Brett from Jurrasic Fish: holding one remaining gurt big Bass (line caught at Weymouth - sustainable fishing)
SOLD at our Local Food Market (below) in Dorchester 15th August 2009

Dorchester’s First Local Food Market is tasty success

This Saturday, crowds stuffed the streets of Dorchester for a full menu of fabulous local food and great entertainment as Transition Town Dorchester and the Dorchester Music and Performance Group helped bring the county town to life.

Transition Town Dorchester was awarded a special market license to enable eight of the most local and tastiest food producers to sell their goods from a street bazaar of market stalls which flanked the edges of South Street and helped fill the streets from 10 in the morning ‘til 4pm. The South West Co-operative Group Membership provided £350 funding towards the event and together with the Joint Markets Car Boot Fund are helping publicise and support the development of sustainable and low carbon activities through Transition Town Dorchester.

The food market launched the new Transition Food Group and was designed to raise awareness of the high quality and availability of local food that is produced within 15 miles of Dorchester, giving people an opportunity to buy truly local food direct from local producers.

The event was also co-ordinated to link-in with musical and theatrical street entertainment provided through the Dorchester Music and Performance Group and promoted by Dorchester’s most colourful of Town Criers, Alistair Chisholm.

Transition Food Group organisers Andy McKee, Ian Reeve and Dan Newberry were overwhelmed with the support and enthusiasm shown by local people and visitors.

“It was exceptionally successful”, said Andy,
“We gave out information to more than 500 people who were interested in local food, and so many people asked us to run the event regularly that we lost count! Our traders all reported that they’d had a good day and lots of customers went away happy with their local purchases.”

Transition Towns have calculated that for every £1 spent in local businesses 80p stays in the local community whilst only 20p of every £1 spent in the big retailers and supermarkets stays local. The Transition Food Group will be looking for ways to support and help local food producers to be more accessible to people in Dorchester so that everyone can benefit from the local jobs, less food miles and healthier future.

Stall-holders included:

• Jurassic Fishing Brett sold out of his sustainably line caught fish by lunchtime! Ring Brett on 07916 129939
  
• Woolsery Cheese award winning handmade cheeses, UpSydling
  
• Oxfords Bakery traditional craft bakery, Sherborne
• Green and Pleasant organic vegetables and veg boxes
  
• Filberts Bees Lower Muckleford farm
  
• 12 Green Acres organic meats
  
• The Fridge town centre speciality delicatessen
  
  The Transition Town Dorchester stall also provided information on Gardenshare, Casterbridge Food Co-Op (a local food co-operative for buying foods together), the Transition Food Group, Earth Oven Workshops and information about the Transition Movement, Why Local Food matters.

Photo: Mark Rogers from Filberts Bees shows Lynne Coombe some of the flowers that his bees use to make their forage honey. Mark manages over 70 acres at Lower Muckleford Farm near Dorchester.

For information about this event please contact Andy on 07833 621861


The Local Food Market was kindly sponsored by The Co-operative Membership SW



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