When Jessica Chu is looking for fresh fruit, vegetables and other grocery items, she doesn’t head for a supermarket. Instead, the ArtSci ’07 student makes a trek down to the local farmer’s market in Market Square—though by her own admittance, she doesn’t go to the market as often as she would like to.
That may be changing this year.
Chu is working in cooperation with Joli Manson, purchasing director for Brown’s Fine Foods, to establish an on-campus extension of the Kingston farmer’s market. Though still in the planning stages, the proposed market would take place once a month at rotating locations around campus and would include selected vendors from the Kingston area.
“We want to involve the Queen’s community in knowing about their local agriculture,” Manson said. “Even if that just means that one student will be shopping more regularly at the Kingston farmer’s market.”
Though not as strong as they were during the hey day of small-time farming, farmer’s markets have been gaining popularity in recent years, mainly due to growing mainstream interest in organic, free-range and other sustainable methods of producing food, many of which are available at most farmer’s markets.
Kingston boasts one of the oldest farmer’s markets in the country as farmers have been congregating behind City Hall since 1801.
H.J. Reinink has been bringing the produce of his farm in Yarker, northeast of Kingston, to the city’s farmer’s market for the past 13 years. His wares, which include vegetables and eggs, are organic and free-range.
He said that he comes to farmer’s market because it supports the local community economically and also provides a healthy alternative for customers.
“Food is fresher because it hasn’t traveled a great distance, and fresh food is always healthier. It’s also healthier for the environment,” Reinink said. “When [food] is grown organically, it’s better for the person eating it and it is more respectful of the environment.”
He says that while some students shop at the market, the age of most of his customers would be about 35 and older.
“That may be a lifestyle thing,” Reinink said. “Ten years ago, people were saying that they remembered farming as something their grandparents did. Now we’re getting further and further away from the idea of the family farm.”
Reinink, who grew up on a farm himself, is a member of the National Farmers Union, an organization that works to support and maintain small, non-factory family-farming as an industry. The union also has a youth branch, which is part of their initiative to encourage younger people to support this type of farming either by becoming farmers themselves or by supporting their local farming economy.
“Younger people need to eat too, and they need to get into a habit, or a mindset, that goes beyond local or organic product, to having a relationship with the people who are growing it,” Reinink said.
The farmer’s market is a great way to establish that relationship, as the consumer meets and interacts with the farmer. With the middleman cut out, the farmer takes home more profit, and the consumer leaves with a locally grown product.
“It’s important for students to be more connected with where their food comes from,” Chu said. “A lot of the time we go to A&P or Food Basics and forget that there are farmers growing the same foods locally.”
A recent study by Queen’s geography adjunct professor Alison Blay-Palmer, and students Mike Dwyer and Jennifer Miller, has largely been the impetus for much of the discussion to bring the market on campus. The report found that 81 per cent of customers are interested in knowing more about local foods, and knowing which foods are locally grown.
For Joli Manson, informing students is the purpose of an on-campus farmer’s market.
“We want to raise the level of awareness of where food comes from, how growing affects food quality and about the global perspective of the environmental cost of transporting food,” she said. “It’s allowing students to see what kind of food is available locally.”
Manson said that on market days, Brown’s Fine Foods outlets on campus will be featuring a menu item and a recipe that includes market items. A more long term goal of the project may involve incorporating an on-campus community garden.
The proposed date for the first on-campus market is Oct. 16, location and time to be announced. The group will be advertising in
the Journal.
The Kingston farmer’s market is open Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays from 6 a.m. till 6 p.m., spring through fall.
All final editorial decisions are made by the Editor(s) in Chief and/or the Managing Editor. Authors should not be contacted, targeted, or harassed under any circumstances. If you have any grievances with this article, please direct your comments to journal_editors@ams.queensu.ca.