Farmers' Markets: to Regulate or Incentivise?

For a variety of reasons, organic farmers and growers have always been interested in farmers� markets. While they may be of no substantial interest to the biggest of commercial producers, many of the smaller food producers like them for a variety of reasons.

Organics has always been about the consumer getting to know more about the product, and farmers� markets are a good vehicle to do this.

Along with the rise in farmers� markets, the rise in cynicism about these markets has occurred. Dublin-based, or perhaps Dublin obsessed commentators seem fixated with the price of food at farmers� markets, as if they are all held in Brooklodge, or south county Dublin.

In reality, many farmers� markets are better value for what you get than many of the alternatives. I know this because I shop at a few rural ones regularly, and I�ve studied them as an academic for five or so years. This involved visiting dozens all over Ireland.

But people are funny about the price of food. Especially people who don�t often frequent places like farmers� markets.

Here�s a few lines from the excellent Omnivore�s Dilemma book by Michael Pollan, in which the now iconic Joel Salatin talks about the price and the value of the food in his farm shop:

�When someone drives up to the farm in a BMW and asks me why our eggs cost more, well, first I try not to get mad. Frankly, any city person who doesn�t think I deserve a white-collar salary as a farmer doesn�t deserve my special food. Let them eat E Coli. But I don�t say that. Instead, I take him outside and point at his car: �Sir, you clearly understand quality and are willing to pay for it. Well, food is no different: you get what you pay for��.

This is not to say that there aren�t issues facing local food. These issues can boil down to distance and disconnection.

Consumers come looking for local, naturally produced food. And often they get it. However this level of personal attention can be time consuming for producers: there are issues of scale for producers to stand at every stall their produce is on. This balance between integrity and viability, between actually providing local food and having a range of varied products people might want to buy, is key.

Of course, there are buffers against the stallholders and the produce itself coming from further and further a field - many farmers� markets manage to avoid an excess of distance and disconnection.

Nonetheless, there are sometimes frustrations at the difference between the wording, and the impression of local food and the reality people sometimes experience, particularly in or near Dublin.

With this in mind, some promising steps have been taken by Junior Minister Trevor Sargent to address the standards to which farmers� markets operate.

While there is a consultation process underway, involving a number of Departments and stakeholders, its clear what the Minister himself prefers: �I�m very focused on providing incentives first and foremost. I recognise that there is a need for regulations, for example from a health and safety point of view, but some of those are already in place. I�m hoping to encourage an accreditation system which would be an incentive for farmers� markets to, as it were, �tick the boxes��not unlike the systems in place on beaches or for the green flag schools.�

And while the specifics are to be hammered out through the consultation process, it is clear that the Minister wants �to encourage rather than to regulate.�

This must chime pleasantly with those wary of over-regulation, or wary of too strict an interpretation of the dictates on locale stifling the markets� growth potential.