RIP Chris Bedford, Michigan activist and filmmaker.
Getting Real about Food & the Future from Christopher B. Bedford on Vimeo.
Vermont Enhancing Farmers Markets with Evaluation Tools
What: Enhancing Farmers’ Markets with Evaluation Tools
When: Monday June 20. 11 am – 2 pm
Where: Vermont Agency of Agriculture Conference Room, 116 State Street, Montpelier, VT
Note: We will provide coffee, tea, and light refreshments
Led by Market Trainer/Researcher Darlene Wolnik, sponsored by NOFA-VT
Michael Pollan explains food chains
A great video to embed on your market websites or in your email newsletters. Simply explained for many audiences.
A town’s new agricultural plan
Thanks to our friends the Greenhorns (well in the way that all farmers are our friends, not like we share a car or anything like that), we heard about this town named Cato in New York that has adopted a comprehensive agricultural plan to preserve farmland for the future. The town has 13 strategies, including conservation easements, the adoption of a Right-To-Farm Law and changes in zoning.
Read about it on the Greenhorns site “The Irresistible Fleet of Bicycles” where they blog well about food and community.
Cooking Up A Story
The opening of the 2010 Portland Farmers Market is filmed and then found on Hulu.
Farmers market from a farmers perspective
Map of shrinking food deserts in Pittsburgh
this map shows smaller food deserts in the summer, when farmers markets are open. I find the new graduate student focus on farmers markets fascinating. It seems since so many probably grew up with the latest iterations, they assume their longevity. Glad of that.
Not sure its news that food deserts shrink when markets are open. Although, if it helps officialdom realize that we open farmers markets where they are needed, it could help.
I do prefer the Diego Rose (Louisiana Public Health Institute) definition of “food swamps” rather than food deserts to be more descriptive usually. Meaning areas swamped with bad food, rather than no food.
The Real Dirt on Farmer John-The Movie
How did I miss this movie?
A must-see movie for all food organizers. Farmer’s mind, farmer’s point of view.
Commodity farming, artist colonies, devil cult paranoia, homeopathic remedies, Rudolf Steiner, CSAs, body image remade by picking tomatoes, cancer, love, Mexico, giant bee costumes, community barn raising, and John’s mother Anna Peterson are all shared.
Independent Lens
Objectified-The Movie
A movie that looks at industrial design through designers explanations and theories. Well worth your time. You might be asking, why is this a post on a public market blog?
I believe that engineering of the market space itself is something in which many market organizers and vendors excel. Add to that how many innovate by designing/inventing new systems or appropriate tools when necessary.
So, designers? Yes, another title for a market organizer…
Two great quotes from the movie:
“If we understand what the extremes are, the middle will take care of itself.”
“Let’s put great design into everyday things.”
Some younger people expect to pay more for heathier options when dining out
A study by The NPD Group reveals that when dining out, Americans do not expect to pay more for healthier food. According to the study, nine percent of all restaurant visits are based on a customers’ desire for lighter or healthier fare (down from 10 percent in 2007). The results did vary a bit by generation, with over half of consumers aged 25 to 49 years old expecting to pay the same price for healthier items and standard fare. Thirty percent of consumers aged 18 to 24 would be willing to pay more for healthy menu items.
Super Cooperators
Am reading a new book by Martin A. Nowak titled “Super Cooperators” which explores the ways and reasons humans cooperate. I picked this up because it seemed to correlate to the work I was involved with when at marketumbrella.org, measuring social capital with their NEED tool. NEED (still in pilot but I believe getting closer to an online tool like SEED) measures the quality and quantity of transactions within market communities (included neighbors who feel its impact) to get at levels of trust. Trust is a proxy for social capital. Adding social capital to markets is important because it means behavior change is possible.
So, in markets, engineering cooperation is the main activity used to add trust. The market organization is essentially using direct reciprocity, indirect reciprocity, and spatial laws to add levels of cooperation-all terms learned from this book.
I like the author’s definition of cooperation:
The willingness to give something up in order for someone else to receive a benefit.
In a sentence, this may describe the positive transactional nature of markets rather than a roadside stand or a storefront. The multiplicity of vendors often directly competing yet cooperating, shows a sophisticated awareness of the need to offer choice to shoppers and on another level, cooperating as a community to add innovation or programs lead markets to a more successful future.
Helping Farmers Markets Grow 