Why eat local?

Credit: iStock / Matteo De Stefano

This article is excerpted from School Year Gardens: A Toolkit for High Schools to Grow Food from September to June by Paris Marshall Smith and Arzeena Hamir.

The Cost of Our Current Food System

Currently, supermarkets provide consumers with a cornucopia of food that has been shipped in from around the world. While we enjoy the luxury of eating strawberries in December and apples in June, our food system is unsustainable. Food that is imported has a huge impact on the environment and provides little income to farmers who grow it.

A study cited by the David Suzuki Foundation website estimates that a basic North American
meal travels 2,400 km from field to table(1). For each half pound of salad greens consumed
locally rather than purchased from California, a local consumer would save almost 1/2 kg of CO2
from being released in the air(2).

New Zealand is 7,500 miles from British Columbia and while Okanagan farmers exported $77 million worth of apples, we imported $111 million worth of them. Even though New Zealand may be able to produce apples cheaper than local farmers, what is the true cost of eating apples from so far away? A 2001 University of Iowa study found that the average apple traveled 1,726 miles to reach the consumer and released 17 times more CO2(3).

Although the cost of food is beginning to rise in Canada due to increased oil prices, farmers
see very little of this money. According to a 2005 study by Canada’s National Farmers Union,
Canadian farmers receive approximately 6.5 cents from the sale of a box of corn fl akes, which
retails for $3.57(4).

Eating Local Means Eating Seasonally! Means Building Community!

Supporting local producers helps to build a moral economy by creating space where people
can develop their awareness around where food comes from and who is producing it. Consumers (those who eat the food) can engage in active discussions with Producers (those who grow and process the food) about social justice, community and environmental issues. Eating local: trust + producers and consumers = growth of community.

By building community around food, it no longer is seen as a commodity, as a thing, instead, relationships begin to be built with food and those who work with it.

Food is more than a product – there is meaning and value to food.

1 Nature Challenge, David Suzuki Foundation Newsletter, October 2004, p. 3, www.davidsuzuki.org/_pvw370829/WOL/Challenge/Newsletter/oct2004_buylocal/page3.asp

2 Lifecycles Food Miles Calculator, July 27, 2007, www.lifecyclesproject.ca/initiatives/food_directory/?q=foodmiles/inventory/add

3 Th e True Cost of Food, Adbusters #55 Sept-Oct 2004, adbusters.org/the_magazine/55/Th e_True_Cost_of_Food.html

4 Global Investor.com, downloaded at www.digitaljournal.com/article/209731/Global_Food_Cost_Rising

This article is excerpted from School Year Gardens: A Toolkit for High Schools to Grow Food from September to June by Paris Marshall Smith and Arzeena Hamir. Click here to download the entire toolkit as a PDF.