How to Think Globally, Eat Locally

Over the last decade, the environmental consciousness of the U.S. has grown in tremendous proportions. Corporate natural-food markets have a firm grip in the marketplace, first supplementing, then overtaking local farmer's markets. Fads and ideologies like low-impact living have spread from the suburbs to the city streets. And eating locally is a cost-effective, simple place to start. However, in eating locally, you're not just supporting the environmental sensibilities of a green society, but you're also impacting domestic agricultural policies and, to a broader extent, foreign agricultural relationships and dependencies.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

1. Institute a low-mileage purchase standard. Low-impact ideologues endorse the 250-mile rule. This means not purchasing goods grown farther than 250 miles from your home. That mark was not chosen arbitrarily. That distance--250 miles--is, according to some reports, the greatest distance a local farmer can drive to sell her goods. Some advocates take it even further, depending on the accessibility to their home. Do you think you could live within the confines of the 50-mile rule?
2. Save the local farmer. In the last 50 years, U.S. agriculture has seen a precipitous decline in the number of small to mid-size operating farmers. Unable to compete with large food corporations, they are forced to lease portions of their land to commercial growers or sell their property outright. In both cases, the erstwhile local grower is left twiddling his thumbs, wondering how to apply generations of agricultural knowledge to the 9-to-5 economy. Essentially, he's out of a job.
3. Help diminish our dependence on foreign goods. Smaller farming operations haven't been gobbled up by commercial agriculture simply because of the financial motivations of the latter and its competitive marketplace. The vast corporate agricultural conglomerates are nearly forced to buy up land to produce more. Given their size and capability, literally tons of [name-your-food] are shipped to the corners of this country and the globe. In fact, this is encouraged by government policy as a vehicle for two global moneymakers. One is competing globally in the export of goods and maintaining a prominent position in foreign trade. And two, is balancing domestic output against dependence on foreign agriculture.
4. Reduce your carbon footprint. Logistically speaking, local agriculture is environmentally friendlier than its commercial counterpart. Transportation alone is a massive contributor to the emissions output. Trucks, ships and airplanes traverse the globe everyday carrying cheap goods from Omaha to Osaka, Bangalore to Boston. In addition, the largely mechanically run processes of commercial farming require enormous energy levels to function, while emitting waste into the air, earth and water. While local farmers drive cars and use machines, their own emissions are a fraction of a fraction of those larger farming operations. Advocating local agriculture has a direct correlation on the global carbon footprint.
5. Spend more to get more. For many of the reasons above, commercial farming is able to produce enormous quantities of food and a low price. Because of the financial strain on local farmers, buying locally often means paying a higher price--something the average consumer's pocketbook can't fathom. Still, at the lower cost, what you're paying for in buying commercial is a lower-quality food, higher emissions, increased dependence on foreign agriculture and the depletion of one of the cores of the American tradition and foundation: The local farmer. In supporting them, you're supporting a movement much bigger than green-thinking trends and exploited fads. If this were as pervasive a movement as "advocates" claim, we'd be talking about a shift in the global agriculture consciousness.

Tips & Warnings

• Go to weekend farmer's markets to check out the supply.
• Look into farms within a drivable distance. If you live in an urban area, heading out into the country for a day or weekend is a great getaway, and you can buy fresh produce direct from the source, literally days (or hours, even) after it was harvested.
• Simply going to a chain natural-food market and buying products labeled "organic" doesn't mean you're doing a bit of good. Many times, these are just as tainted or cheaply produced as the food you'd find elsewhere.