Farmers markets get fresh look from Elon professor

Tiemann, the Jefferson Pilot Professor of Economics at the university, authored “Grower-Only Farmers’ Markets: Public Spaces and Third Places,” which looks not so much at the dollars behind curbside markets as much as the social perks that customers cite for their decision to shop local.

“Third places,” as Tiemann describes them, are locations like coffee shops or neighborhood taverns where people can engage in informal conversation about current events, local concerns and sports “without becoming close enough to trade dinner invitations or share holidays.” The problem, he points out, is that third places are slowly disappearing from many communities as suburbs expand and American lifestyles change.

Why is that bad? “Informal association adds more dimensions to our lives and makes our communities richer,” he writes. “A decline in third places and public spaces may lead to a decline in society as we find ourselves spending time only with those we know well.”

That is where a farmers market fills a particular void in a community. In both his article and a subsequent interview, Tiemann, who has frequented farmers markets since the early 1970s, shared the results of a 2002 survey conducted at the Carrboro Farmers Market in Carrboro, N.C., which sits next to Chapel Hill. He writes that more than a third of respondents cited “meeting friends, a spirit of community, or the friendliness of the people” as what they liked best about the market.

Farmers markets continue to grow in popularity. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which publishes the National Directory of Farmers Markets every two years, nearly 4,400 markets were in operation as of the 2006 edition, up from 1,755 when the directory first started in 1994.

Tiemann said that cities with healthy population and economic growth have at least one farmers market, not to mention other “third places” like small stadiums and downtown parks, that help attract younger, educated employees to the region.

“Creative people like to have a lot of what urban sociologists call ‘loose ties,’” he said as he listed other benefits to a farmers market. For example: Visitors to a curb market learn how to interact with diverse groups of people – diverse in gender, race, creed, age and socioeconomic background. “And we learn habits, like how to respect other people’s spaces … we come to recognize that we’re part of a larger society.”

The article in The Journal of Popular Culture is not the first work Tiemann has published on the topic. His research also appeared in a 2004 edition of the International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy. That article, “American Farmers’ markets: Two Types of Informality,” examined the economics behind the business structure that exists in many of these markets.

Tiemann is currently researching the relationship between mass transit and the level of obesity in urban areas. His work, in conjunction with Paul Miller, an associate professor of exercise science, and economics student Erika Lamanna was the topic of a paper presented in April at the 2nd International Congress on Physical Activity and Public Health.

Tiemann joined the Elon University faculty in 1984 after working for Wabash College in Indiana, Clarkson College of Technology in New York and Marquette University in Wisconsin, where he served one year as a temporary appointment. He graduated with honors from Dartmouth College after studying economics and earned a master’s and doctoral degrees in the same subject from Vanderbilt University.

Today he teaches courses in the principles of economics, statistics, urban economics and emerging economies.

To read the full article from The Journal of Popular Culture, click on the link below, which opens a file in PDF format.