National Farmers Market Week is just around the corner. Do you know where to find your nearest farmers market? If not, the internet is bursting at the seams with free tools to help you find them.
Oklahoma Agritourism, Shape Your Future, the National Farmers Market Directory, and American Farmland Trust all have online databases of farmers markets, searchable by location. It’s worth looking at all four, because several markets are listed in one but not the others.
Taken all together, these listings tally to well over a hundred farmers markets in the state – and that’s not counting all the other direct-sales venues, like hubs, farm stands, and U-pick operations.
That may be a bit of an overcount, but it’s still well above the 40 “registered” farmers markets listed in Closer to Home, nearly 20 years ago. (The Made in Oklahoma network no longer maintains that registry.)
The number of farms selling direct to the customer hasn’t kept pace with that increase in the number of farmers markets, but the amount of money changing hands certainly has.
The last time we looked at those numbers, the number of Oklahoma farms selling direct (a number that includes farm stands, U-pick, and other outlets, in addition to farmers markets), was 2,344. That’s from the 2017 Census of Agriculture. Since then, the 2022 Census has been released, showing an increase of nearly 200 farms – around 8% – to 2,535.
Over the same period, the total value of direct sales in the state climbed from $9.9 million to $14.5 million – a nearly 50% increase. (We’d speculated in the earlier article that direct sales might see a boost from COVID, and that certainly appears to have been the case.)
Oklahoma has beaten the national trend over the same period, which has seen direct sales increase by less (16%), while the number of farms with direct sales has actually dropped by 10%.
Taken all together, those numbers mean that the value of direct sales per farm grew 30% nationwide, to $27,981. In Oklahoma, the growth was higher, at 36%, but the average value per farm was still only $5,748.
Even the higher national sales figure probably isn’t enough to sustain many operations on its own, but it does illustrate the potential of direct sales. The benefits don’t just accrue to the farms and farmers. The National Farmers Market Coalition’s website is full of information on all the benefits farmers markets bring to the rest of us. Apart from providing fresh, nutritious, healthy local produce, farmers markets also boost local economies, help save farmland, and support sustainable agriculture.
An online article profiling one of Oklahoma’s newest farmers’ markets, OKC’s Eastside Fresh Market, highlights many of these benefits.
