Among the numerous ways to promote healthy eating, two
programs that stuck me with curiosity were Farmer’s Markets and Community
Supported Agriculture (CSA). While farmers markets are a common way to provide
nutritional, affordable food to low-income residential areas, these same areas
find difficulty in participating in CSAs. A one time large payment or
incremental smaller ones are harder for low-income families to afford and with
such a dependence on the crops available for that season families may not like
their seasonal options. While these concerns between farmer and consumer can be
accommodated through recipes and communication, why don't CSAs target the upper
class in urban areas and Farmers Market target low-income neighborhoods to help
the appropriate communities who can afford different things?
I believe
this could make a hierarchy within the food system planning that puts farmer’s
markets on the lower end of a spectrum, while CSA are on the higher end. If
low-income families involve themselves in farmer’s markets jobs to generate
higher incomes they could eventually be able to work up to solidifying their
ability to consistently purchase from CSA’s. This would create motivation and
competition within low-income neighborhoods to increase their economic status. However,
creating a hierarchy within the food system planning could create competition
between farmers so that farmers from farmer’s markets compete to increase their
yields and revenue to switch to CSA’s – or they may want to sell to a higher
income community. This would leave low-income communities to fend for
themselves yet again, against food swaps and food deserts that engulf them. Without
addressing the concerns of income equality to purchase nutritious foods in different
systems of food providers, the fear of division and profit may hinder
collaboration for a culturally diverse and aware community maintaining
sustainable actions.
Although
this blog may be a stretch, it is something that came across my mind while reading.
It hypothetically addresses the challenges of different food programs and how they
could affect the overall community system. Do you think there’s a chance of
this occurring, if not what affects do you see of how food programs interact in
positive and negative scenarios.
This is an interesting notion, but I think it is a stretch. I do definitely agree with you that there needs to be more farmer's markets that cater primarily to lower-income populations where there are more cases of food insecurity, but we would still need farmers markets for other socioeconomic groups because they are a good source of nutritious foods. I would just hope that planners and food advocates use farmers markets as a means to foster the interaction and mixing of different socioeconomic and cultural groups. And on the economic thing you mentioned, I think that employment only from alternative food systems would be enough to trigger the economic conundrum you have given, but it would be a great economic driver for the community. I can only imagine good scenarios stemming from more alternative food practices.
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