How on earth does buying locally grown produce and other foods effect us on a global scale? After all, we’re just small town country folk.
It’s simple really. The less your food travels to you and the less you travel to it, the less pollution and eco-waste is pumped into our world and our bodies.
The Great Travelling Head of Lettuce
Think of it this way. A head of iceberg lettuce can be grown by a local farmer, then shipped 5,000km away to a processing plant where it is sold for it’s final destination to London England (yes this actually happens). When all the mileage in fossil fuels and wear and tear on our highway system and other eco-pollution is added up for this “perishable” food item, the expense we pay as taxpayers and global residents is far greater than the nutritional value of this almost all water food. When we could have just gone down the road to the local food shed on a Saturday morning and purchased the lettuce directly from the producer. If we purchased locally, this would eliminate the middle man (or middle men), giving farmers a better price for their product. It also eliminates certain global trade laws that allows Canada to purchase the same head of lettuce or other foods at a cheaper price from foreign distributors. Local farmers are then undercut with this surface level “inexpensive” (remember the fossil fuels?) produce which has caused many home-grown farm boys and girls to have to shut down their family farms. If that wasn’t bad enough Canada has strict regulations on how food is grown and what type of fertilizers, chemicals and sprays farmers are allowed to use to treat our produce. Many developing countries (that we purchase from) can still spray what ever they feel like on their produce including the very harmful DDT which was banned in Canada in 1985. Then as long as it’s not sprayed in Canada, we can import what ever is “cost effective” – forgetting about global effect, or our own precious health effect. Having said that, you might want to consider purchasing a fruit and veggie cleaner.
Don’t Gas My Apples PLEASE
After the discovery of ethylene in 1924, fruit producers began to ship all sorts of table goodies like tomatoes, banana and apples all unripe. These are then gassed at a regional gassing facilities near their destination. Some of these varieties are even bred genetically to not ripen on their own but wait to be gassed and then heavily waxed so they look their best for our supermarket visuals. Yummmmmm. “Mommy, can I have some more ethylene gas please?”
So What Is The Cost?
The next time you go to your local market- be it organic or not; I’m sure you’ll take a moment to consider the price of what you’re eating. Are grocery stores all that bad? No, it’s kind of hard to get in your full daily servings of vegetables in the middle of winter. Grocery stores have their purposes to supply us with off season foods. They serve an even greater purpose if your grocer understands the importance of purchasing locally and brings in local produce during prime season. Whether you buy from a road side stand or you pick up your foods from your grocery store, take a minute to look at where is comes from, read the label. Where it was processed from and where it was packaged from are two different places. Make sure it’s local, and then BUY IT!
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