In the heart of the information era, while most young people see farming as traditional and old-fashioned, a group of young Jamaican entrepreneurs have decided take on a new approach to local food retailing  they are selling Jamaican farm foods and other agro-produce online. They realized that there are a lot more young Jamaican farmers, artisans and entrepreneurs like themselves, who need to source new markets in order to sustain and grow their business ventures. Economic crunch have most agro-producers under the pump and they need to come up with unique ways to increase their sales, but only few of them have personal computers or access to the internet and very few can take on the challenges of building and operating an e-commerce site and marketing the site to national and international shoppers.

Iriemart was born primarily to solve this frustration. Iriemart takes purchase information from the buyer, pick and sort items from farms or producers, processes the payments via Paypal, and make deliveries to buyers. After networking with numerous Jamaican farmers and artisans (mostly from rural areas), and getting a lot of support from friends and family with IT knowledge, these young innovators are using e-commerce to distribute local farm foods and a host of other agro-produce at www.iriemart.com.

All Jamaican farmers, artisans and food producers large and small can contact Iriemart at 876 484 5171 or 876 481 3258, email: [email protected], whenever they have produce for sale. Iriemart delivers these produce directly from farms to consumers. But the farmers and producers aren't the only ones benefiting -- Iriemart lowers the cost of foods for families struggling with soaring grocery bills. For the first time, consumers in Jamaica are discovering the benefits of buying locally grown foods at farm-direct prices. The items are fresher, tastier, more nutritious, more convenient to purchase, and a whole lot cheaper than anything in the supermarkets. For restaurants, other food service providers and wholesale outlets, the search for locally grown fruits, vegetables, ground provisions, plants, livestock etc, just got easier, as it is much more convenient to contact iriemart for this free information.

For families and friends in USA, Canada, UK or anywhere in the world, they can save on the cost of remittance by purchasing deeply discounted Iriemart Shopping Points (shopping points are used as cash when checking out items), to be used by any other Iriemart member in Jamaica. International shoppers can also purchase items directly, for delivery to their party in Jamaica. Members get a similar experience to a regular supermarket, but it is much more scalable, you get a better selection, you can check for availability of items weeks before you need them, order speciality items that are not listed and request samples plus much more. It makes more economic sense for consumers to order in bulk quantities from Iriemart at any time and have the flexibility of collecting freshly harvested items in smaller quantities as needed. Iriemart also sends information to members about changes to items that are of interest to them, such as availability and "special priced". Although Iriemart works much like any other online retailer from the consumer's perspective, behind the scenes it is more like a unique logistics service, connecting all players in the agro-produce supply chain, both online and offline.

Iriemart is actively signing up home-based and large-scale Farmers, Artisans and Producers island-wide and encourages all local small cottage industries to get involved with this new market opportunity. There is absolutely no charge for submitting product information to 876 484 5171 or 876 481 3258 or email: [email protected]. Membership is FREE for all consumers. The site has only been live since July 5, and it has had hundreds of visitors so far. Deliveries are currently being made within Kingston and St Andrew, with plans for full island-wide deliveries soon. Whether you're a restaurant or a consumer, a visit to www.iriemart.com can help to take control of our local food chain, so farmers can survive from the land we love.