To Market, To Market

The fresh produce markets in Vanuatu have been a source of great fascination. Some communities hold them just once a week while Port Vila seemed to be open for business daily. All the produce is incredibly fresh and has likely been grown organically. The presentation is fabulous too with ingenious use of bamboo sticks to create wands to support fruits, palm fronds to secure heads of lettuce or to create baskets for root vegetables.















By and large the biggest issue from our own perspective was the volume of the bundles:-11 lettuce, 1/2 kilo of chilli's (so potent that you can feel your corneas detaching) etc. Even partnering up and splitting/sharing a purchase is too much for a couple living on a boat! This makes me wonder at why their veggie bundles are the size they are. One can accept that a weekly market might mean that people may want to stock up, but out in the villages, people generally have a garden so they are probably just topping up. Our suspicion though, having noted how families seem to cluster in a compound, is that shoppers are buying for a whole family group; or that families are generally so large to necessitate these volumes.



The markets also sold flowers, firewood for cooking and river pebbles(also used in cooking).