Northstar Organics Farm is a NOOA-certified organic farm located on a 10-acre property off Bear Hill Road in Central Saanich. Owned and operated by Shawn Dirksen, the farm has become one of the region’s leading producers of year-round organic vegetables and fruit, supplying households, restaurants, and retailers throughout Greater Victoria.

Shawn grew up on a mixed vegetable and greenhouse farm in Ontario, where he developed a lifelong connection to agriculture. After moving west, he spent seven years farming on Lasqueti Island before joining the Haliburton Community Organic Farm in Saanich. It was there that he began building relationships with local customers, restaurants, and farmers’ markets while refining the intensive organic growing methods that continue to shape Northstar Organics today.

Shawn joined Haliburton Community Organic Farm in 2014, and in 2016, he purchased the farm’s current property in Central Saanich and began transforming it into a highly productive certified organic operation. Today, Northstar Organics features seven greenhouses, one acre of blueberries, and a diverse mix of field crops, all grown with the commitment to building healthy soils through composting, cover cropping, and crop rotation, beneficial insects, biological controls, and preventative growing practices. The combination of greenhouse and field production allows the farm to provide fresh local produce in every season.

The farm comprises eight full-time staff members and additional seasonal employees, producing an impressive variety of 90 different crops from fields and greenhouses, including tomatoes, peppers, shishito peppers, cucumbers, carrots, turnips, onions, salad greens, eggplants, Asian greens, choi, melons, strawberries, blueberries, and much more.

In addition to selling to customers directly at Victoria Farmers Market at Moss Street and Esquimalt Farmers Market, Northstar Organics supplies many of Victoria’s most respected restaurants, currently including End Dive, Janevca, The Arbutus Room, Spinnakers, Inn at Laurel Point, Café Brio, Hey Happy, Charlotte & the Quail, Marilena, Eva Schnitzelhaus, and Nourish, The Drake, Stage, Lumache, and Courtney Room. Their produce is also available through select grocery retailers, including Market Garden, Lifestyles, Local General Store, For Good Measure, and the South Island Farm Hub.

Through innovation, hard work, and a commitment to organic agriculture, Shawn and the Northstar Organics Farm team continue to demonstrate what is possible on a small-scale farm, producing an abundance of fresh, local food while helping strengthen Vancouver Island’s food system.

You can buy produce from Northstar Organics Farm at the Victoria Farmers Market at Moss Street year-round, every Saturday at 10am. They also have an online store for pickup orders at northstar-organics.localline.ca.