CROPS Farm
CROPS (Community Reaps Our Produce and Shares) is a Multnomah County initiative that promotes culturally specific farming, business development, healthy eating, and community building. CROPS is managed in partnership with Mudbone Grown/Feed’em Freedom, a Black-led Regional Food Hub that focuses on sourcing from Black and Global Majority producers, ranchers, fishers, and herbalists.
The farm has been a County project since 2010 when the County used vacant County-owned land to start a farm that would provide fresh produce to local foodbanks. Today, Feed’em Freedom continues that tradition, distributing fresh produce grown at the farm at their food bank locations and also creating an incubator and demonstration farm for supporting and training new farmers.
The farm was relocated in 2020 to Troutdale on 3 acres of land that had previously been overrun with blackberry brambles. The County and Feed’em Freedom have invested substantial resources to develop the site. The site now features a barn, municipal water supply, electricity, driveway, greenhouse, biodigester, aquaponic freight farm, and refrigeration storage.
If you are interested in learning how to get involved, contact Feed’em Freedom Foundation.
CROPS History
CROPS was started as a temporary use for surplus County land over a decade ago. The idea was to grow food for families in need. County farmer, Jerry Hunter, led the effort to create the farm, clearing 3 acres of land choked with invasive blackberry bushes and transforming the site into a lush farm. Over the following 10 years, Jerry created a safe and healing environment where people of all ages and backgrounds volunteered, learned and shared skills, built community and grew fresh organically-grown food for the community.
The farm was conceived as an innovative way of using vacant County land to grow vegetables for communities in need. Since its inception in 2010, its purpose has expanded to serve as a demonstration site for innovative farming practices that also promotes business development for Black and African-immigrant farmers, while continuing to support communities in need through community-supported agriculture that is subsidized through the Oregon Health Authority and other partners.
In 2017, Black farmers made up only about one-tenth of 1% of farmers in Oregon, the result of deeply entrenched discrimination in state and federal policies. Black farmers had been barred outright from even owning land in Oregon for the first 70 years of statehood. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has acknowledged its extensive history of denying Black farmers low-interest loans, subsidies, grants and other assistance. CROPS Farm has blossomed into a modern demonstration farm for education, an incubator for new farmers – especially those from our Black and and African Immigrant communities – and a place where all are welcome to learn and build connections.
The farm is managed by Feed’Em Freedom Foundation and Mudbone Grown. These culturally specific community-serving organizations have a wide range of partnerships with schools, businesses, and other government agencies. Under Feed’em Freedom’s leadership the farm has become a hub for entrepreneurship, training, and community building. Feed’em Freedom leverages the CROPS farm and shared resources to help new farmers gain access to land and markets.
The farm was relocated in 2020 to its current location. After years of development, the farm now features orchards, fields for growing produce, a barn, a greenhouse, and innovative technologies like a bio-digester and hydroponic equipment for growing greens year round. The farm also includes high tunnels for season extension, cold storage, solar energy, and many other innovative technologies and practices to help farmers learn how to adapt and grow food with the ongoing threat of the climate crisis.
Before CROPS
The CROPS site is located on land that was once used as the County Poor Farm. The County Poor Farms were an early attempt by the State and Multnomah County to serve those most in need. The farm housed people and was financed in part through the sale of farm goods produced on this land. Today, the site is owned by McMenamins and is run as a hotel and concert venue. McMenamins has preserved much of the original architecture and you can learn more about the history of the Poor Farm on their website.