Truly Local

No Surprise: Farmers Market Shoppers Expect Local Produce

Apologists for the practice of allowing peddlers of wholesale produce into "farmers markets" insist that shoppers at the venues want variety and don't particularly care where the food comes from. That self-serving excuse is poppycock, as a survey of farmers market shoppers in Ontario confirms.

According to a press release about the findings, "Customers feel a strong sense of community and local pride in attending farmers' markets.... The market customer is uniquely sensitive to the need to support local primary producers. (62% feel this is extremely important, 30% feel it is somewhat important.)"

The study was conducted by Farmers Markets Canada, chaired by Bob Chorney, who has been on a mission in recent years to clean up Canada's peddler-ridden farmers markets.

'Hucksters and Peddlers Are Evil. They Really Are.'

Robert Chorney, executive director of Farmers Market Ontario, got so fed up with the proliferation of peddlers reselling wholesale produce at most so-called “farmers markets” in the province that he started two new grower-only markets at the start of this summer. He had helplessly watched as peddling proliferated, particularly in the greater Toronto area. He was unable to act, even though he directs an association that claims 115 of the 135 farmers markets in Ontario as members, because FMO is a marketing, lobbying and grant administering organization with no authority to set or enforce rules at any of the local venues. The two new markets are the only ones that are directly managed by FMO, and apparently, they are the only markets in the greater Toronto area with strict rules against reselling.

In early September, I gave Chorney a call to find out how things have gone this summer. Considering that this is their first year, the markets have done well, he replied. There have been about 25 or 30 stalls at each market -- in the Liberty Village neighborhood every Sunday morning and in Woodbine every Friday afternoon. The markets, which will stay open through October, have gotten good local press and have drawn decent crowds. The concept has been so well received that four or five other communities have contacted Chorney about starting a grower-only market of their own next year. There likely will be several more next year, if he can recruit enough growers, Chorney said. Here’s what else he had to say, in response to my questions.

What sort of feedback have you gotten from customers?

“Our crowds have been incredibly supportive, and the fact that they verbalize it so much is wonderful. It’s really heartwarming to have any number of shoppers come up to us and say, ‘I’m so happy you’re here. God, this was long overdue. It’s so nice to be able to talk to farmers. I used to shop at such and such a market. I don’t go there anymore because the more this got talked about, the more I realized that half of those people aren’t even farmers’.”

Has the spread of peddling in markets in the area significantly hurt the real Ontario farmers?

“Oh, yes. Some of those markets with resellers have knocked the farmers right out. The farmers have said, ‘To hell with it. If the organizers want to have these people here, then let them have it.’ The real farmers have gone home. I’ve talked to farmers who have said, ‘This is my last year, I’ve had enough.’ Those hucksters and peddlers are evil. They really are. Produce is big business. They buy and sell the stuff. They pose as farmers. It’s really insidious in some of these markets.”

How have other farmers markets in Ontario responded to what you’re doing?

“This was our way of sending a very strong message not only to shoppers and to those huckster and peddlers and resellers, but to our members that there is a right way and a wrong way to run markets. There was a bit of a backlash from some of our members. They thought we were criticizing them. We said, no, if you have some of those resellers, why don’t you deal with it.”

What response have you gotten from the farmers?

“Our bar is set very high, as far as vendor participation. I hate to use this term but I think we’ve smoked out some farmers who grow but who also do a lot of supplementation. We know that the farmers left in our markets grow 100 percent of the things they bring.”

Are there enough farmers producing enough crops for more markets?

“That’s the big challenge. Over the winter, we’re looking at engaging someone on a part-time basis to do some recruiting at farm trade shows. It’s a learning exercise for farmers generally to see how high we set the bar and how serious we are about it.”

It must have also been a learning experience for shoppers. Do they understand that there may not be any local tomatoes even on a summery day in June?

“It’s beautiful when a shopper would come to us and say, ‘Why don’t you have any sweet corn, it's late June.'  We would say, 'Madam, the first crop of corn in Ontaria is coming out of the fields on July 7, 8, or 10th, in that range, not a day before.' She would say, 'Well, I bought sweet corn at a farmers market the other day.' We would say, 'Yes ma'm, but do you know where that sweet corn came from?' 'Well, I assume Ontario.' 'No, that corn's from Georgia.' We know because we've been tracking it. As we have those opportunities to make those points, it's really gratifying because when people are getting the proper information, they’ve been very supportive.”

Law Needed to Halt Cheating, Farm Union Official Says

Grant Robertson, a senior official with the National Farmers Union-Ontario, weighs in with a plea for reclaiming "farmers markets" in Canada for Canadian farmers. He doesn't mention the move afoot in Toronto to promote new farmers markets that are for farmers only, but he's no doubt supportive.

Robertson has gotten an earful from angry consumers:

"As the Ontario Coordinator of the NFU, I have fielded a number of calls, emails and community event discussions with consumers who feel ripped off. They attend some of these markets because they want to buy directly from farmers so they know their food purchases are directed to the people who grew or raised their food, not to others in the food system who have doubled and tripled and then doubled again their retail price over the last number of years while still paying farmers 1970 prices. When these consumers find out many, some, most (it depends on the location) of the supposed farmers' market vendors at a few of these markets are not producers at all they feel cheated and sceptical of all vendors in all markets. Truth is, the closest some of these re-sellers get to a farm is passing farm laneways on their drive to the food terminal.

"It is time for government to step in and act....It seems it is now time to enshrine in law the term 'farmers' market'. If you want to use that term you should have to have the overwhelming majority of your vendors be primary food producers –- farmers...."

A Third of 'Farmers' at Toronto Markets Resell Produce

Jennifer Bain, the food editor for the Toronto Star, says "keeping it Canadian" ain't easy. For Canadians who want to buy food from local farmers whenever possible, it doesn't help that most of the so-called "farmers markets" in the Toronto area can't be trusted to sell only local produce. They are filled with folks who have no qualms about selling produce that they bought wholesale, trucked in from who knows where. Nevermind that customers are drawn to the folksy outdoor "farmers markets" because they think they're buying fresh-picked produce brought in directly from local farms.

In a column in May, Bain wrote about the launch of two new farmers markets in Toronto that have given shoppers a truly local alternative. The founder of the new markets, Bob Chorney, told Bain that 30 per cent of vendors overall at so-called farmers markets in the greater Toronto area are resellers.

Bain found a vendor in one Toronto market who vigorously defended reselling. Deborah Cauz from Sherway Gardens Farmers' Market told Bain in an emailed answer to a question:

"Why is the Ontario Food Terminal considered to be a dirty word or cop out? It is the primary means of distributing food grown in Ontario and has a dedicated farmers' market section to facilitate this."

Hmmm. So selling wholesale produce at "farmers markets" is such a well-established racket in Toronto that the wholesale terminal has a section set up to cater to the hucksters? I wonder if they also supply them with faux-dirt-stained workshirts and bits of straw to sprinkle in their hair.

Cauz insisted that buying from what she called "food terminal vendors" is "legitimate and without false pretense." Most of the resold stuff comes from Ontario anyway, grown by local farmers who simply couldn't bring their crop to market themselves, Cauz asserted.

Bain wasn't buying it:

"Some resellers sell items that obviously aren't from around here (bananas, mangos and the like). Others resell American corn or strawberries just before the Canadian version is available. Shoppers, even savvy ones, don't always realize what's going on.....

"If I want Ontario produce that's bought wholesale and then resold for retail prices, I'll go to supermarkets or greengrocers because they're stocked with goods from the Ontario Food Terminal.

"At farmers' markets, I want the farmers to get retail prices. And since there's limited space at these markets, I'd like the slots to go to farmers, especially the small-scale ones who don't already sell at the Ontario Food Terminal. If there's a reseller there, I want their booth labelled as such. If they're selling U.S. produce, I want that made clear.

"Call me picky. Call me a purist. But I care about what I eat and where it's from."

Real Farmers Take on Hucksters in Ontario

What better way to inaugurate this new blog about farmers market integrity than with good news from Ontario, Canada. Led by a group called Farmers Markets Ontario, real farmers are revolting against the proliferation of produce outlets that are "farmers markets" in name only by creating "something rarely seen in the rest of Canada –- certified farmers’ markets."

The organizers of the two "Real Farmers, Real Local" certified farmers markets in the Toronto area -- in the Liberty Village neighborhood every Sunday morning and in Woodbine every Friday afternoon through October -- are also speaking candidly about an issue that's taboo in many markets. The dirty secret, belying the hype about buying local, is that all too much of the produce peddled in farmers markets has been trucked across the continent to the wholesale markets where the so-called farmers load up their pickup trucks with the stuff -- sometimes buying it at cut-rate prices because it's blemished, overripe or otherwise not up to the standards required by supermarkets! Consumers are cheated and real farmers also lose.That's what prompted the organizers of the two new markets in Ontario to act.

"During the summer of 2006, it became very clear to Farmers’ Markets Ontario (FMO), that something needed to be done to combat the growing number of resellers or hucksters that had infiltrated and in some cases, were dominating, some of the markets in the Greater Toronto area. Farmers were being literally squeezed out of existing markets by resellers who continued to glut the market with food terminal sell-offs and in some cases, told there was no room for them to sell at market. Recognizing that most market operators would not soon purge their markets of resellers, hucksters and ‘produce-jockeys,’ FMO studied the Greenmarket program in New York City and the State of California Certification program where all farmers are certified and where all vendors at market are ‘the real thing.’"

The managers of the new markets in Toronto will take steps to assure that shoppers who come to their markets will be getting the real thing -- produce that is truly locally grown by real local farmers. As the mission statement asserts:

"All farms will be inspected by an independent farm inspector, hired by FMO. There is zero tolerance for the reselling of products that have not been grown by the vendor....

"By signing a compliance agreement with FMO where guarantees are
provided as to the vendor’s authenticity as a farmer, the vendor
acknowledges that false or misleading statements shall constitute
fraud and subject to the appropriate legal ramifications and/or
remedies."