Over the past few years, a host of both negative and positive factors such as high unemployment rates in urban areas and an increasing trend to return to a more old-fashioned, but at the same time more natural and rewarding way of life have encouraged people to leave the city and engage in agricultural activities. Some of these activities, like mushroom or snail farms, have even been deemed fads by critics, though they actually seem to catch on and become the basis of an entire new era in Greek agriculture.
The land of Attica is blessed in many ways, and Marathon offers an ideal microclimate for leafy greens all year round, as well as for summer vegetables in season tomatoes, cucumbers, courgettes, and onions assuring not only freshness but also great taste. Today, in the wider Marathon area, more than 50,000 square meters of greenhouses and 100,000 square meters of open-air crops are run using alternative farming methods, in an effort to rid the final consumer product of chemical pesticides and fertilisers. Instead of chemicals, controlled populations of insects are used to kill pests in a completely natural way, which protects vegetables without risking any potential harm to consumers.
Touring the region by car or even on foot, visitors are bound to meet local farmers selling quality produce along the network of country roads connecting the small villages this is indeed as close as one can get to sourcing straight from the farm!
