The dirtier, the better? Temporalities of regenerative agriculture at a farmer’s market in Copenhagen

Focusing on Grønt marked, an outdoor farmers’ market in Copenhagen, this paper explores the temporalities that emerge in intra-actions (Barad, 2007) between locally grown vegetables, eaters, growers and other bodies in gentrifying urban space.

Grønt marked is a part of a growing regenerative agri-food movement in Denmark. Started in 2019 by a group of volunteer international food professionals and activists, the market blossomed during the COVID-19 lockdowns as a “safe” outdoor social event. In 2023, the market has grown from a monthly event to a weekly Sunday market from May to December in three different locations. The market offers affordable stalls to producers of local, regenerative foods, on the condition that the food is sold by the producers.

Based on fieldwork and conversations with organizers, eaters and growers since 2021, I explore the temporalities that emerge around the locally grown vegetables sold at the market. These vegetables are often unusual, smaller, dirtier, strangely shaped and more expensive than supermarket produce. This brings up questions of food justice and access, echoing existing critiques of “slow food” and “slow living” (see, for instance, Sharma, 2014). However, the slowness also entails that labour otherwise undertaken by (underpaid) manual laborers, like distribution and cleaning of the vegetables, is now performed by the eaters themselves. Shopping and preparing food takes time in a different way. In addition to rhythms and tempos of food access and preparation, the market also enacts certain seasonalities. In addition to the vegetables reflecting the changing seasons, the market takes place outdoors, exposed to sun, rain and wind. In addition, for many eaters, the soil on the vegetables embodies proximity to soils and “nature” outside the city, hinting to urban-rural and sometimes intergenerational temporalities. The paper inquires how these different temporalities (re-)articulate urban spaces and ecologies, and how they gesture towards food presents, futures and politics in and beyond the city.