Farmers markets are a popular place in the US where visitors feel they can get the freshest of produce straight from the ones who pick it. This may be misleading however, as some farmers don't only show their own produce.
Farmers might resort to buying vegetables from outside sources — including Amish wholesale auction houses, other farms and grocery stores — to supplement booths, or at times when their own farms aren’t producing.
If not properly labeled however, they can give a false impression that all of the produce was freshly picked out of local soil. Booths might be charging dearly for something that was trucked in.
It irks farmers who are following the rules, working on slim profit margins and sweating it out when Mother Nature throws them a curve.
“It’s like going to Napa Valley and they’re pouring ‘two buck chuck’ and charging $20 a glass for it,” said Nami Moon Farms co-owner Chris Holman. “We’re like the winemakers. What’s at a farm market should be an artisan product. It should be qualitatively better.”
Another farm, Olden Organics in the town of Rosendale, Wis., sells in Appleton, Oshkosh and Green Lake farm markets. Co-owner Tracy Vinz said she’s seen unlabeled outside produce at some booths for years.
Vinz is on the board of the Oshkosh Farmers Market, where farmers are allowed to have up 50% resale, meaning half of the food at the booth might not be grown on the local farms.
That lenient allowance was put into place so the market could have a wider array of fruit and vegetables. But, Vinz said even with the generous 50% rule, there are violators.
source: usatoday.com
