Shanghai: Half City, Half Pastoral Dream
Letian Haiwan Farm in Fengxian, Shanghai, is decidedly not your typical eco-farm.
When I arrived for my internship this past March, I immediately sensed this place differed from my preconceptions of agriculture: it wasn’t simply about growing crops, but also involved leasing land and hosting events. You couldn’t help but remark: typical Shanghai, really. Even a farm here is managed with such elaborate flair.
Spanning over 80 mu (roughly 5.3 hectares), the farm dedicates more than 40 mu to woodland and 20 mu to shared facilities. The remaining 20 mu have been brought under cultivation and divided into either caravanning pitches or tiny plots—roughly a tenth or half-tenth of an acre each—which are leased to members. The farm’s staff typically tend these vegetable beds, though members may either drive down to harvest their own produce or opt for doorstep delivery for a small fee.
During my three months here, all manner of unexpected stories unfolded, giving me a rare vantage point to observe the interplay between urban life and the soil, and to reflect on my own path.
I. Starting with a Single Tomato
Yet transplanting the seedlings is merely the first step. The newly planted tomatoes require watering both on the day they go into the ground and the following day. You cannot simply hose them down; instead, I find myself repeatedly squatting and rising, drawing water into a watering can. Under the harsh sun, fatigue sets in quickly. Even once planted, seedlings may fail to thrive due to weather, soil conditions, or pests, necessitating replacement. In total, you will need to replant roughly three times to ensure each bed maintains a viable number of young plants.
I once considered tagging a single tomato seedling to observe what it takes for it to survive. Long before the fruit ripened, however, I was struck by the sheer tedium of the routine: raising seedlings, clearing the beds, turning the soil, applying fertiliser, digging planting holes, watering, transplanting, watering again on the day of planting and the next, replanting three separate times, more watering, tying support strings, pruning side shoots, retightening the strings, further pruning, and finally covering with protective netting.
After all that toil, provided you are fortunate enough to avoid birds snatching them, you might finally enjoy a perfectly ripe tomato. Because the farm does not rely on conventional chemical pesticides, however, setbacks are frequent: you might finally spot a deeply crimson tomato, only to pick it and find the underside has already been eaten away.
II. Is a modest plot enough to feed a family of three?
Consequently, although these families harvest vegetables at the farm, they still need to regularly draw on food supply systems outside it. What their food choices reveal is the social reality of the consumers themselves: children attend school, making morning meal preparation too rushed; work commitments leave no time for cooking lunch; and while evenings allow for cooking, eating only the farm’s limited output day after day would quickly grow monotonous. Behind the weekly farm visit lies the everyday routine propped up by online grocery retailers and supermarkets.
I once asked them whether they weren’t worried about food safety when buying vegetables from outside sources. The usual response is that while they are concerned, they have little choice. For a start, buying purely organic produce is prohibitively expensive; secondly, they simply cannot tell much difference between organic and conventional vegetables.
Admittedly, whether organic vegetables are genuinely more nutritious or flavourful remains uncertain. What is certain, however, is that the farm’s production methods aid ecological conservation—a point that consumers do not weigh heavily. Beyond personal food safety, broader considerations such as caring for our shared living spaces and the wider environment are rarely factored in. For most people, purchasing decisions are ultimately driven by personal, practical concerns.
III. The Pastoral Ideal and Commercial Reality
Food is far from the only reason they come here. The plot also fulfils the romanticised vision of rural life held by many city dwellers: harvesting fresh vegetables straight from the ground, enjoying natural scenery that is a world away from the urban sprawl, and giving children a chance to connect with the outdoors.
It is precisely this romanticised ideal that explains why some members, after renting a plot for two or three years, still cannot identify a corn seedling or tell which greens are edible and which are not. That 5,000-yuan annual fee does not necessarily reflect a deep appreciation for the land or the labour it requires. Rather, the vegetables are simply bundled with other lifestyle perks they value, and together these form the underlying motivation for every transaction.
To meet these expectations, the farm has to do much more than just grow crops: keeping the grounds tidy, providing spaces and facilities for recreation, and hiring extra hands to help members with their plots. On top of that, the farm must rely on supplementary income from nature education and other activities to make up for the shortfall in agricultural revenue. This means those dedicated to farming need to pick up skills in marketing, education, and customer service, becoming true all-rounders and investing far more of their energy and care.
Fortunately, after months of dialogue and adjustment, the romanticised vision of rural life and the realities on the ground have gradually merged. Among the membership, there are certainly those who genuinely care about the farm and have a true stake in this land.
When packing the vegetable boxes on rainy days, the roots of leafy greens are caked in mud and certainly look rather messy, yet no member has ever complained. If a batch isn’t trimmed to perfection, or if adverse weather means we can only deliver a limited selection for a while, there’s rarely any grumbling. With the recent heat, greens wilt almost as soon as they’re picked, let alone what condition they’re in by the time they reach customers the following day.
I’m fairly certain that if these members were shopping elsewhere, they’d gladly opt for pre-washed, perfectly trimmed produce. If we were to stock the farm’s vegetables in a high street shop, they might not even glance at them. One member once confessed that when shopping at a supermarket, they’d always queue early for the freshest stock, insisting that even a night’s delay was unacceptable.
Yet now, at least some of our consumers are beginning to shift their perspective through their connection with the farm’s land and harvests. They’re learning to identify out-of-season produce and embracing the idea of eating with the seasons. They’re also coming to understand that summer greens are naturally prone to insect damage, and can reasonably infer that the pristine-looking leaves on supermarket shelves are almost certainly pesticide-treated.
IV. Will You Stay?
Indeed, whether they are interns or consumers, many feel adrift in the city, struggling to find a sense of purpose. Despite holding seemingly respectable positions, they often find themselves reduced to mere cubicle-bound number-crunchers—which is precisely why they come to the farm in search of a grounded, down-to-earth existence.
The consumers, at least, have found their sense of purpose. Visiting the farm every weekend—or even once a month—to unwind and share in the joy of the harvest offers them an anchor of stability amidst a life otherwise suffused with anxiety and uncertainty. It even helps them rebuild their urban connections: by sharing the farm’s eco-friendly vegetables with neighbours they barely know, they are weaving new social networks.
The interns, however, may still be on the road. I once asked the farm’s founder, Teacher Yuan, whether those who abandon established careers for agriculture do so because greater life experience has clarified their desires, enabling them to shrug off societal expectations and external judgment. His answer was that it has little to do with age, and everything to do with personal intention. Some may appear young, yet have known exactly what they want since the very start.
For myself and the other interns, our visions of the future remain somewhat hazy; we are still weighing our options. Navigating the space between the city and the pastoral dream requires strategy and adaptability from the farm itself, and interns like me are no different. Take one intern who declared a desire to “rebel” by stepping off the conventional track, arriving to work in agriculture—a field their parents viewed as having no future prospects. Yet they still selected Letian, an unconventional farm aligned with their academic background, hoping to acquire skills transferable to other professions.
Reflecting on this farm experience, I see it as having offered a temporary breathing space, setting me apart from a society that worships material wealth. Having truly felt the toil of working the land, I’ve begun to genuinely value food, taking only what I can finish at the table. Even since returning to university, that sense of separation hasn’t abandoned me; it continues to ground me, preserving my inner resolve and a clear head. The farm operates as a brief sanctuary and a place to recharge. Although you eventually return to your former routine, you carry away lessons drawn from the soil. Those lessons linger, and over time, they may well inspire you to dedicate yourself to this field.
Foodthink Author | Xiao Cui