Alice's Farm was founded five years ago through a partnership between the Social Cooperative Alice and the Association of Family Members and Mental Health Supporters of Tuscia (A.fe.SO.psi.t.).
The farm is run by Cooperative Alice and staffed by five disadvantaged workers (hired on regular contracts), one psychologist, one agricultural worker, one operations coordinator, and five civil service volunteers.
Beyond the five permanent employees, Cooperative Alice runs numerous paid internship programs for school-age young people (middle and secondary school students) and post-secondary adults who struggle to find work in the mainstream job market.
The four-hectare farm centers on a main complex with several buildings: a farmhouse containing a shop, office, and two workshop areas; a wine cellar for the farm's own production; and a greenhouse where aromatic herbs and organic vegetable seedlings are grown for the main garden. The organic orchard itself occupies substantial space. There are roughly 150 olive trees. Other sections house facilities for strictly organic poultry farming and equestrian activities. The farm also keeps a small herd of goats and pigs, several donkeys, and various farmyard birds—peacocks, ducks, and others.
The farm's coordinator explained the thinking behind this deliberately diverse operation: to create work for people with different kinds of disabilities and needs, to expand the range of tasks required to run the farm, and to match workers to jobs suited to their level of independence.
Each workday begins with everyone gathering at a board that lists the day's tasks. Some are routine—feeding and caring for animals, cleaning shelters, maintaining water supplies. Others are seasonal—pruning trees, pulling weeds. Work assignments follow each person's abilities and strengths as much as possible.
The five permanent employees work independently because they completed an initial internship of several months. During work hours, the agricultural supervisor oversees the more delicate operations, while civil service volunteers provide hands-on support.
The farm's reliance on manual labor and organic methods serves two purposes. Environmentally, it's the right choice. Practically, it keeps workers safe from the pesticides and toxic chemicals that conventional farms rely on—a crucial consideration when your workers live with psychiatric and cognitive disabilities. The production methods balance two demands: the farm must sell quality products to survive economically, and it must genuinely include workers with mental health challenges and cognitive limitations. Here's how this works in practice. For the olive groves, soil tilling is contracted out (the farm owns no heavy machinery); pruning is done by the agricultural worker with disabled workers gathering and stacking branches. Fertilizing is done entirely by the workers themselves (with an assistant supervising) who spread compost by shovel and wheelbarrow around each tree trunk. Weeding is done by hand—by the disabled workers alone. Harvest brings everyone in; more hands means faster work.
Garden work particularly suits this model. Workers with disabilities can follow each stage actively—from soil prep through direct sales at the farm shop—and see the value of their own labor. The shop itself anchors the farm's connection to the wider world.
But the shop isn't the only link. Alice's Farm is also part of a network of educational farms. School groups of all ages visit to learn about organic agriculture and meet the workers.
What Is a Social Cooperative?
A social cooperative is an enterprise designed to serve the general interests of the community, to promote human dignity, and to integrate citizens into society... (Article 1, Law 381/91). There are two types. Type A cooperatives run social, health, and educational services. Type B cooperatives pursue community benefit and social integration through productive work that creates jobs for socially disadvantaged people—former drug users, recovering alcoholics, formerly incarcerated people, people with mental illness, people with disabilities, youth at risk, and others.
How It Began
In 1997, after repeated requests to the local health authority, A.fe.SO.psi.t. organized a vocational training course in floriculture and landscape design and maintenance for people with mental health conditions. The course was held at Cooperative Alice. To build on this success, the cooperative looked for employment pathways, working with nearby municipalities and local health units. After several positive placements, and thanks to landowners who donated property at symbolic cost, Cooperative Alice and the parents' association launched Alice's Farm as an agricultural enterprise.
Cooperative Alice operates several centers running diverse programs for people with various mental health conditions. Its mission: agricultural, industrial, commercial, and service work that employs disadvantaged people. It works across five sectors: agriculture, food service, graphic design, and personal services.
Department of Agroforestry and Rural Environmental Economics
