Over the last two weeks, our team has been criss-crossing the two districts of Bihar which are the base for the INFUSION project’s research, Samastipur and Bhojpur. We have been ground-truthing our survey tools and doing dry runs for our high frequency data collection from rural food markets in collaboration with our excellent data collection partners, DAI Research and Advisory Services.
The days were unrelentingly hot and muggy (even though it is the rainy season) and the drives to the markets were long and bumpy. Yet I always woke up on each field visit day with a sense of excitement – maybe it’s just me, but I find food markets and the people in them endlessly fascinating.
The markets we visited ranged from small clearings in villages with some 30 or 40 vendors, to large and chaotic ‘block markets’ with 200 traders lining each side of a busy road, a wall of noise rising into the air from trucks screaming past and loudspeakers blaring festive music. In the smaller village haats you could find villagers preparing baskets of freshly harvested sponge gourd and pale purple brinjals for sale at the market, and locally caught fish still gulping in shallow iron vessels. The small markets operate only a couple of times a week, and only after 3 or 4pm. On a particularly hot afternoon an unspoken consent might even emerge to set up only after 6pm, with the bulk of trading happening in darkness, lit only by mobile phone lights or the headlights of an idling three-wheeler. In contrast, larger block markets would operate for most of the day every day, and there you might find tomatoes from Bangalore or chillies from Andhra Pradesh.
Large or small, most markets have some things in common: there is little sign of even rudimentary cold stores. Many market sites have very little by way of infrastructure, not even a basic raised platform or a roof to protect people and produce from the elements. Seasonal elements can easily interrupt commerce and availability – on one cloudy day with a forecast of rain we found that vendors only trickled in a couple of hours after opening time. Strong rains can quickly degrade connectivity to markets. Food safety hazards abound – clouds of flies throng fresh meat and fish sales sites, and produce can be in proximity to sewers. While vendors are typically sensitive to keeping food loss to a minimum, e.g. via pricing according to time of day or saving discarded food for livestock feed, the high perishability and lack of storage does imply losses to produce, profits and nutrient supply.
These rural food market sites are a vital node in providing equitable access to nutritious foods for the population, not only as sources of direct purchase, but also in driving supplies to other parts of the food environment such as village shops and itinerant traders. They arise from the remarkable ingenuity and entrepreneurial spirit of innumerable people with very modest resources. Our visits have deepened our conviction that modest investments and upgrades to food markets can go a long way towards delivering better access to safe and affordable nutritious foods whilst also boosting outcomes for traders and farmers. The INFUSION project aims to study this potential in detail.
Bhavani Shankar, July 22, 2024