La Red Mexicana de Tianguis y Mercados Orgánicos - Better Than Coffee

By Carolyn Young

Mexico. If you're one of the thousands of consciously consuming so-called Northerners obsessed with certifiably guilt-free, label-bearing products, you will conjure up images drizzly mornings filtered through the Brownian motion of rising steam; or perhaps you envision the sun-chiseled face of a Mexican campesino, climbing laboriously up the slopes of the Sierra Norte, tump-line on forehead. Coffee. Coffee. Of course, coffee.

Somehow coffee precedes the cactus pear, beans and cilantro, products more commonly found in a Mexican marketplace. Indeed, while it is the world's largest producer of organic coffee, if you're looking for a caffeinated beverage in Mexico the kind you're most likely to find is Coca-cola or Nescafe.

The reality is that the majority of Mexicans, like many Latin Americans, have no idea what "organic" means, although they may never have produced otherwise. Despite the increasing number of commercial-scale farms, sales of US-banned pesticides and artificially cheap subsidized US imports, there still remain many small-scale producers who, out of necessity or principle, produce mostly organic crops. In fact, of the 307, 692 hectares being farmed organically 80% is owned by small producers, half of whom are indigenous. There is, however, a newer generation of producers that are slowly turning to organic production not only for export, but for local consumption.

Evidence of this can be found in an emerging network of organic markets and "tianguis" whose main office is located at the University of Chapingo, a twenty minute drive from Mexico City. The network seemed a natural continuation from the Chapingo-based project that began in 2001 as a buyers' coop of 14 families and became a full-fledged farmers' market with more than 50 families in regular attendance and twenty to thirty producers depending on the season. With much support from the academic community and, in particular, the Centre for Investigations in Sociology, Economics and Technology in World Agriculture and Agroindustry (CIESTAAM), this "tianguis" has become a centre, not only for direct producer-consumer relationships, but also a source of environmental and cultural education and awareness. The formerly empty hall now houses a resource library, weekly workshops and annual cultural events. Though a great proportion of the market's organization is still maintained by a few employees at the University, the producers have been paramount in creating their own rules of operation and maintenance, and each is subject to an internal organic standard based on the National Organic Program of the states.

Through the coordination of this market and her own research, CIESTAAM student Dr. Aurora Lobato García and her colleagues learned of other markets already in existence in various Mexican states. Organic markets in Xalapa, Tlaxcala, Oaxaca and Guadalajara were already thriving by January 2005 when, with the financial support of Canadian-based non-profit, Falls Brook Centre, the markets and their respective coordinators decided to join forces. Since then, the network has blossomed to include projects in four other states and financial support for workshops and meetings for coordinators and producers alike.

Each market has its own story to tell. While Chapingo and Xalapa's markets emerged from the academic communities' wish to blend theory with praxis, others grew from popular movements supported by non-governmental organizations such as "Circle of Responsible Consumption and Production" in Guadalajara or prominent community members such as artist Francisco Toledo in Oaxaca in response to the growing prominence of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and multinational food chains such as McDonalds.

This movement, however small, could be the beginning of a movement towards greater food sovereignty within Mexico. While the Mexican middle and upper classes turn more and more towards American franchises and supermarket models, there is a growing number that are consciously choosing a newer version of the traditional Mexican economy—one that ensures healthy and environmentally-sound food choices. The sectors´ struggle lies in meeting the needs of this growing domestic demand while remaining competitive and accessible, promoting awareness about organic systems, ensuring that corruption doesn't reduce the integrity of the products or that the need for certification make the market inaccessible to producers who can't pay the certifyers' fees.

Cooperatives such as those formed to produce and distribute fair-trade, organic coffee have attempted to evade these problems by pooling their resources, sharing equipment and using internal auditing systems that allow for group certification, a model that the organic markets are also adopting. In an economy where the traditional market system is just beginning to be infiltrated by imported products and encroached by franchise giants such as Walmart, consumers and producers need to create and abide by their own market rules not those created by an invisible hand.

So, the next time someone mentions Mexico, perhaps you will remember the network of organic markets that is growing there and think of buying local, organic produce yourself.

For more information, please visit www.fallsbrookcentre.ca

Carolyn Young is currently working with CIESTAAM and Servicios Ambientales de Oaxaca on a CIDA-funded internship in Mexico.

OACC gratefully acknowledges the author for permission to post this article on our website.