Adventures in learning how to treat our Earth more gently and our bodies well, while still enjoying a life filled with good things.
How green are your groceries?
By Coralie, on June 16th, 2009 at 05.00 PM
Category: 
Have you ever heard of ‘food miles’? It’s about how far food travels to get from where its grown to our tables. Much, if not all, of the food available in big chain supermarkets is grown a long, long way away from where we buy it. It travels across the country and across the world for our ‘convenience’.
Food miles are important to consider
Even much of the organic food available is also sourced from much further away than is ideal. Organic food is fantastic, but the fuel needed to ship it from far away eclipses the benefits of growing it organically.
Not only is there a cost involved with the fuel used in the shipping of these goods, but we pay a cost with the nutrition in that food. The longer a food sits around between being picked and being eaten, the less nutrition there is in that food. Food is an organic substance: it begins to break down the moment it’s picked or removed from the ground. Would you prefer to eat food that’s been picked only a day or so before you get it, or food that’s been sitting around in storage for as long as a year? (I’m not kidding you. Recent media has brought to light practices of food being stored for as long as that; apples referred to as ‘birthday apples’ because they’ve been in storage for full year.)
You’d think you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t, but there are other solutions.
Community Shared Agriculture
One solution I’ve found that works well for me is to engage in Community Shared Agriculture (CSA). CSA is a system whereby food products are sourced from local farmers and producers. I found a company called Food Connect, who enlists the help of ‘City Cousins’ to take delivery of the food. Customers then have to travel only to their local City Cousin to pick up their weekly delivery of groceries. The produce is bought from farmers no further than a five hour drive away. This means the food is fresher and the amount of fuel used is far less.
Food Connect sources food that is predominantly organic, chemical free and/or “conversional” (meaning the farm is working towards certification). Supporting these local farms keeps them in business and means that they can afford to grow a variety of seasonal foods, rather than being forced into the environmentally unstable practice of growing one or two mass crops of just the one type of food, in season and out.
I can source almost every fresh food that I need via Food Connect, from a nice variety of fruit and vegetables, to milk and cheese. Pantry staples such as eggs, honey, and peanut butter are available as well as more interesting foods like olives and avocado oil.
Local farmers’ markets
If you don’t have a group like this available where you are, another option is to shop for your produce locally by attending farmers’ markets. Most farmers travel no more than two hours to get to these markets, so the food mileage is very small. You may even be buying direct from the farmer! The food is cheaper than at the supermarket, fresher, and the farmer gets a far better deal by selling direct to the public.
Eating local food, picked fresh and produced in season is not only good for your body and the environment, but it helps your extended community by supporting the people within that community. It’s a win/win situation.
How far does your food travel?
Where do you shop for your fresh groceries? Are there markets near you? Do you have favourite farmers’ market nearby? Leave a comment to tell me of your experiences shopping for fresh, local food.
Possibly related posts:
Do stuff with this post:
I know a couple who took the idea of food miles to the extreme. They decided to only eat food grown and produced within 100 miles of their home - and as authors, they wrote a book about this year-long adventure. The book is called ‘100 Mile Diet‘ written by Alisa Smith and J.B. MacKinnon.
They found it was actually quite a tough year as most of our society is set up to receive food from elsewhere it can be quite difficult to only eat locally. But it was a challenge and when all was done they had learned so much about the food grown near their home, how to prepare new foods and how to eat with the seasons.
Recently the authors challenged a local community to sign up for a 3-month 100 Mile challenge and it was aired on Canada’s Food Network - it’s a very humbling, funny, educational look at how the 6 families they followed took to the challenge and the hurdles they faced in learning how to eat differently.
The great thing is it’s being aired online so it’s easy to just stream the show and watch from any locale: http://100mile.foodtv.ca/ If you’re interested in seeing how local eating can be done I highly recommend it! The show is done here in BC, Canada but the premise of local eating can be done anywhere…it’s time to take it globally!
Hi, Sandra. Thanks for your comment and for the links. That show looks great! I’ll bet the local community learned so much doing things this way. It’d be very interesting to see how their mind sets changed over that time. I might have to check out the book, too. Thanks for the recommendation.
When I’m in the right frame of mind I try to grow my own vegies, had a few shocker hauls, and the last few crops have been unsuccessful which put me off for awhile, but once the frosty mornings subside for awhile I plan to get some more things sprouted. 1) It’s cheaper 2) They taste better 3) More enviro- friendly 4) great chance for extra education for the kids. We try to get as many photos as possible to document their growth.