Farmers market lies exposed: hidden camera investigation (Marketplace)

[Music] we're inside farmers markets are you really buying direct from the farm or are they feeding you lies what's the buck code accordion so that's horny produce right over there not a family farm after all tracking down the truth tumors are paying a premium for your product because they think that you brew it are you ripping people off this is your marketplace this is probably where you think food from your local farmers market comes from but more a nurse wants you to know the truth I think people go to the market to have relationships with farmers and they think that the people that they're buying the food from are far worse like meat and she's not alone my name is Sam mcclain I've been farming for 27 years these farmers are letting you in on an industry secret the people you're buying from it your market may not be farmers at all I think it's just being misled or deceived and it doesn't set right I think people at the market don't know that and they're buying that food and they're being lied to so it's it's a real issue and I'm actually surprised that it's not talked about more and I'm actually surprised that yeah people don't know don't know I'm one of those people I shop at farmer's markets all the time you sell a lot of berries though today and I had no idea there may be people who didn't actually grow the food themselves can I try one of your berries yeah they're called resellers and we're told they're not always upfront about it so our plan visit as many markets as we can across Ontario journalism these markets are a billion dollar industry but largely unregulated so we're gonna ask each vendor what they grow thank you and then see if their claims check out the homegrown ones at 18 are they yours then or I don't farm anymore are you doing okay yeah it doesn't take long for us to start getting suspicious at a busy market in downtown Toronto this vendor advertises his produce as homegrown added bonus it's chemical free he says it's theirs but we spot boxes with a different name under the table and when we call the name on that box we discover it leads back to a wholesaler who says those tomatoes weren't sold as pesticide free the owner later says he tries to label produce that is in his [Music] that wasn't the only vendor it seems is trying to mislead us so as I'm as this stuff from from your place like the asparagus you start getting nicer I'd agree know what's the pop code pretty cool corny at this market the vendor says the name of his family farm is corny but we saw produce with that name and at least three other markets the other place we spa corny is at the grocery store so that's corny produce right over there not a family farm after all in fact corny is a large-scale wholesaler and you can find them right here at Ontario's food terminals so when we follow up with the owner of that stall they won't comment and they won't tell us if they grow anything at all over time it's become much harder work much needing that much larger acreage and some people have found it easier to just go to the terminal and bring the produce in some callin enos these cells up here my name is Astrid Manske and we gather honey in the wannabe Township and East you're gonna be the smoker now people are coming not for the grocery store they could go to the grocery store if they wanted that but it market after market we find stickers usually seen at the grocery store Niva then some vendors claim the produce is theirs is it have you grown you're sorry yes but the sticker we spot here and at other markets all belong to the same producers let some read some kind so that's who we're tracking down next red Sun is a multinational company based in Kingsville Ontario there's over 1700 greenhouses here this total farmer thinks around 27 acres oh wow this is not where most people think their local farmers market food is coming from yes you see the temperature change oh yeah it's much cooler in here red Sun President Jim demenna doesn't like hearing vendors are passing off his produce as their own trouble with that we spent a lot of money in time growing our products we're well over a million dollars an acre so it's not a just that I think I'll be a greenhouse grower today that's a serious serious number most of their product is sold directly to grocery stores produce that doesn't make the cut is sold off cheaper might be miss shape and it might be too small or maybe even too big so that finds its way to a wholesale market and maybe somebody would would pick that up buy that from a wholesaler and then in turn sell it to a you know to it to a farmers market or something like that at some markets we also find wholesale produce that's not from Canada at all and already hey this vendor says these peppers are local but the sticker leads back to a large grower in Mexico the vendor later tells us he didn't know hard to believe but we find lots of international produce at so-called local farmers markets [Music] so far in our test we found reselling at eight out of the ten markets we visited some resellers are upfront but at four markets we catch vendors twisting the truth our last stop is Peterborough Saturday market it's one of the largest farmers markets in the province it's also at the center of a battle between farmers and resellers headlines in the local paper highlight the fight that's been brewing when we head in we're not sure what to expect everything's coming future then yeah we visit a range of vendors and get a range of answers 10 farms is one of the largest vendors with two large stalls one run by James Kent the other by Brent Kent we're stuffed with stuff out this of you guys great days they tell us everything is grown by them or neighboring farms but after seeing stickers like these again these are huge these ones and again we've got goats where's your farm Newcastle it's time to check things out for ourselves you drive up on 1:15 there's like the third and fourth and fifth concessions you know on all those concessions so there it is so this is the property record check which says that all of this along here and there is the Ken's just corn [Music] Wow not a whole lot here other than tractor beds it's hard to know if we're seeing everything for sure because I can't see beyond those trees but the only crop I can see is corn we stay on the tens trail they're coming through the barriers now and our investigation had to sell to the border we're reselling could mean jail time we're trying to prevent fraud this is your market place fresh from the farm or rush life we're tracking the food you buy at farmer's markets back to its source for Lauren nurse that leads to her farm just outside Peterborough Ontario but for other vendors we've discovered that trail could lead to the Ontario food terminal Canada's largest wholesaler [Music] is everyone that here we're here early the day before Peterborough Saturday market yeah guys I've got a pretty good shot through here with my camera I'm gonna use it to see if anyone familiar shows up got a big Farmers logo on the back so if they're coming through the barriers now [Music] I'm shooting it right now there's James Kent he's told us he grows what he sells but the day before market he isn't in the fields he's here [Music] [Music] the next day we're at the market when they can't arrive we watch as boxes that look just like those loaded at the terminal get unloaded here and it's not just his own stall James is talking he also makes deliveries to Brent Kent and another vendor at the market zucchinis are transferred into market friendly bushels carrots unpacked from plastic and this time those stickers are peeled off the market fills with shoppers and we head into we found no evidence of radishes across from the cats everything across the street is just I don't know what wild vegetation but we did see over half a dozen boxes of radishes the day before alongside them a variety of produce including zucchinis and peppers there's no difference between food that you buy at the grocery store and food at the farmers market if it all comes from the food terminal it's the same food so people are being duped but there is a difference when it comes to price the zucchinis and peppers the Kent's were selling cost fifty percent more than what we found at local stores that same day a higher price point but still cheap enough to make it hard for farmers to compete it's our main sales venue and so when someone is kind of essentially completely undercutting at us at every step of the way that really affects our bottom line for Sam and Astrid it's personal they sell it the Peterborough Saturday farmers market alongside the Kemp's it's important to the customers that a farmers market be a farmers market because they trust and believe without asking and you break that trust you break your customer base a farmers market is for farmers and and that's who it should foster farmers like Lauren she sold at the Peterborough farmers market too but after one season was told there was no longer room for her I'm mad I'm mad I want to be I want to be feeding my community in Peterborough you know I'm a farmer and I should be selling in the farmers market it's kind of preposterous across Canada there isn't much protecting farmers or shoppers from false claims but it doesn't have to be this way we head to California we're reselling is against the law [Music] inspectors visit each market here four times a year today they're at the Santa Monica Market in LA looking for vendors breaking the law occasionally we'll find exotic pests that aren't known from California ed Williams heads the investigation department for LA County what he'll do is he'll just take a look at what's on the table verify it against what's on the certificate each farmer must be certified to sell what they grow people even have their clipboard hanging right the certificates are required to be posted where people can see them for people who break the rules what are the penalties there's both a monetary penalty possible and a suspension you could even face up to six months in jail so what does Eadie think of our test results we've found people who are selling produce that they didn't grow but they're telling us that they did well that's what we see on occasion here we definitely see that and to me that's nothing but fraud to crack down on fraud ed and his team don't just check the markets they take their inspections all the way to the farm surprisingly one of our inspectors actually found leaks they pulled one up and there were no roots someone had just taken leaks and stuck them in the dirt kanji ah Satomi cells at the Santa Monica farmers market what Greg's doing right now is he's he's actually seeing that there's signs that people have been working in this area I think about roughly 50 pounds or so why do you guys go to all this trouble to have guys like Greg come out here and check things like dandelions to make sure that the consumer is not getting ripped off people are willing to pay a premium price for a product at farmers market sometimes two times as much as what you would pay in a regular grocery store we're trying to prevent fraud who's looking out for shoppers here we prefer to work with farmers markets that sounds like a slap on the wrist consumers are paying a premium for your product because they think that you brew it are you ripping people off this is more marketplace the real deal on your marketplace our investigation into farmers markets found reselling at 70% of the markets we visited at half of those vendors made claims that didn't check out shoppers at this market don't like our results that's a straight-up scam it becomes almost like a marketing ploy which feels immoral to me I could go to the supermarket if I wanted to get food from mass producers but in Peterborough Brent and James Kant told us they grew produce he picked up it's a food terminal we've been reaching out to them for weeks we've been given no answers so we're heading back inside the market hi there I'm Charles see a girl with us CBC's market please Charles I'm well thanks listen we've been trying to get a hold of you and we just like to know why you're misleading people saying that you grew produce when you didn't grow it didn't even come from your farm why aren't you being transparent about reselling because consumers are paying a premium for your product because they think that you grew it are you ripping people off James Kent doesn't want to talk but we may get some answers yet directors here and I just want to know what what's the issue Mark Jones represents the market board he says they've chosen to include reselling since produce isn't available year-round do a very simple reason is economics for reselling but it's the issue about being honest and open and transparent about it we know that transparency is an issue and we've been working on that with our farmers okay that takes time so consumers here will have to wait as for the Kent's a few days after our interview we get an email from James he says he does grow some crops but also sells local produce from the terminal because he believes it benefits his customers but this isn't the only Ontario market where vendors misrepresented what they sell so our next stop is the Ontario legislature I do I do yeah Jeff Lille is the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Affairs we show him what we found somebody witnesses that kind of activity they could file a complaint with the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture Food and Rural Affairs every time we receive a complaint we'll certainly make sure that we investigate if you do do an investigation and you determine there was misrepresentation what's the next step we prefer to work with farmers markets to to get a resolved so that sounds like a slap on the wrist that's because there's not much more the ministry can do not without rules like those in California do you feel like there needs to be legislative change here something with a little bit more teeth and you made a good suggestion to us today to look at the California model and I make a commitment to do that we'll be watching in the meantime at your next trip to the market here's how to put vendors claims to the test for yourself the things that they're selling or not in season zucchinis in June strawberries in early June in behind there are the boxes with the labels on them if it's somebody else's name on that box and that person didn't grow a uniformity and perfectness I mean the peppers are all the same size all the same shape let's start asking the right questions and start seeking out the real farmers you know the best question I ask is can we visit if you don't guess then invite you can probably bet that they're not a farming and if you think you see misrepresentation in Ontario the minister says give him a call 1-800 complaint line is one eight seven seven four two four 1300 they're supposed to be free to try but these little bottles of anti aging cream are giving Canadians new wrinkles I'm outraged at this company's poor business ethics even the Dragons are getting dragged in entrepreneurs they're shysters we'll show you how they do it it was supposed to be for free and now I'm enrolled in something go in search of who's behind it and we ask why can't anyone stop it [Music]

Channel: CBC News

Views: 4,100,348

Rating: 4.7936854 out of 5

Keywords: Farmers market, farmers, market, lies, exposed, hidden camera, investigation, produce, buying, grown, grown locally, locally, Marketplace, undercover, shopping trip, catches, vendors, lying

Id: YYwB63YslbA

Length: 22min 26sec (1346 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 29 2017

Reddit Comments

[u/[deleted]]

TLDR

Many vendors are farmers markets are not farmers, they purchase produce from wholesale distributors, often for a lower price because the produce are misshapen or the wrong size for grocery stores.

The vendors then sell the produces they bought for cheap and slap on them a premium because they make people believe they are the farmers who grew the produces.

Many of the produces are also mislabeled, they come from Mexico, the USA and other countries but are sold as locally grown.

Finally, produces that are advertised as "bio" or "pesticide free" have been grown in industrial operations with pesticides and often in countries with low regulations.

So basically, buying at a farmer's market, you could be paying more than at the grocery store for produce that were grown at the same place but that the grocery stores rejected.

[u/rpgguy_1o1]

What made me skeptical about our local farmers market was that I'm pretty sure you can't grow bananas and mangoes in Waterloo

[u/NicNoletree]

Excellent post. Thanks for helping to raise awareness.

[u/ThrowawayCars123]

I recall a couple years ago, there was a farmer's market where one vendor tried to call attention to this.

The market reacted by throwing her out on her ear.

[u/beefrox]

It helps to know what's seasonal in your region and what kind of greenhouse crops are popular. If you see someone selling tomatoes and berries in the spring, there's little chance they was grown by the farmer. Even things like garlic in May-June can be suspect as it's harvested in late summer/early fall and doesn't usually last more than 6-8 months.

Dirty potatoes and carrots in August? Probably a good chance they were grown locally.

[u/kimiconfessions]

I have worked for a relation to my brother in law who does exactly this. They used to own a farm in Grimsby but it was bought out by developers over a decade ago. They still continue to go to the St. Lawrence Market and sell what they tell people is their product. The father would tell consumers exactly what they wanted to hear and nothing else. Organic? Yes. Freestone peaches? Of course! If he was getting backed in to a corner he would feign a language barrier (the family is not Canadian born). I couldn't think up the lies fast enough so I wasn't asked to help all that often.

[u/meakbot]

I used to work at a small town market. The owner had a huge sign out front that said

“Local only (no lemons)”

It amazed me how many people would pass through and demand the explanation.

[u/oliolibababa]

You know what would be helpful....a nationwide "Verified Farmer" tag/sticker. Honestly, it's all it would take. We have organic labels already. Hell, twitter and instagram even have verified 'ticks'.

Farmers could apply for a "verified seller" certificate/label that they could display at their venues. Maybe different colors for local and local organic. This would be an easy spot for customers.

Is this really so hard to organize?

[u/joevapes]

wow, thanks for the share. this is some fucked up shit.