SPENCER - Fourteen years ago, there were 15 farmers markets in West Virginia, according to USDA statistics.

Now, there are 50.

They've cropped up in traditional farming communities like Spencer, and in tourist towns like Fayetteville. West Virginia University Extension Agent Brandy Brabham is helping to start one right now in Amma, just off the Interstate 79 exit in rural Roane County.

One reason? Senior vouchers.

The program started in West Virginia nine years ago. The U.S. Department of Agriculture provides a grant - it's $490,000 in West Virginia - that buys $20 farmers market coupon books for senior citizens. Seniors who live at no more than 185 percent of the poverty level can use the coupons to buy fresh fruits and vegetables at farmers markets.

There's a smaller number of vouchers for WIC (Women, Infants and Children) nutrition program participants - $70,000 a year for West Virginia, according to the USDA. The goal is to help lower-income seniors, pregnant and postpartum mothers, and small children get the fruits and vegetables they need in their diets.

The problem for a while was, they didn't have anywhere to spend the vouchers.

"In the Amma area - the rural parts of Clay, Calhoun and Roane counties, and probably Clendenin - not a lot of elderly people can afford to travel to [the nearest farmers market in] Charleston," especially at today's gas prices, Brabham said.

WIC participants had the same problem, said Denise Eagan, who coordinates the farmers market nutrition program for WIC in West Virginia.

"About 72 percent of the vouchers we passed out last year were used," Eagan said. "It's not that our participants don't want to use them. ... We did a survey this past spring, asking both farmers and the participants for their ideas about the farmers market program. Unanimously, both groups said, 'Don't stop this program. We love it.'

"But accessibility can be a challenge."

It's becoming easier, as more farmers and consumers band together to start farmers markets all over the state. Some counties share a market. Now, only three counties in the state still lack a farmers market: Mingo, McDowell and Wyoming.

SPENCER - Fourteen years ago, there were 15 farmers markets in West Virginia, according to USDA statistics.

Now, there are 50.

They've cropped up in traditional farming communities like Spencer, and in tourist towns like Fayetteville. West Virginia University Extension Agent Brandy Brabham is helping to start one right now in Amma, just off the Interstate 79 exit in rural Roane County.

One reason? Senior vouchers.

The program started in West Virginia nine years ago. The U.S. Department of Agriculture provides a grant - it's $490,000 in West Virginia - that buys $20 farmers market coupon books for senior citizens. Seniors who live at no more than 185 percent of the poverty level can use the coupons to buy fresh fruits and vegetables at farmers markets.

There's a smaller number of vouchers for WIC (Women, Infants and Children) nutrition program participants - $70,000 a year for West Virginia, according to the USDA. The goal is to help lower-income seniors, pregnant and postpartum mothers, and small children get the fruits and vegetables they need in their diets.

The problem for a while was, they didn't have anywhere to spend the vouchers.

"In the Amma area - the rural parts of Clay, Calhoun and Roane counties, and probably Clendenin - not a lot of elderly people can afford to travel to [the nearest farmers market in] Charleston," especially at today's gas prices, Brabham said.

WIC participants had the same problem, said Denise Eagan, who coordinates the farmers market nutrition program for WIC in West Virginia.

"About 72 percent of the vouchers we passed out last year were used," Eagan said. "It's not that our participants don't want to use them. ... We did a survey this past spring, asking both farmers and the participants for their ideas about the farmers market program. Unanimously, both groups said, 'Don't stop this program. We love it.'

"But accessibility can be a challenge."

It's becoming easier, as more farmers and consumers band together to start farmers markets all over the state. Some counties share a market. Now, only three counties in the state still lack a farmers market: Mingo, McDowell and Wyoming.

And that might change: Savanna Lyons, who helped start the Fayette County Farmers Market two years ago, said Wyoming countians have asked her group to help them start a farmers market.

Fayette County is expanding its own farmers market this year, from Fayetteville to a second location in Mount Hope.

"These folks need access to fresh food," Lyons said.

On a sunny Friday afternoon, 65-year-old Jane Whytsell stops under the shady farmers market awning outside the Spencer senior center for a dozen farm-fresh eggs.

The senior vouchers are what got Whytsell started shopping at the market. "Oh, yes, I look forward to getting those vouchers," she said.

Whytsell's neighbor, Cathy Flashman, brought the eggs from her farm that morning. Flashman also sells yarn she spins and dyes herself from merino wool. When summer vegetables - and the vouchers - come in, that's when the market gets busier. That's when Sherry Bernardis will have her full complement of vegetables at the market: everything from corn and tomatoes to kale and Brussels sprouts, all grown organically in her 8,000-plus-square-foot garden.

She grows some of her food to give to Helping Hand, for local residents in need. But if it weren't for the farmers market, she wouldn't have anything to do with the surplus. "I would just give it to family and neighbors," Bernardis said.

Brabham said she's heard the same thing from other producers. Before farmers markets were so widely available, "they'd probably give it away, or let it go bad, or can what they could," she said.

Now, that surplus produce has a market - a $3.1 million annual market in West Virginia, according to a survey by WVU Extension.

"I expect we'll have more markets this year than we did last year," said Jean Smith, marketing and development director for the West Virginia Department of Agriculture. "I know, for instance, that Wirt County is going to have a market for the first time this year. Their folks that got the coupons had to go to Wood County or Jackson County to get to the nearest farmers market. ... They're doing it because of the coupon program."

To contact staff writer Tara Tuckwiller, use e-mail or call 348-5189.

If you go

• Spencer Farmers Market: 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Fridays behind the Roane County Committee on Aging in Spencer.
• Fayette County Farmers Market: 7:30 to 11:30 a.m. Saturdays in the parking lot of the Fayette County Courthouse in Fayetteville.
• Amma Farmers Market organizational meeting: 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, May 27, at the Senior and Community Building in Amma. Vendors are needed - home gardeners, greenhouse operators, flower gardeners and fresh eggs, honey and molasses producers, as well as producers of handmade items from agricultural products and homemade baked goods. Call 927-0975 for information.
• Find a farmers market near you: Visit www.wvu.edu/~agexten/farmman2/farmmrkts.htm for a searchable list of farmers markets by county.