Farmer and Consumer Attitudes at Farmers Markets in Norway Kjartan Åsebø Anne Moxnes Jervell Geir Lieblein Mads Svennerud Charles Francis ABSTRACT. Urbanization and an increasingly globalized food system cause growing physical and psychological distances between produc- ers and customers. Alternative distribution initiatives with direct sale to local customers are emerging. This paper reports results of two surveys, one from producers and one from customers, in the newly introduced Nor- wegian farmers market system. The main aim of the research was to ex- amine attitudes toward local foods and evaluate the potential of this new marketing channel to reduce the distances between farmers and consum- ers. Results show that producers were more concerned than customers re- garding knowledge on how food was produced, and locally marketed, although customers were also interested in these issues. Both groups re- garded as to how food was produced to be more important than where it was produced. Producers were more interested in giving customers infor- mation on agriculture than customers were in receiving this information. Kjartan Åsebø (E-mail: kjartaas@gmail.no), Geir Lieblein (E-mail: geir.lieblein@ umb.no), and Charles Francis (E-mail: charles.francis@umb.no) are all affiliated with the Department of Plant and Environmental Science, P.O. Box 5003, Norwegian Uni- versity of Life Sciences (UMB), N-1432 Ås, Norway. Anne Moxnes Jervell (E-mail: anne.jervell@sifo.no) is Director, National Institute for Consumer Research (SIFO), P.O. Box 4682, Nydalen, N-0405 Oslo, Norway. Mads Svennerud (E-mail: Mads.svennerud@nilf.no) is affiliated with the Norwegian Agricultural Economics Research Institute (NILF), P.O. Box 8024 Dep., N-0030 Oslo, Norway. Address correspondence to: Charles Francis at the above address (E-mail: charles. francis@umb.no). Journal of Sustainable Agriculture, Vol. 30(4) 2007 Available online at http://jsa.haworthpress.com © 2007 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1300/J064v30n04_06 67