Welcome to the Oak Tree Low Carbon Farm located in the village of Rushmere St Andrew to the East of Ipswich.
The Oak Tree is a Community Supported Agriculture Scheme which means it is a partnership between farmers and the local community, providing mutual benefits and reconnecting the people to the land where their food is grown.
In practice we are a bit like a shared allotment – a large one with around 200 people helping at the farm on a regular basis!
Community Supported Agriculture Schemes have been popular in the USA and Japan for many years, and are now growing in the UK. We were the first Community Supported Agriculture Farm in Suffolk!
Members of our scheme enjoy a weekly supply of ultra-fresh vegetables from the farm grown without the use of artificial fertilisers or pesticides. The harvest is shared out equally between members each week.
Members also have the opportunity to buy chickens’ eggs from the farm’s free range chickens, soft fruit and low carbon cut flowers.
Those who wish to, also enjoy the health, well-being and fitness benefits of working at the farm.
We also hold events at the farm for members of the public and social events for our members.
Our aim is to create a financially viable and environmentally sustainable farm producing a plentiful and diverse supply of nutritious food for the community of people that works on the land, having a good time while doing so.
By teaching and demonstrating how this can be done we hope to encourage others to do the same.
We are a not-for-profit social enterprise run by Community Interest Company (CIC). We have four directors : Tom Wilmot, Andy Black , Lucy Drake and Ken Stewart.
One day we would like to expand our low carbon food production onto other plots of land, so for this reason our community interest company is called the “South Suffolk Low Carbon Food CIC”.
- You can learn more about the farm through our virtual farm tour
- Find out how to join us here
- Learn about about our work with soil carbon here
- Read about the origins of the Oak Tree Farm in this article in The Guardian in 2014!
- Visit The Oak Tree Blog
- Read Joanne’s posts on The Oak Tree on the Guardian Gardening Blog describing the very early days of the farm!
- Read about a similar scheme we visited when we were first setting up
Tom Wilmot, one of the Farm’s directors
Joanne Mudhar, founder of The Oak Tree Low Carbon Farm
In this short video we made in 2013 you can learn about the history of the farm and meet a few of our members at the time. (N.B. the farm looks very different today!):
Visit our Facebook page!
