Outside Oxfam, at the bottom end of the High Street is a zebra crossing across St James's Street from Costcutter. On a lamp-post as one crosses, the pedestrians are treated to a small yellow sign put up in promotion of the Walthamstow Sunday Farmer's Market.
You might think, that a High Street which has a market stretching from Cleveland Park Avenue to Pretoria Avenue, and trading from Tuesday to Saturday between 8.00am to 5.00pm, would not need another market on a Sunday. The farmer's market, however, is supposed to be something different, bringing a taste of the country to the deprived foodies of the inner city. It is also supposed to offer the chance for us townies and the good folk from the shires to get to know each other. All products sold are supposed to have been grown, reared, caught, brewed, pickled, baked, smoked or processed by the stallholder. According to FARMA (Farmers' Retail & Markets Association) the idea is that the consumer "is buying the freshest, most local produce possible, supporting your local community and economy, and helping the environment by reducing food-miles".
Cookery programmes on TV always have celebrity chefs extolling their virtues, with the farmers themselves all claiming how great it is to get feedback from the consumer regarding their produce. The Farmers' Market is certainly well-beloved of people who try to ramp up property prices in the so-called Village by pretending its just like living in Islington. It isn't.
Anyway, to cut a story short, although the Farmer's Market is miles up a High Street where I can already buy fresh fruit and vegetables from people I have known and watched like a hawk for years I have been known to follow the fashion for these things and pop along to the Farmer's market. Have I ever bought anything? Not for ages.
The fish stall, when it is there at all has put me off by looking unhygienic; the fish lying on a table in the open Walthamstow air with a very meager sprinkling of ice indeed deployed to keep the goods from going off. Much better to go to N&A Fishmongers, or even ASDA, in my view.
Considering how cheap they are on the same spot on a Saturday, vegetables are expensive, though sometimes interesting, and the meat also costs far too much. Giving people a load of guff about the producers living on the breadline does not wash when the farmers are selling retail with so few overheads, their business being promoted for them at taxpayers' expense by the council. Even the exotic treats like quail can be bought quite routinely in local stores like Faris's Supermarket, at much more reasonable prices if you are prepared to get out and look for it.
The honey, well, it's just honey. The man who sells it is pleasant enough, though his simple son of the soil routine has an underlying patronizing and contemptuous edge to it if you really listen to his well worn patter to his customers about the cheese on the stall opposite being made from freshly milked billy goats. He should remember that not everyone you meet in a city grew up in one and can spot it when he is slyly taking the piss.
The bread is as over priced as bread ever is on these markets, and does not compare, to my mind, as favourably as some of the delicious fresh warm bread that customers who turn up at the Turkish shop at the right time of day can enjoy for a fraction of the cost.
The questions I always have in my mind about these farmers' markets is why the stallholders are so anti-competitive? They never seem to want to compete with anyone else for their business. I am told this is the same at lots of the farmers' markets in London. The selection of goods on offer is always carefully restricted by the cartel that operates the markets, so that basically, there is usually only ever one or at the most two kinds of supplier for each type of produce on any one day (they sometimes have a couple of different cheese stalls).
I also ask myself, if this produce is so good, why don't they take a pitch on our regular market? There is a jumbo free range hen's and duck's egg stall that recently started bringing eggs from the farm on Fridays and Saturdays (to be found usually not far from Woolworths). Why can't these other traders? And are the goods really being sold by the makers? I have met at least one person selling cheese at Walthamstow, on her own, who lives in London.This is hundreds of miles from the farm the producer comes from to deliver to her to sell. He sells at a big mark-up and pays her, what? Does it matter if its a farmer or a person who sources directly from an identifiable farm anyway?
On the whole, using the public space at the Town Square on a Sunday is not a bad idea, and as we do not have anything better being offered by way of suitable cultural events at that time and place, I am not advocating the Farmer's Market is scrapped. If we did that, how would groups like St Luke's be able to piggy-back on the middle class footfall and raise funds with their cakes? Where would the ammo come from for our middle-class weekend protestors? Its also useful for the kind of politician who doesn't normally turn up in public in the area he's paid to represent to put his face in at a time that suits him. But I do wish it was a real market, with more stalls manned by people making a real effort to compete for our business and offering better value for money.