Oya Organics
Photo by Brenton Gieser
SIZE:
20 acres
YEARS IN BUSINESS:
7 years
PRODUCTS:
Diverse vegetables, including heirloom tomatoes, summer squash, fennel, and leafy greens
MARKETS:
CSA, farmers’ markets, and wholesale
COUNTY:
San Benito
Growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area, Marsha Habib didn’t initially see herself becoming a farmer, though she had agricultural connections. When she was younger she visited her grandparents’ subsistence rice farm in Japan. Later, she took a gap year before enrolling in UC Berkeley, volunteering at Hidden Villa and traveling to Switzerland and France with the WWOOF program (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms).
These experiences, along with her agroecology and conservation studies at UC Berkeley and abroad, led her to understand the struggles faced by small farmers and rural communities. After graduating, Marsha was a farm apprentice at the Center for Agroecology and Sustainable Farming Systems at UC Santa Cruz, an AmeriCorps volunteer at Santa Clara University’s BUG (Bronco Urban Garden) program, and a student at ALBA (Agriculture and Land-Based Training Association) in Salinas. It was through these farming programs that Marsha learned how to operate a farm.
She sub-leased a 1-acre plot of land in San Benito County, growing food while bringing together college students and local farm workers to share conversations, meals, and field trips. The food from this small farm was donated and sold to underserved populations at a farm stand at a community center in San Jose.
After the AmeriCorps project ended, Marsha continued farming, founding Oya Organics, a small diversified organic farm in Hollister. Currently, she works with 4 employees, growing mixed vegetable crops on a 20-acre plot. Though she grows over 50 crop varieties, Oya Organic’s main crops are tomatoes and squash in the summer and fennel and leafy greens in the winter. Marsha markets produce through a CSA program, wholesale clients like Coke Farms, and at Bay Area farmers’ markets. After all these years in agriculture, Marsha’s focus remains on farming at a small scale.
Profiled by the Santa Clara County Food System Alliance in their Small Farms, Big Potential report from 2020.
“I don’t want us to get big and just keep growing and growing. I want to be at a scale where I know every acre of the farm and have a personal relationship with the plants and employees.”