Halifax, N.S. (Rural Roots Canada) – What can we learn from the world’s oldest farming market traditions?
The executive director of Farmers’ Markets of Nova Scotia and recent Nuffield Scholar Justin Cantafio, travelled across Mexico, Europe, and Turkey to find the answer.
His biggest takeaway? Local food systems aren’t just about food, they’re about culture, community, and accessibility.
“I purposely sought out regions of the world or countries that have market traditions going back hundreds, and in some cases, thousands of years, because I really wanted to see what that means,” said Cantafio. “Whether it was in urban or rural Mexico, or Malta, or throughout continental Europe into Turkey, the same thing kept happening over and over and over again, and that was how important the embedded nature of local food systems are and how incredibly good farmers markets and public markets are at embedding food and culinary traditions and access to traditional foodways into the everyday life of the populace.”
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For Cantafio, he was thrilled to see how farmers’ markets were constantly in touch with the food of their place. “It makes eating local food and eating healthy second nature, and it also makes it accessible and easy. A place like Barcelona, for example, that follows the Market City’s initiative and has integrated that into their municipal bylaws and policies, is interesting in that they’ve invested over $140 million Canadian over the past four years into farmers’ market and public market infrastructure in efforts to make sure that every Barcelonan lives within walking distance of a market.”
Cantafio believes Canada has a unique opportunity to follow the lead of these countries and cities and strengthen its local food system.
“Without getting too romantic about it, we’re sitting on a great potential here in Nova Scotia and across Canada to really build a strong local food system that benefits farmers of all scales and producers of all scales, but also serves as the backbone of a farming economy.”
