The Placemaking Round-Up
A biweekly newsletter with public space news, resources, and opportunities.
The Biweekly Bazaar
A curated dispatch on all things public markets plus the latest announcements from the Market Cities Program.
A biweekly newsletter with public space news, resources, and opportunities.
A curated dispatch on all things public markets plus the latest announcements from the Market Cities Program.
Editor's Note: Register now for the 11th International Public Markets in Toronto taking place June 8-10, 2023. This in-person gathering will feature inspiring speakers from around the world, networking sessions, mobile workshops, market tours, and more!
If you’ve attended one of our International Public Markets Conferences, you know that breakout sessions, where we turn the floor over to market practitioners, government leaders, grassroots advocates, and educators, are one of the most exciting ways to learn about what’s new in the field from the people on the ground.
Featuring themes curated by our team, the breakout sessions invite participants to learn how public markets are overcoming challenges and achieving success. Each breakout session also features a Q&A section—a sure way of sparking interesting conversations within the group.
This year’s conference in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, marks the first time that the conference has held a Call for Speakers, attracting 80 proposals from over 20 countries, and the results provide a snapshot of some of the most important trends in the world of public markets today.
In response to the conference theme, “Setting a New Table,” applicants were invited to share the ways in which their market-related projects or initiatives work to put promises of a fair food system, inclusive economies, and social cohesion into action. The Call for Speakers created space for new topics and themes to emerge beyond all the tried-and-true topics of past conferences, such as economic opportunity, funding, and management, which we will also feature.
The resulting program will include 11 panel sessions, three “unconferences,” and one academic-led lighting round that capture the issues that matter most to our audience. In particular, three key trends emerged from the dozens of proposals we reviewed:
Read on to learn more about how these key themes show up in the work of market leaders around the world.
Aware of the ways in which public markets and market networks support more resilient communities, we hosted an unconference—“Markets in the Age of Climate Change: Supporting Resilience through Markets”—during the 10th International Public Markets Conference in London. Now we’re taking this idea further by featuring a panel of short presentations that will explore the different ways markets and related initiatives across the globe are taking steps to prepare their own operations as well as their communities to endure the impacts of climate change.
We’ll hear from Claire Lee of CMHC-Granville Island, based in Vancouver, Canada on how the Granville Island Public Market is working with the City of Vancouver to identify the risks of coastal flooding for the market, and their action plan for long-term resiliency and adaptation. This should serve as a great example for other markets that are at similar risk for major climate change impacts and how they too can begin taking steps to safeguard their long-term futures.
Nnaemeka Ikegwuonu will discuss his social-impact innovation, ColdHubs, which are modular, solar-powered walk-in cold rooms that can extend the freshness of produce, meats, and other perishable goods from two to 21 days. We will also learn about his organization’s efforts to expand at markets across Nigeria, on a flexible pay-as-you-store subscription model, to reduce food waste and support a more sustainable food supply chain. In the face of more frequent extreme weather events, a warming planet, and increasing global food demand, creative solutions to strengthen local food supply chains, like this one, have the potential to scale to all different types of geographies.
We hope this session will inspire discussion around the need to ensure the survival of markets and highlight the ways markets can support long-term community resilience efforts.
At their best, markets are community places that make all customers and vendors feel welcome. However, depending on where you are in the world, the introduction of a new farmers market can be seen as an indicator of gentrification, catering to the well-to-do within a community.
Due to the controversy and nuance behind this topic, we’re thrilled to feature an unconference led by Sagdrina Jalal of Sage D Consulting and Catt Fields White of Farmers Market Pros who will explore tools for farmers market managers and operators to better collaborate with legacy residents and small businesses in order to create farmers markets that support economic opportunity, micro business incubation, and integrated communities as well as increased food security. Participants of this unconference can expect to observe and compare the effectiveness of specific communication methods within a variety of cultural norms, in addition to identifying language including vocabulary, phrasing, and questions that will better support connecting with local community leaders to form coalitions.
Beyond this unconference, we will also explore the related topics of how public markets can support social cohesion and create opportunities for individuals to negotiate across differences, during a panel of short talks focused on social infrastructure. Social infrastructure encompasses the less measured yet vital qualitative aspects of public markets and their ability to bring all different types of people together.
As the Market Cities Program continues to broaden its network, we have become increasingly aware of the importance of public markets to many different areas of academic research. Researchers in the fields of economics, public health, design and architecture, urban planning, history, food studies, sociology and cultural studies, among others, have found public markets fertile ground for further exploring their particular topics of interest. Of course, this makes sense, given the myriad ways in which public markets benefit their communities, which we discuss regularly—and it is exciting that the conference will feature a wide scope of cutting edge research on public markets across different academic fields.
We were thrilled with the large response we received from academic researchers through our Call for Speakers and were compelled to create a new lightning-round session—"Research Roundup: A Global Tasting of New Findings on Public Markets"—where we’ll hear researchers from across the world pitch their research studies and preliminary findings. Topics will include: planning strategies for temporary “open markets” (or Pazar) in Turkey; sustaining livelihood opportunities for wholesale vegetable market traders in the Philippines; and exploring the physical architecture of place at farmers markets in the US, to name a few!
The session will also include an audience discussion to explore common trends in the research, what’s on the horizon, and give market practitioners and others the chance to ask questions and weigh in on what future areas of research would benefit their work. We’re excited about the opportunity to further strengthen ties between public market researchers, as well as connections between academics and the on-the-ground market practitioners who can benefit from these studies.
In addition to our core conference program panel sessions and unconferences, our local hosts in Toronto have also organized an amazing program for the Friday mobile workshops. These sessions will highlight the work of Toronto’s most innovative and impactful markets and food initiatives, exploring the topics of Indigenous food sovereignty and reconciliation, waste reduction and the circular economy, and new approaches to economic inclusion and business incubation, among many others.
We can’t wait to reconnect with these market leaders, advocates, organizers, government leaders, and educators to explore all the ways these exciting topics will intersect with the work of our conference attendees. We also hope these discussions will collectively deepen our commitment to creating a fair food system, inclusive economies, and social cohesion through public markets.
To learn more about these exciting topics, join us on market tours, and network with others in the field, register for the 11th International Public Markets Conference.
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