Towards a New Economy
Mindful Markets Forum, 31st August – 2nd September 2015
The success of Mindful Markets Forum in 2014 inspired Suan Ngen Mee Ma social enterprise to publish the book in both English and Thai language. The book aims to empower the emergence of consumer movements in Asia to support small-scale farmers. Wallapa van Willenswaard, the editor who initiated the green market networks in Thailand, interviewed resource persons in the forum together with her journalist team.
The book contents are divided into 3 parts; an introduction of Green Market Networks and Towards Organic Asia, an overview of three important sources of inspiration and case studies. Mindful Markets: Producer-Consumer Partnerships towards a New Economy book was launched during the second Mindful Markets Forum, 31st August – 2nd September 2015.
Mindful Markets Exchange Forum of Good Practices on Alternative Markets in the Mekong region/ASEAN/ASIA Cooperation of Small-scale Farmers, Social Enterprises and Green Consumers, 31st August – 2nd September 2015 in Bangkok
After last year successful of Mindful Markets Forum for supporting consumer education and building the bridge between small scale family farmers and local consumers, the second Mindful Markets Forum was held on 31st August – 2nd September 2015 at Srinakharinwirot University (SWU), Bangkok. Over 20 network partners participated in the event to exchange and strengthen our mission in following mindful economy principles.
According to the international year of soil in 2015, the panel of ‘healthy soil for healthy life’ became the main theme in the opening session to emphasize the importance of healthy soil as the best way to ensure healthy food production all over the world. The next session was discussion on the cooperation between small scale farmers, social enterprises and green consumers in supporting of soil fertilities and organic means for building a mindful economy. This session, Zainal Arifin Fuad from La Via Campesina also discussed the involvement of mindful markets and food sovereignty. Even though, agricultural movements have various names from various groups, they have the mutual principle for organic food sovereignty that required cooperation from producers, enterprises and consumers.
On the second day, the session of ‘consumer consciousness’ was the theme to exchange knowledge and experiences by Dr.Cho Wanhyung from Hansalim Cooperative Federation in South Korea and Abdur Rob from Practrical Action in Bangladesh. In addition, an academic session organized by Srinakharinwirot University discussed organic products from various approaches. The group workshops started in the afternoon where our partners joined into 6 groups; Small-scale farmers’ movement,, Consumer cooperatives: Peoples’ movement, Local food economy, PGS and certification systems, URGENCI/CSA Asia and Green and Social enterprise. The last day was the session on ‘Mindful Markets: Organic Products, Market and Supply Chain in Thailand’ where our partner Thai social enterprises talked about food situation in Thailand. The Green Fair ’08, an annual community organic exhibition organized by Suan Nguen Mee Ma social enterprise and Green Consumer Society project, was held in parallel to the forum as a good opportunity for small-scale producers, social entrepreneurs and consumers to meet and expand wider organic networks in Thailand and Asia.
Towards Organic Asia 