Markets (Organic/Farmers)

Markets are places where the exchange of goods and services occurs. Specifically, in relation to green consumerism they are places where organic foods are sold, but they may also be associated with notions of buying local, supporting local firms, lowering food miles, and slow food. Originally, in the 1920s, organic food tended to be marketed through small-scale, informal links directly between farmers and consumers. Direct marketing continued to be the main way in which organic food was sold up until the 1950s and 1960s. By the 1970s, in both Europe and the United States, retail health-food outlets specializing [Page 298]in organic products started to appear. These were often run by people who were part of alternative movements and were concerned with a variety of issues such as the industrialization of farming and social justice within developing countries.

However, by the mid-1980s and early 1990s the production of organic produce increased rapidly. Small-scale shops were no longer able to handle the volumes involved, and a number of other market outlets developed. These included conventional supermarkets, which have increasingly stocked organic produce, encouraged by the premium prices available. The 1990s and early 2000s have also seen a growth in large-scale box schemes, such as Abel & Cole and Riverford Organics in the United Kingdom and the Good Food Box in Canada. At the same time, farmers markets have burgeoned in both the United States and Europe as a medium that includes the sale of organic produce in a way that encourages the connection of producers and consumers. Small-scale vegetable box schemes have also grown, as have specialized organic food outlets—especially in countries such as Germany and the Netherlands.

Farmers markets have burgeoned in both the United States and European Union countries. The sale of organic produce encourages a closer connection between producers and consumers

Source: iStockphoto

The net result of these processes is that there is now a wide range of markets for organic food. It is also evident that there is some kind of division between those that involve a degree of direct marketing—wherein there is contact between the producers and consumers of the products involved—and outlets where the produce is more anonymous and distanced, whereby institutional organic regulations become more important.