Saturday, January 3, 2009

ESPANOLA MARKET MERITS SUPPORT

January 2, 2009, Opinion piece from the Santa Fe New Mexican

The compilers of The 2008 New Mexican Piglet Book are right! The farmers at the Espanola Farmers Market have shockingly exceeded their station and are no longer content to pile their vegetables onto the back of pickup trucks and pull over in a hot parking lot to sell their produce.

Our customers have gotten uppity as well. Many of them are low-income mothers and seniors using WIC coupons to buy home-grown produce. They like the new permanent site that the State Legislature funded with $440,000 "to purchase, design and develop land" for the market. The market even plans to install plumbing and indoor toilets! We give away free books to children each market day and plan to use the lower irrigated fields to teach students how to farm.

What were we thinking!? That the farmers who grow our food could have their own market place in the very same valley where they live and work? Let them eat vegetables!

Sabra Moore
Manager
Espanola Farmers Market

Thursday, January 1, 2009

2009 HAS ARRIVED WITH PLENTY OF WEATHER BEHIND IT!


Farmers markets are receiving more attention these days in the larger discussion of focusing on local economies and reducing dependence on oil. Going green these days means going to your local farmers market. The 2008 season was proof positive of the new role the Espanola Farmers Market is playing in the lives of northern New Mexicans. It means produce locally grown and available to large numbers of people. Reasonable prices. Food for the table grown with love. No huge shipping costs. Carried from the field to the market to the table.

Happy New Year from the growers and their families and the many people responsible for the new Farmers Market site!