The Approach of Local People to Earth Market in Cittaslow Cities: The Case of Imbros Destination

Abstract

Slow Food movement was sparked in reaction to late-capitalism's focus on increasing the
speed and scale of economic growth and industrial production, and the resulting
homogenization of food production, distribution, regulation and culture. As for Cittaslow,
which means ‘slowcity’, is an international network of small towns with the aim of
addressing the ‘slowfood’ philosophy in their urban desing and planning. In this context,
Earth Markets are farmers' markets that have been established according to guidelines that
follow the Slow Food philosophy. Imbros destination is considered as an example for this
study which aims to assess local people's approach to Earth Market in the Cittaslow cities.
Imbros is one of nine CittaSlow cities in Turkey. Imbros also will host an Earth Market
which is 35th in the World and 2nd Earth Market in Turkey. The study follows a
qualitative research format which is designed as a semi-structured interview form,
organized for carring out in-depth interviews. In addition, the triangulation provided with
observations in the field and document analysis and data were analyzed with descriptive
analysis. In conclusion, it was found that the local people in general adopted the formation
cittaslow and they look in a positive way to Earth Market project. However they do not
have enough information about the Earth Market project.