From Farm to Fr
HOW local growers strive to survive wit by Rachel Koertner
In
the midst of the hardship the world is facing, one nonprofit has found a way to meet many needs of the community - bringing people together, giving them access to fresh food, supporting small businesses, and bringing a bit of joy and normalcy into people’s lives. Every year Plant Chicago runs a farmers market full of a wide variety of fresh products. However, this nonprofit was stopped in its tracks this year with the stay-at-home order. Markets aren’t able to run normally during quarantine, greatly affecting all of the farmers, vendors, and everyone involved. Staff members at Plant Chicago know how crucial supporting each other is in this time, and how important it is for small businesses to still get the sales they are counting on, so they created an online market. Starting in March they worked hard to correspond with the different markets and vendors to pool resources, see who was able to consider other options like delivery and pick-up, and then put all of the resources into one convenient spot for community members to use. “There might be some markets that don’t get started at all, and there are some farmers that it is how they make their money, so without the market they are out of luck,” said Executive Director of Plant Chicago Jonathan Pereira. “The online market was really the only option. We knew we had the platform and the audience, and so we can use our megaphone to get the information out to the public.”
