"We all pull together". Relational values in consumer motivations in Swiss community supported agriculture cooperatives

There has been a recent growth of community-supported agriculture (CSA) cooperatives in Switzerland as consumers become increasingly sensitive to production realities. This paper studies the motivations and relational values of Swiss CSA members on food, nature, and community, and explores how CSA uniquely reconnect consumers with the realities of food production and the environment. Because of CSA’s strong focus on solidarity and mutual relationships, a relational values approach was chosen to describe members’ motivations to join the CSA, what relationships they have and how these relationships affected members’ values. 21 qualitative interviews with CSA members were conducted to accomplish this. They were analyzed with qualitative coding using both inductive and deductive codes. Results show that members join CSA primarily for the high-quality organic food offering, transparency of methods and financing, consumer participation and decision-making, as well as the community experience. All these attributes add to food appreciation. Social values of supporting local farms and helping with a meaningful project were also strong motivators for membership. Values regarding environmental protection were common and CSA offered a platform for realizing these values through work practices. Through work participation, members experience the efforts and realities of the production process first-hand and consequently form a positive personal relationship with the producers, the food, and the farm itself. As a result, previously abstract intrinsic and instrumental values are complemented with strong relational values. Members perceive themselves as part of the picture and relate to the CSA directly. Respondents reported greater sensitivity regarding the environmental impacts of their actions and a change in their consumer behavior. Confrontation with work realities also creates increased practicality regarding sustainability and environmental conservation in members. Further, members’ personal understanding of nature is expanded and partly repopulated with human activity as they are confronted with agrarian values. Overall, CSA offers them a platform to realize and implement their environmental ethics and connect to nature. In conclusion CSA relational values are present and highly important for Swiss CSA model to motivate and retain members. CSA affirm people’s agency in shaping and interacting with their environment and provides a working platform to connect local community, small farmers, and environment. Values are dynamic and plural, with the results showcasing how lived experiences can change values and beliefs. Values compel practices as much as practices generate values. I believe that further research on practices as source of values could benefit a variety of environmental and social fields. CSA are a promising alternative to the conventional food industry that repopulates and shortens production chains and brings tangible benefits for both farmers and consumers by re-embedding economy into social norms and human interactions. CSA focus on building a trusted relationship between producers and consumers answers an unspoken consumer need for transparency and connection long neglected in regular grocery stores. The primary drawback of CSA is the high demand on member time and effort that limits its mass-market viability. As such I believe CSA could become a lighthouse project for greater consumer integration in production and become part of a possible future diverse food regime