That is what we need in India...

A village on the western fringes of Hampshire is well on the way to becoming the first in England to defy the power of the supermarkets by achieving communal self-sufficiency in food.

The parish of Martin lies on good agricultural land beneath the chalk downs of Cranborne Chase. In past centuries, its 164 households would have been sustained by the output of local farms and dairies. But, over the last 60 years, the dairies closed and the farmers directed their harvests towards the vast hoppers of agro-industry. The people of Martin continued to be surrounded by fields growing food, but none of it reached their plates. And after the village shop closed in 1982, they had to travel to buy provisions.

Nick Snelgar, who earns a living from growing herbs and shrubs near his home in Martin, thought it was crazy that he could not eat local produce. "It would be fresher, tastier and more nutritious than anything from the supermarket and I thought it could be cheaper too if we organised to cut out the middlemen," he says. "Farmers' markets tend to be expensive niche providers for the few. I wanted a system to provide local food for the many."

He organised a meeting in the village social club in 2003, and from it came the nucleus of enthusiasts who have organised the producer co-operative that is now feeding most of Martin's residents.

Futurefarms grows 45 types of vegetables in two fields in the village. Within the fields, two acres are set aside for rearing free-range pigs. Chicken runs are moved regularly across the bigger field and the rest of the land is grazed by sheep. Chickens, lamb and pork are sold alongside vegetables at a Saturday morning market in the village hall throughout the year.

In the early years, the food was produced entirely by voluntary labour, and Martin remains a village full of people on rotas for various horticultural and stock-rearing tasks. But Futurefarms, which is a not-for-profit growers' co-operative, now has an annual turnover of £36,000 and can afford to employ four part-time staff.

Snelgar says 60% of the households in Martin use the co-op to supply at least some of their food. It is not trying to expand production to sell elsewhere because that would miss the point. "We are not interested in the wholesale market. We are only interested in the Martin market," he says.

So far the co-op has signed up 126 of the village's families as members. They pay £5 a year, but can escape the charge by volunteering for seven hours' work. They make no commitment to buy the produce, so the co-op has to remain competitive on quality and price.

Snelgar's dream is for each village to combine co-operatively to employ a food grower with as much status as the local teacher or doctor. He says: "I don't want to kill off supermarkets. They should continue to do what they do best: provide toilet rolls and manufactured products that do not deteriorate when transported."

The Futurefarms operation avoids the use of chemical sprays and artificial fertilisers, but it cannot claim to be organic. Its main 15-acre field is on former set-aside land that was regularly doused in weedkiller by a previous owner. Yet the Soil Association, which polices organic values, regards the co-op as an inspiring example of how a small community can combine to produce food locally.

The association's annual conference, opening in Birmingham today, will seek to challenge the hi-tech vision of British farming espoused by John Beddington, the government's chief scientist. Beddington has called for increased production to counter a "perfect storm" of food shortages that could become a global threat by 2030.

Bonnie Hewson, the Soil Association's projects director, says the global scale of the problem should not deter people from making a valuable local contribution. "The Futurefarms experiment is an inspiring example of how a small group without much funding can do its own thing in a small corner of England, and do it well.

"People are sick of being told to worry about food. They need to feel empowered. We know of lots of alternative local food systems that are sustainable, resilient, viable and principled. They may not be able to solve the global problem, but they can say: 'Nothing we are doing will stand people in worse stead.'"


Gold award

Across Britain, scores of local food projects are supported by the Soil Association, often in coalition with other groups. In Dorset, the Local Food Links scheme is providing hot lunches to 23 primary schools in Bridport and Blandford. It was the first catering company to win the association's gold award for sourcing at least 50% of the ingredients locally and using at least 30% organic produce.

The school meals venture was triggered by the Jamie Oliver television series that led the government to order all schools to serve hot meals by September 2008. This posed a problem for Dorset county council, which had decommissioned all its primary school kitchens in the 1980s. It contracted a factory in Nottingham to supply cheap frozen readymeals that were trucked to Dorset and reheated. Tim Crabtree set up the Local Food Links scheme in Bridport to provide a healthier, local alternative. It is now supplying similar meals to four care homes for older people and a day centre.

Crabtree admits he relies on charitable grants to break even on school meals at £2 a head. The care homes will pay £4 and that should be enough to make the operation sustainable, financially and ecologically.

Crabtree started one of Britain's first farmers' markets. He expected producers and consumers to share the benefits of shortening the supply chain. "But most of the gains were captured by the producers," he says. "We have seen a polarisation in food. There are niche organic outlets for those who can afford it, but most people end up with food at low cost and low nutritional value. We think we can do something about that in institutions serving people who need high-quality food."