Friday July 4th, 2008
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The "Eat Local" Dilemma
Posted by Su Avasthi on February 8, 2007 - 6:18pm.
From the Department of Tricky Gray Areas comes an argument that eating local may be doing more harm than good.
A lot of us subscribe to the idea that we should eat local and we have a clear grasp on why: Our food is more likely to be fresh and organic. Shipping and transportation costs from imported foods are reduced, which reduces carbon emissions. It supports our neighbors and strengthens our local economies. And there's a significantly reduced risk of eating a fatal spinach salad.
But according to this Reuters news story, a British think tank says that eating local is likely to create far more problems on a global scale than it will solve. Their argument goes like this:
Imported foods (flown in from around the globe) do create carbon emissions, but the impact is fairly limited. In terms of the overall carbon footprint, they claim, the benefits are nominal, when compared to the impact to poorer nations.
In many cases, buying local threatens the livelihoods of millions of farmers and their families in parts of Africa and non-industrialized areas. They rely on trade to survive.
According to one expert, "It may well be that some products (from Africa) may actually have a smaller carbon footprint and a greater social impact [than buying locally-grown produce.]"
Now that the natural grocery stores in my neighborhood have embraced the "eat local" philosophy (they know a trendy marketing angle when they see one), it has become far easier to buy local produce on a regular basis. And so far, I've tried to support it whenever possible.
But now I'm not sure how this new twist will change my shopping habits. I imagine I might have to revise my "buy local, think global" philosophy a bit (Good thing I don't have to worry about the bumper-sticker.)
If anyone has ideas on the best way the average person ought to proceed through this muddle, please share them.
I want to start my own think tank. How does one do that? It sounds like a great gig.
Most places I've worked, they pay me not to think.
I'm not convinced that this report requires us to rethink the whole buy-local concept, though I agree with the article's advice to "consider carefully" our consumer actions. Being conscious of what we do is what being green is all about, and the choice of whether to support your local farmer or the poor African farmer is no less difficult than any other choice we make when we spend money.
My choice, usually, would still be the local farmer. For me it's about fostering stable, self-sufficient communities just as much as reducing our carbon footprint, and (while I hope this isn't perceived as heartless) I believe that the best way for us to help African farmers is to help them help themselves. That is, to share our ideas on community-building and to encourage local small-business entrepreneurship and interdependency on the local level.
I absolutely care about the welfare of poor people in other countries, and I acknowledge that we are all increasingly knit together by globalization. But I believe that the best commodity to transmit across the world is information, not goods. People are more important than products, and the globalizers have forgotten this.
Sorry for the long response. Michael Shuman's excellent book The Small-Mart Revolution has much to say on this topic and is worth a read.
I think the major oversight of this article is that it presupposes that Africa needs a globalized form of agriculture in order to thrive.
In fact, this could not be further from the truth, and in addition, it is another reason to eat local.
Pre-colonial Africa was able to feed itself based on a system of small family farms. The climate is suited to this lifestyle with long growing seasons and fertile land.
Problems came, however, when massive deforestation took place in order to make very large farms for cash crops like tea, or anything else that could be exported. Before this small family farms produced food and traded locally.
Suddenly the transition from a livestock-based economy to a money-based economy made life harder to sustain. Weath in the hands of the few took away from sustinence for the many. In addition the massive deforestation cause the topsoil to erode and lowered the water table.
The African continent is a place rich in natural resources and favorable climate. There is no reason that it could not be a sustainable place for humans to live, as it had been for most of history.
The famine, violence, and poverty that exists there are direct results of colonialism and globalization, so it can hardly be an argument in favor of it.
(If you're interested in reading a bit more on the subject, I'd highly recommend Wangari Maathai's Unbowed.)