Market managers across the UK have been urged to act with initiative and introduce measures such their own currency to put themselves at the fulcrum of communities and ensure long-term prosperity.
Richard McCarthy, executive director of charitable organisation Market Umbrella, said farmers’ markets filled a huge gap in the food delivery system in many cities and needed to be embraced to tackle issues with infrastructure, consumption and obesity prevention.
Market Umbrella runs from four markets in New Orleans and McCarthy shared his insight in building profitable markets through techniques in engaging custom.
He told delegates at the FARMA conference in Telford on Tuesday of the rebuilding process undertaken after Hurricane Katrina razed the city to the ground in 2005.
Market Umbrella has introduced a currency system which allows visitors to the market to pay using tokens, exchanged at the entrance for debit or credit payment. The system has revolutionised the market, which had previously suffered from relying on the cash that customers already had on them.
Market Umbrella, which is credited with bringing $8.9 million (£5.5m) of economic value to the city, also took steps to ensure farmers’ markets in the city did not become elitist by tying in their currency - which carries the images of local farming figures - with government-funded schemes.
McCarthy said: “Hurricane Katrina obviously represented an infrastructure collapse and we weren’t able to operate a market for 10 weeks, and two markets for six months, afterwards. But markets can operate as a positive place in a distressed city and the human capital - in terms of good access and intellectual capital - is as important as the financial side.
“The market currency can prove challenging as you are effectively running a bank, but the opportunity to brand the money and the financial returns are excellent.”
The currency scheme does have some precedent in the UK in Brixton, London, where the borough has its own money but is not used widely in markets.
But one comment from the floor questioned the initiative’s worth in the UK as “people do not like vouchers so a clear system would have to be put in place”.
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