graduated from CMU and were looking for a job where they could be more connected to the earth and engage their interest in growing their own food. Their involvement in farming to this end has been a valuable experience.
“I feel like I’ve learned how to interact with the land and grow food for myself,” they say. “The more that you get into that kind of stuff, the less you feel like you know. But it’s been really rewarding to feel like I’ve gained a lot of skills and understanding of those things.”
As with any farm, Metanoia members have had to juggle long hours during the growing and harvesting seasons, coupled with the need for an alternative form of employment in the winter months. Drudge acknowledges this will likely remain an ongoing challenge.
But Drudge is looking forward to a bright future on the farm as Metanoia continues to introduce innovations to increase its sustainability, such as the no-till system it adopted and the honey bees it brought in last year.
“Just really creating as much of a little ecosystem of good care as we can in that space is what we’re excited about right now,” they say.
Although Metanoia’s CSA season is already well underway, anyone in the Winnipeg area who wishes to sign up for a mid-September bounty box, can do so at this link. You can enquire about other options or signing up for a CSA next year, here.