Thyra Hudson was so pleased with last Friday’s farmers’ market in Mandeville, she visited twice. “This is my second trip,” a laughing Hudson confessed as weighed down with bags of yam and assorted vegetables she stopped to talk with the Observer in the early afternoon.

“I came early and bought for myself and then I called my sister in Kingston to ask if she needed anything, and here I am, I had to come back,” she said.

Hudson was among a stream of Mandeville residents flowing through the Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA) office from early morning until long after sunset to buy fresh vegetables and other produce at concessionary prices.

Mandeville apart, there were also special farmers’ markets in Portmore, Denbigh in Clarendon, and Port Maria in St Mary last Friday as part of the agriculture ministry’s drive to ease a glut of vegetables.

In Mandeville, farmers set up stalls in a rough circle around an unused swimming pool in the spacious backyard of what was once a hotel — now housing RADA.

A cardboard sign told eager, smiling buyers that carrots were going for $20 per pound, tomato $20, lettuce $40, ginger $60/$100, pumpkin $40, yam $40. A quick check revealed many other items including cabbages, callaloo, dasheen, gungo peas, coco (tuber)…

Read more at the Jamaica Observer here

http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/Consumers-flock-Mandeville-farmers–…