The Issues: Buy Local

 

The concept of buying local is simply to buy food (or any good or service) produced, grown, or raised as close to your home as possible. With industrialization, our food is now grown and processed in fewer and fewer locations, meaning it has to travel further to reach the average consumer’s refrigerator. Although this method of production is considered efficient and economically profitable for large agribusiness corporations, it is harmful to the environment, consumers and rural communities.

sustainable TableFood Miles, Resources and the Environment
"Food miles" refer to the distance a food item travels from the farm to your home. The food miles for items you buy in the grocery store tend to be 27 times higher than the food miles for goods bought from local sources.i

In the U.S., the average grocery store’s produce travels nearly 1,500 miles between the farm where it was grown and your refrigerator.ii About 40% of our fruit is produced overseas and, even though broccoli is likely grown within 20 miles of the average American’s house, the broccoli we buy at the supermarket travels an average 1,800 miles to get there. Notably, 9% of our red meat comes from foreign countries, including locations as far away as Australia and New Zealand.iii

So how does our food travel from farm field to grocery store? It’s trucked across the country, hauled in freighter ships over oceans, and flown around the world.

A tremendous amount of fossil fuel is used to transport foods such long distances. Combustion of these fuels releases carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, particulate matter and other pollutants into the atmosphere, contributing to global climate change, acid rain, smog and air pollution. Even the refrigeration required to keep your fruits, vegetables, dairy products and meats from spoiling burns up energy.

Food processors also use a large amount of paper and plastic packaging to keep food fresh (or at least looking fresh) for a longer period of time. This packaging eventually becomes waste that is difficult, if not impossible, to reuse or recycle.

Aside from the environmental harm that can result from processing, packaging and transporting long-distance foods, the industrial farms on which these foods are often produced are major sources of air and water pollution. Small, local farms tend to be run by farmers who live on their land and work hard to preserve it. Buying local means you can talk directly to the farmer growing your food and find out what they do and how they do it. Do they grow their food organically? If they're not certified organic, ask them why. Many small farms, even if they haven't taken the certification step, still utilize sustainable or organic farming methods that help protect the air, soil and water.

Health and Nutrition
Buying food from local farms means getting food when it’s at its prime. Fresh food from local farms is healthier than industrially-farmed products because the food doesn’t spend days in trucks and on store shelves losing nutrients.v

Food transported short distances is fresher (and, therefore, safer) than food that travels long distances. Local food has less of an opportunity to wilt and rot whereas large-scale food manufacturers must go to extreme lengths to extend shelf-life since there is such a delay between harvest and consumption. Preservatives are commonly used to keep foods stable longer, and are potentially hazardous to human health. Industrially-produced foods are also difficult to grow without pesticides, chemical fertilizers, antibiotics and growth hormones, all of which can be damaging to both the environment and human health.

Even though most Americans live about 60 miles from an apple orchard, the apples you typically buy at the grocery store travel 1,726 miles between the orchard and your house.iv That’s further than driving from Portland, Maine to Miami, Florida!

Local foods from small farms usually undergo minimal processing, are produced in relatively small quantities, and are distributed within a few dozen miles of where they originate. Food produced on industrial farms, however, is distributed throughout the country and world, creating the potential for disease-carrying food from a single factory farm to spread rapidly throughout the entire country. The 2006 E coli outbreak is a good example of this, as contaminated spinach from a single region in California managed to sicken people in 26 states.vi

Products such as ground beef, which is pooled from hundreds of different animals, are of particular concern. The meat from a single diseased cow could end up contaminating hundreds of pounds of food distributed to thousands of people. Once such a product is on shelves, it is very difficult to determine where the contaminated meat came from. Preventing or controlling disease outbreaks in such a system is nearly impossible.

In addition, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the federal agency which inspects meat and poultry, does not have the authority to order a recall of dangerous or mislabled product once it has left a plant. The agency can only urge the company to issue a recall themselves. This often leads to delays in notifying the public, wasting valuable time and increasing the odds that unsafe products get eaten by consumers.

Family Farms and Community
According to the USDA, the U.S. has lost over five million farms since 1935.vii Family farms are going out of business at break-neck speed, causing rural communities to deteriorate. The U.S. loses two acres of farmland each minute as cities and suburbs spread into the surrounding communities.viii By supporting local farms near suburban areas and around cities, you help keep farmers on the land, and, at the same time, preserve open spaces and counteract urban sprawl.

What You Can Do
Join the growing movement of consumers around the world who are making a little extra effort to find food raised nearby.

  • Check out our Eat Seasonal page to find when foods are in season in your area.
  • Buy food directly from your local farmer at a farm stand or a farmers market. Or join a CSA group and get a farm share.
  • Encourage your local grocery store to stock food from local farmers.
  • Visit our Shopping Guide section for CSAs, farmers markets and other sustainable outlets.
  • Join the 100-mile diet movement.

Did You Know?

  • The majority of the money spent on grocery-store food goes to suppliers, processors, middlemen and marketers. Only 3.5 cents of each dollar actually goes to the farmer.ix If you buy food from a farmers market or farm stand, you can be sure that most, if not all, of your money is going directly to the farmer.
  • Communities reap more economic benefits from the presence of small farms than they do from large ones. Studies have shown that small farms re-invest more money into local economies by purchasing feed, seed and other materials from local businesses,x whereas large farms often order in bulk from distant companies. Large factory livestock farms also bring down local property values with the intense odors they emit.xi
  • A typical carrot has to travel 1,838 miles to reach your dinner table.xii
  • In the U.S., a wheat farmer can expect to receive about six cents of each dollar spent on a loaf of bread—approximately the cost of the wrapping.xiii
  • Farmers markets enable farmers to keep 80 to 90 cents of each dollar spent by the consumer.xiv
  • About 1/3 of all U.S. farms are located within metropolitan areas, comprising 18% of the total U.S. farmland.xv
For More Information
  • Food Routes' Buy Local Campaign includes information on the benefits of buying locally and offers resources for promoting local food production.
  • Visit the Locavores website to get tips on eating food grown within 100 miles of your home. 
  • Watch the Harvest Eating video podcast to learn about shopping and eating seasonally.

Although today's global marketplace allows us to buy foods grown virtually anywhere in the world all year round, these options are not the most sustainable.
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