Berkshire Farmers Markets Aren’t Just Catering to the Rich These Days

Originally published in The Berkshire Eagle, May 9, 2024. By Jane Kaufman.

Reach for an heirloom tomato at a farmers market today and you’re as likely to rub elbows with someone who can afford to pay top dollar as you are with someone who can’t.

This hasn’t always been the case. In the 1990s, farmers markets boomed in popularity and produce prices cultivated exclusivity. But market-rate prices didn’t result in sustainable prosperity for farmers. Whole swaths of the community were priced out of farmers markets and their fresh, locally grown fruits and vegetables. Farmers couldn’t afford to produce for any less and still make their livelihoods viable.

Fast forward to today: Farmers markets no longer are the purview of the affluent shopper. The heirloom tomato is within reach to both the haves and the have-nots.

Boosted by federal and state subsidies and the advocates who pushed to make it so, farmers markets foodstuffs are now affordable — and in many cases are half-price or free — to people in need, while still guaranteeing that farmers collect the retail prices they need to keep producing.

MASSACHUSETTS INNOVATION

The federal 2014 Farm Bill gave farmers the ability to sell to consumers through the federal Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program, commonly known as SNAP and formerly known as food stamps.

“It was the first program of its kind in the country,” Ashley E. Randle, commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Agricultural Resources, told The Eagle. “So it really did set a model for other states.”

WHY FARMERS GO TO MARKET

“The only reasonable way that farmers of our scale can make a living is by selling direct to customer at retail prices,” said Jim Schultz, who owns Red Shirt Farm in Lanesborough, working a total of 13 acres. “As soon as you start to go wholesale, the margins get even thinner.”

That aligns with the conclusion of a study that the Massachusetts Department of Agricultural Resources made in 1978, at a time when the state had about a dozen farmers markets, including one in North Adams. The study predicted that Massachusetts farmers wouldn’t be able to compete against larger farms.

“In order to ensure that Massachusetts farmers were as viable as possible, and that we retained as much farmland as possible, direct to consumer was the mechanism that would provide the highest and most efficient return on investment for farmers,” said Edith Murnane, executive director of Mass Farmers Markets, a nonprofit that works to promote healthy lifestyles, community and farming through farmers markets. “So the initial mission, which is really still very central to the work that we do, is to help create and promote and develop vibrant marketplaces for farmers so that they have a really effective way to do direct to consumer sales.”

As of the 2022 Census of Agriculture, Berkshire County had 471 farms encompassing 71,880 acres, with the average farm working 153 acres. Most range in size from 10 to 49 acres. Market value of the agricultural products sold was $38 million with total farm production expenses at $35 million. Net cash income to farmers was just $471,000, according to the 2022 Census data.

The 2022 Census reported that 26 percent of Massachusetts farmers were selling directly to consumers — at farm stands, in community-supported agricultures or at farmers markets.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the farmers market model had to pivot to prepaid orders online, home delivery and single-shopper experiences.

The pivot “reconnected people with a local food system because the conventional food system was essentially broken by COVID,” Schultz said.

Customers that Schultz picked up during the pandemic pivot are still coming back to his booth.

“What people want is freshness, flavor, quality and diversity that they just can’t find anywhere else other than the farmers market, and the people who come there are willing to pay for it,” he said.

While Red Shirt Farm has had SNAP certification for several years, it’s only had Massachusetts’ Healthy Incentives Program certification for three. It’s been worth it, Schultz said. Sales have gone up — at both the North Adams market and at the Pittsfield winter farmers market. Sales have also been more consistent and with a returning loyal customer base.

Schultz estimates 30 to 40 percent of sales on any given market day are subsidized.

“We are committed to food access for all of our customers,” said Schultz. “And for a while early on, before we had either one [SNAP or HIP], we were trying to keep our prices really low to allow people who wanted our food to be able to get our food. But now with these programs, we can charge what we need to charge, more like the retail market rate, without having to be overly worried that we’re excluding folks from being able to eat our food.”

Schultz grosses between $3,000 and $4,000 daily in the summer at the North Adams Farmers Market.

Since 2022, Berkshire Agricultural Ventures has run The Market Match Fund, which it describes as “an economic development and food access program, designed to provide a consistent, annual funding stream to match customer SNAP benefits at Berkshire-area farmers markets.” The Market Match Fund is at 10 farmers market locations in the Berkshires, including North Adams, Pittsfield and Sheffield farmers markets. In 2022, it distributed $116,500 to 10 markets, and increased that support to $141,500 in 2023.

Rebecca Busansky, executive director of Berkshire Agricultural Ventures, said the program supports 135 farmers, who otherwise might not be able to accept SNAP payments for their produce.

Busansky said the state’s Healthy Incentives Program and Berkshire Ag’s Market Match Fund have been an “economic development boon” to farmers and communities.

A CONSUMER’S PERSPECTIVE

The subsidies are helping people like Donna Richards. She took the bus from Adams to a recent farmers market in North Adams. She was carrying a bag with handles to bring home groceries.

Facing health issues, “I have to eat a certain way,” she said. Richards said she uses her electronic benefits card to buy as often as she can, while acknowledging “it’s expensive.”

Beginning in late June when the Berkshire Mobile Farmers Market van visits Adams on Fridays, Richards won’t have to travel quite as far to get organic produce if that’s her preference. Adams will have its own, albeit smaller, mobile farmers market. She also might be able to purchase more too — since Berkshire Regional Transit Authority has a policy holding riders to a three-bag limit.

Jane Kaufman is Community Voices Editor at The Berkshire Eagle. She can be reached at jkaufman@berkshireeagle.com or 413-496-6125.