Food Politics

Wal-Mart’s Community-Baiting Farmers Market

Photo: Brave New Films/Flickr

In an attempt to offset community and political turmoil over their potential arrival in the Chatham neighborhood, this Saturday Wal-Mart is hosting a “farmers market” on their proposed building site at 83rd and Stewart. We’re putting “farmers market” in quotes because, as the Tribune notes, the event will be “supplied by Wal-Mart vendors.” That could very well mean family farms selling their own wares, but the fact that all proceeds are going to the Chatham Business Association seems to point to it just as easily being apples and peaches trucked in from goodness knows where. Let’s just call it an outdoor produce market, shall we? [Tribune]

Wal-Mart’s Community-Baiting Farmers Market