Author: D.W.

Market Forces Report is released

Michigan: “UCS released the report just a few days before the 12th annual U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) National Farmers Market Week, which starts Sunday. According to the report, “Market Forces: Creating Jobs through Public Investment in Local and Regional Food Systems,” the number of farmers markets nationwide more than doubled between 2000 and 2010, jumping from 2,863 to 6,132, and now more than 100,000 farms sell food directly to local consumers.”

Source: Huron Daily Tribune

Download the report here:
Report

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Farmers Market Coalition visits Oregon City Farmers Market to kick off FM week

Stacy Miller, Executive Director of Farmers Market Coalition kicks off National Farmers Market week in Oregon.
Story

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Healthy eating costs money. but the good news is…

“There are increasingly more farmer’s markets offering fresh fruits and vegetables in low income neighborhoods where before it would have cost residents to travel for healthy food choices.”

Story

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Off to Portland Oregon

I travel this evening to Ecotopia (read the description of the area in the book “The Nine Nations of North America”) to work with my colleagues at the Community Food Security Coalition (CFSC), and as a bonus, to meet up with the fine folks from Farmers Market Coalition (FMC) who will be also be traveling to the area.
As many probably know, I serve as a board member of CFSC. It is an amazing organization that puts on the best food conferences and its crackerjack staff has a myriad of projects going to support many different organizations, like FMC and their Learning Circle project (more on that later) that I will be able to work on as well.
Check out both of their websites:

CFSC

FMC

Pictures and updates from the Renewable Region over the next few days…

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“Fair Food”? I’d say not…

“Cotton candy, corn dogs and candy apples once ruled the midway at the local fair, but visitors now want food that’s exotic—as long as it’s on a stick…”

Maybe the national farmers market movement needs to do a top 10 food items list. That side-by-side comparison with this one would show once again how the industrial food system is obsessed with caloric count and additives versus alternative food’s obsession with taste and healthy foods.

Although let me say that fairs have a place in local food systems, and it might be time for farmers market organizers to saunter over to the exhibition area and shake a few hands, or hand out some flyers to the seniors heading to the exit…

Wacky Fair Foods

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More on food trucks

I recently posted a story about Seattle’s new food truck laws. This msnbc story covers that in detail and also adds some of other cities that are just trying to figure it out. Nice to see cities paying attention to start ups, but will we see McDonald’s carts in the future too?
Food trucks

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Session proposals for 2012 Main Street conference

2012 National Main Streets Conference: Rediscover Main Street

Over the past year a constant theme heard locally and nationally is the trend of retailers – including “big box” stores –moving away from strip malls and back downtown. Businesses are not alone either. Residents and visitors are also choosing more traditional locations. In Baltimore we will continue to showcase the power of preservation-based economic and community development and to provide education and networking opportunities to help businesses, governments, residents and visitors Rediscover Main Street.

The National Trust Main Street Center is seeking session proposals designed to help inform, inspire ideas, and explore methods and best practices to capitalize on this growing trend and to encourage the rediscovery of what Main Street has known for decades – preservation as economic development works! Read more about submitting a proposal for the 2012 National Main Streets Conference here
Deadline: August 26, 2011

Contact the National Trust Main Street Center:
1785 Massachusetts Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20036
202.588.6219 | mainstreet@nthp.org | http://www.mainstreet.org/

The National Trust for Historic Preservation is a private, nonprofit membership organization providing leadership, education, advocacy, and resources to save America’s diverse historic places and revitalize our communities.

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Watch the healthy people shop

This seems to me to the kind of tip that would work so well in a market newsletter; maybe ask a Board member or a volunteer or a farmer to offer some tips for shopping at your market.Story

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Black farmers settlement under fire

Black Farmers settlement targeted

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Seattle expands food truck rules

Many cities are feeling the pressure from both the entrepreneurs who want to start new businesses and from the restaurants and coffeehouses that see these mobile vendors as competition that are allowed to live without the hassle of the rules of a storefront.
Interesting that Seattle is expanding the area for these trucks, not restricting them.

Seattle Food Trucks

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Reuseable bag reminder

The tip I read in Larry Leach’s HuffPostcolumn gave yesterday is another excellent idea for markets with chalk or dry wipe signs at their entrances:

I also have yet to see a retailer place a reminder sign on their entrance, “Did you remember your reusable bag?” Now that would show shoppers they care for the environment, especially if they GAVE you a reusable bag with their logo on it.

His advice is often geared to the small business with sensible tips and ideas for all sizes. Do yourself a favor, get a board member or a volunteer to subscribe to his blog’s RSS.

Larry Leach is an advertising sales rep for 11 Calgary Community Newsletters and the British Canadian newspaper. He is chair of ARTICS a Calgary based education group, publicity director for Crossroads Community Association and past president of Deerfoot Soccer.
His advertising blog (2011 Canadian Weblog Awards Nominee) can be found at larrytheadman.blogspot.com

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Meat-Eaters Guide

As markets find more ways to measure themselves, natural capital will have to be an important category. Yet, the local food system is not always the lowest user of energy (sometimes the lack of centralization in distribution seems to work against us) but of course, we know that will balance out by the green style of shopping, innovative farming, and intentional planning of the market organizers. An example such as the Crescent City Farmers Market which no longer sells plastic bottles of water, but simply filters water and offers it free or sells a reusable cup to those who forget theirs. In many ways, markets should work hardest on the environmental issues of farming and consumerism, because they come the hardest.
Environmental Working Group has released a carbon footprint for meat eaters. It may be worthwhile to link or to print for your shoppers and farmers to read through. As usual, we don’t need to preach but to lead with information and allow people to make good healthy choices.
EWG

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Rice in Vermont

One of the most important roles for farmers markets is to encourage this type of innovation and allow the farmer a feedback loop from a diverse group of shoppers.
However, the story doesn’t say where the original grant came from though.

Rice in Vermont

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