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From Natural Life Magazine, July/August
2007 For many of us, our food is better traveled than we are. According to the WorldWatch Institute, in the United States, food typically travels between 1,500 and 2,500 miles from farm to plate, as much as 25 percent farther than in 1980. For some people, this modern long-distance food system offers unparalleled choice. But it often runs roughshod over local cuisines, varieties and agriculture, while consuming staggering amounts of fuel, generating greenhouse gases, eroding the pleasures of face-to-face interactions around food and compromising food security. And recent heightened concerns over global warming, compounded by food poisoning scandals linked to contaminated pet, poultry, and pig food ingredients from China, have many of us thinking about where our food comes from…that is, counting our “food miles” (or kilometers.) In our quest for permanent dietary summertime, in mid-winter we eat strawberries that have been flown in from warmer climates and make our own nasty little contribution to the greenhouse gas emissions flood that is irrevocably harming our ecosystem. Even food grown locally can rack up a lot of food miles. The carrots you buy at the grocery store could have been transported from the local farm to be packaged at a distant central depot and then sent back to be sold near where they were produced in the first place. Also, because of the way the food processing industry works, ingredients travel around the country – and beyond – from factory to factory, before they make their way to your local store. Some of this has to do with comparative labor costs. For example, some British fish is now sent to China (where labor costs are much lower) for processing, then sent back to the U.K. to be sold. For the same corporate reasons, it is often impossible to buy in-season locally grown garlic in a grocery store because the shelves are full of garlic that has been grown more cheaply in China or elsewhere. Unfortunately, this transportation factor may even offset the positive environmental effects of organic farming, according to a 2005 study by the journal Food Policy. The food miles equation is a complicated one, depending on many factors. Distance isn’t always the only factor, since a long journey by boat, for example, has less environmental impact than a shorter one by road or air. Also to be considered is the negative environmental impact created by many trips by personal cars to supermarkets or farmers’ stalls, compared to that of a few truck loads to neighborhood stores that can be easily accessed by walking or biking. Even the amount of traffic – and therefore highly polluting starts and stops – one encounters on the drive to the supermarket or countryside must be considered. Beyond that, transportation is only one component of the total environmental impact of food production and consumption. In fact... To read the rest of this article, subscribe to Natural Life's online edition. Wendy Priesnitz is the Editor of Natural Life Magazine and a journalist with 30 years of experience. She has also authored nine books. Read her blog. |
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