What is Care Farming?
Care farming is the use of commercial farms and agricultural landscapes to provide healing, mental health, social, or educational care services through supervised farming activities. Also called social farming or green care farming, it involves structured programs of animal husbandry, crop production, horticulture, woodland management, and related agricultural work. Unlike recreational farming or agritourism, care farms are specifically organized to serve therapeutic purposes for people with defined care needs—from mental health challenges and developmental disabilities to addiction recovery and social isolation.
Care farms operate at the intersection of two traditionally separate domains: agriculture and health care. Participants engage in meaningful farm work—feeding animals, planting vegetables, maintaining woodlands—as a central component of their care plan, not as occupational filler. The farm environment itself is understood as therapeutic, providing rhythm, routine, sensory stimulation, and purposeful contribution within a non-clinical community setting.
Origins & Lineage
The philosophical roots of care farming trace to ancient practices: Hippocrates in classical Greece advocated for nature’s healing power, and medieval European monasteries combined farming with care for the sick and needy. In the 1800s, the moral treatment movement in psychiatry began integrating agricultural work into treatment for mental health patients, emphasizing routine, nature, and productive labor.
Modern care farming emerged most significantly in the Netherlands. The first identifiable care farms appeared there in 1949, growing slowly—roughly one farm per year until 1995. Early initiatives in the 1960s and 1970s were launched primarily by pioneers from the care sector. The first care farms initiated by farmers themselves emerged in the late 20th century. In 1999, the Dutch government established the National Support Centre Agriculture and Care, subsidized jointly by the Ministries of Agriculture and Health, Welfare and Sports. This center developed quality systems, facilitated networking, and legitimized the sector. The number of Dutch care farms exploded from 75 in 1998 to 591 by 2005, making it the fastest-growing sector of multifunctional agriculture in the Netherlands.
In the United Kingdom, the term “care farm” gained traction around 2001, when the foot-and-mouth disease crisis forced farm diversification. The National Care Farming Initiative was founded in 2005, later becoming Care Farming UK in 2011, and merging with the Federation of City Farms and Community Gardens to form Social Farms & Gardens in 2018. By the 2020s, the UK hosted approximately 400 care farms.
In the United States, care farming arrived later and remains less formalized. An early and influential example is Gould Farm in Massachusetts, established in 1913 by Will and Agnes Gould as a residential therapeutic community integrating farming and mental health care. The Care Farming Network, launched in 2021 and hosted by Maryland’s Red Wiggler Care Farm, became the first national U.S. organization supporting care farms, listing over 300 farms by 2025.
How It’s Practiced
Care farms vary widely in structure, population served, and emphasis. Activities include livestock care (cattle, sheep, poultry), vegetable and crop production, beekeeping, forestry, habitat restoration, woodworking, and horticultural therapy. Some farms focus primarily on agricultural production with limited participants; others emphasize care provision with substantial staffing and revenues from health contracts.
Participants—variously called guests, clients, or co-farmers—attend care farms through referrals from social services, mental health teams, schools, probation services, or GPs. Programs can be day-based, residential, or vocational, and are tailored to client groups: people with intellectual or developmental disabilities, mental health conditions (anxiety, depression, schizophrenia), substance use disorders, autism, dementia, youth disengagement, or criminal justice involvement.
Care farms in Europe often operate within formal health and social care systems, with government contracts, insurance reimbursement (as in the Netherlands since 2003 with personal care budgets), and established quality standards. In the U.S., care farms typically lack stable public funding and operate through private pay, grants, or social enterprise revenue.
The theoretical frameworks supporting care farming include attention restoration theory (nature’s cognitive restorative effects), the biophilia hypothesis (innate human-nature connection), therapeutic community models, and recovery-oriented mental health approaches.
Care Farming Today
Care farming is most developed in Northern Europe. The Netherlands has over 1,400 care farms. Norway, Belgium (Flanders), Germany, Ireland, Italy, and Austria have established sectors with national support organizations like the Federation of Dutch Care Farms and Social Farms & Gardens (UK). The Green Care Coalition in the UK advocates for nature-based care as a health and social care option.
In North America, care farming remains nascent. The Care Farming Network lists over 300 U.S. farms but notes the sector lacks cohesive funding streams, policy frameworks, or widespread recognition. Regional efforts include the Southeastern Social Care Farming Collective and mid-Atlantic Care Farming Network. Organizations like PATH, Natural Lifemanship, and EAGALA provide standards for equine-assisted interventions within care farming contexts.
Research evidence is growing: systematic reviews document improvements in depression, anxiety, quality of life, self-esteem, self-efficacy, and social interaction among diverse populations. However, more rigorous, long-term studies are needed to establish care farming as an evidence-based intervention comparable to clinical treatments.
Common Misconceptions
Care farming is not hobby farming or agritourism. It requires intentional therapeutic structure, trained facilitators, and individualized care plans. It is not simply “putting people in nature and hoping for the best,” as Will Gould noted in 1921—it demands active interpretation, community integration, and clinical oversight when appropriate.
Care farming is distinct from horticultural therapy, which is a clinical practice facilitated by registered horticultural therapists with specific treatment goals. Therapeutic horticulture is a broader, community-based practice often delivered by non-clinical facilitators. Care farming encompasses both but integrates them within a working farm environment, emphasizing meaningful agricultural production alongside care.
Care farms do not always involve animals or rural settings. Urban care farms operate in community gardens and allotments. What defines a care farm is the combination of intentional therapeutic intervention within an agricultural or horticultural working environment.
Care farming is not a replacement for psychiatric treatment or medication management in cases of serious mental illness, but rather a complementary or alternative setting for rehabilitation, recovery, and social inclusion.
How to Begin
For individuals seeking care farming, start by consulting the Care Farming Network directory (U.S.), Social Farms & Gardens (UK), or national federations in the Netherlands, Belgium, Norway, or other European countries. Inquire whether your local mental health provider, social services, or disability organization has referral partnerships with care farms.
For farmers or care providers interested in establishing a care farm, resources include the Care Farming Network’s mentorship programs and resource library, Social Farms & Gardens’ online courses on care farming principles, and academic research from Wageningen University (Netherlands) and the University of Essex (UK). Key texts include Farming for Health: Green-Care Farming Across Europe and the United States (Hassink & Van Dijk, 2006) and peer-reviewed journals documenting care farming models, populations served, and outcomes.
Understanding local policy, funding structures (personal care budgets, Medicaid waivers, charitable grants), and quality standards is essential. Successful care farms balance agricultural viability with care delivery, often requiring cross-sector collaboration between health, education, agriculture, and social service systems.