Company description

Island Grown Initiative strives to build a regenerative and equitable food system on Martha’s Vineyard that engages, informs, and integrates the community. We grow, glean, cook, distribute, and provide free food for those who need assistance. We also teach Island children about food from its history and ties to our culture, to how to grow and prepare healthy meals.

Job description

Island Grown Initiative Farm Field Crew

Island Grown Initiative is a non-profit on Martha’s Vineyard that works to build a regenerative and equitable food system for our community. We operate a 42-acre farm in the center of the Island, and are in the process of transitioning our field acreage to low or no-till, regenerative practices. We seek hard-working and community-oriented field hands to help us build soil and grow food throughout the 2024 growing season.

The position begins on April 3 and ends on December 31, 2024. Work averages 40 hours a week over the course of the season, with the expectation that some days will be longer than others depending on the season and needs of the farm. Daily start and end times are subject to change during the hot summer months.

Field Crew Responsibilities:

• Greenhouse work: seeding, watering, thinning, transplanting for field crops. Occasional maintenance, seeding, and harvesting in our greenhouse systems.
• Field work: Seeding, planting, laying irrigation, weeding and hoeing, mulching, moving tarps and landscape fabric, regular lifting and moving of sand bags and irrigation pipes, and more.
• Vegetable processing: harvesting, washing, sorting, packing, and labeling produce for CSA distribution or other customers.
• Other: Tracking and entering field data, light carpentry and tractor work if applicable, interaction with volunteers, gleaners, student groups, and CSA members.

What we’re looking for:

• Job and/or educational experience in agriculture (vegetable experience is a plus)
• Detail-oriented, focused, organized, tidy, and computer literate.
• Excellent listening skills, with a willingness to learn and discuss new ideas.
• Physically capable of sustained manual labor, including the ability to safely lift 50 pounds repeatedly.
• Passion for good food, regenerative farming practices, environmental stewardship, food equity and justice.
• Self-motivated, and able to work effectively both independently and as part of a team.
• Willingness and ability to work hard while maintaining a positive attitude.
• Ability to work in all weather conditions, including rain, wind, heat, cold, etc.

Compensation: Pay is commensurate with experience. Potential for housing in a single bedroom apartment for the right candidate, for a separate rental fee. Field crew members enjoy access to the food they grow.

More about the Island Grown farm:

Martha’s Vineyard (Noepe) is the homeland of the Wampanoag people, who have been here for at least 10,000 years and are still here today. The Island is full of striking natural beauty, with lots of walking trails, conservation land, and one-of-a-kind beaches that our employees are encouraged to explore during their time with us. The Island hosts a large summer population, and is home to a vibrant year-round community. Visitors and residents alike love this place for its intense seasonality, beauty, and small-community atmosphere.

Our farm sits on a 42-acre parcel at the heart of the island, on land that served as hunting and fishing grounds for Wampanoag people for many generations. At the edge of the farm lies a kettle hole, a year-round fresh water pond, one of the few year-round sources of freshwater in the center of the island, which made this area an important thoroughfare for Wampanoag people and early European settlers. The land has been in agriculture for at least 400 years.

Island Grown Initiative was gifted the farm in 2012, and leased the land to local growers and graziers. 2019 was the first year we prioritized a transition to regenerative principles in our fields, to rebuild soil vitality and help restore life on the land after years of disruptive and chemical-dependent agriculture. We began the transition on eight acres of the farm fields, dramatically reducing soil disturbance, increasing our use of ground covers and cover crops, integrating livestock rotations, utilizing tarps to prepare planting beds and suppress weeds, and are trialing new systems of carbon and compost applications. The changes we’ve seen in soil health and crop productivity on this acreage have already been dramatic.

About two thirds of the food we produce is sold through our summer and winter CSAs, our discounted price mobile farmer’s market (which accepts SNAP and HIP benefits), and to a few wholesale outlets. The remaining third is distributed for free through our Island Food Equity Network to support good food access for all in our community and strengthen food security.

Our farm is a community space, and crew members will not only assist with all aspects of food production and soil health activities, but will interact with a broad swath of community members. This includes gleaners coming to help harvest food for donation to islanders in need, a diverse cast of local and visiting volunteers, and our dynamic Island Grown staff, who work on programs from food waste capture and composting to farm to school education. We are a busy, multi-faceted non-profit, and we hope to have more passionate food-system advocates join our team!

Compensation

this position is: hourly, $20/hr +

Application instructions

Deadline

April 30, 2024