Understanding and Enhancing the Community Value of Traditional Retail Markets in UK cities

几个世纪以来，传统零售市场（TRM）在英国的城镇和城市中发挥了重要作用，特别是支持贫困社区，提供负担得起的食品和创业机会，并在日益多样化的城市中促进社会包容。然而，它们受到全球零售趋势的根本变化和公共部门削减的影响，使它们处于边缘地位。与此同时，专门针对高收入消费者和游客的食品、当地农产品、时装和手工艺品市场正在复苏，伦敦的Borough和巴塞罗那的La Boqueria是成功的典范。迫切需要进行研究，以了解市场的现状及其潜在的社区价值，这些价值可能处于危险之中，尤其是在伦敦，谴责独立零售商和弱势用户的流离失所。为了应对这一知识差距和政策建议的需要，这项研究将提供一个新的，新颖的和全面的方式来理解社区的价值，这到目前为止已经证明了国际学术和政策文献，但仍然脱节。在我们的研究中，我们将TRM的社区价值定义为三个相互关联的维度：1。经济作为地方，提供负担得起的食品，产品和服务，以及创造机会，低成本的创业。2.社会作为社会流动的平台，发展社区联系和信任，从而更好地实现社会包容。3.文化作为体验文化和种族多样性的空间，为移民、少数民族和一般弱势公民提供一种地方感。该项目将围绕四项任务展开。首先，我们将批判性地分析当前围绕TRM的公共话语是如何通过分析行业，学术，社区，媒体和政策出版物在国内和国际上形成的。其次，通过访谈和研讨会与利益相关者合作，我们将梳理出TRM主要利益相关者理解其社区价值的各种方式。第三项任务将通过访谈、焦点小组和大型市场用户调查，深入和严格了解市场用户的体验，我们选择了三个市场，即谢菲尔德摩尔、斯托克波特和伦敦的皇后区市场。这些代表了TRM正在以不同的方式经历的深刻变革：这三个项目都位于人口密集的城市地区，其集水区内有大量贫困地区，它们都由地方当局拥有和管理，面临严重的资金压力，但处于不同的重建阶段。利用大规模调查的数据，我们将进行地理空间分析，确定市场用户来自不同案例研究的社会人口群体，并将其与他们的各种经验联系起来。第四项任务将集中于为关键的TRM利益攸关方开发有用的产出和工具，如市场交易商组织、地方当局、国家一级的决策者、第三部门组织和地方社区团体，所有这些都参与了TRM的未来。为了扩大我们的潜力，产生真实的社会影响，我们将与TRM部门（全国市场交易者联合会）和社区经济学专家（新经济基金会）的非学术合作伙伴共同制作我们的研究，我们将通过指导小组与其他组织在研究的各个阶段提供支持（见信件）。该项目将在国际期刊上发表五篇学术文章。我们将编写针对TRM部门决策者的报告，以及通过我们的传播战略传播的可访问的简短报告和非学术文章。我们还将与交易员、市场经理和社区团体举行实践研讨会，以测试和反馈我们的研究结果。

Traditional retail markets (TRM) have played a significant role in UK's towns and cities for centuries more recently specially supporting deprived neighbourhoods providing affordable food and start-up business opportunities as well as fostering social inclusion in increasingly diverse cities. However they have been affected by radical changes in global retail trends and public sector cuts which are relegating them to a marginal space. At the same time, markets specialising in food, local produce, fashion and crafts, aimed at high income consumers and tourists are in resurgence with Borough in London and La Boqueria in Barcelona held as successful models. Research is urgent to understand the current situation of markets and their potential community value which may be at risk as evidenced by the rise of campaigns, particularly in London, denouncing the displacement of independent retailers and vulnerable users. To respond to this knowledge gap and need for policy advice, this research will provide a fresh, novel and holistic way to understand the community value, which so far has been evidenced in international academic and policy literature but remains disconnected. For our research we will define the community value of TRM as constituted of three interconnected dimensions: 1. Economic as places that provide affordable food, products and services as well as create opportunities for low cost business start-ups. 2. Social as platforms for social mobility and the development of community ties and trust leading to better social inclusion. 3. Cultural as spaces for experiencing a diversity of cultures and ethnicities and provide a sense of place for migrants, ethnic minorities and generally vulnerable citizens. The project will be organised around four tasks. First we will critically analyse how the current public discourse around TRM is being framed nationally and internationally through an analysis of industry, academic, community, media and policy publications. Second, in collaboration with stakeholders through interviews and workshops, we will tease out the various ways in which key TRM stakeholders understand their community value. A third task will gain an in depth and rigorous understanding of markets users' experiences via interviews, focus groups and a large market user survey in three markets which we have selected as Sheffield Moor, Stockport and Queens Market in London. These represent the profound transformations that TRM are going through in different ways: the three are based in dense urban areas with significant deprived pockets within their catchments, they are all owned and managed by local authorities with severe funding pressures but are at various stages of redevelopment. With the data from the large scale survey we will perform a geospatial analysis identifying the socio-demographic groups that market users come from at the different case studies and relating this to their various experiences. The fourth task will concentrate in the development of usable outputs and tools for key TRM stakeholders such as market trader organisation, local authorities, national level policy makers, third sector organisations and local community groups all engaged in the future of TRM. To extend our potential to have a real societal impact we will co-produce our research with non-academic partners from the TRM sector (National Market Traders Federation) and experts in community economics (New Economics Foundation) and we will be supported through a Steering Group with other organisations at various stages of the research (See letters). The project will result in five academic articles in international journals. We will produce reports aimed at policy makers within the TRM sector and accessible short reports and non-academic articles all disseminated through our communication strategy. We will also hold practical workshops with traders, market managers and community groups to test and feedback on our findings.