Buying Local Foods: Bad for the Environment?

HawaiiGrownByOwn.jpgA provocative new study by UC Davis Sustainable Agriculture and Research department suggests that buying local food may not be such a slam dunk for the environment after all. Rather than summarize the info, I’ll point you to the New York Times, whose writers do a little better job than yours truly: IF IT’S FRESH AND LOCAL, IS IS ALWAYS GREENER?

Much of the questions raised are ones that I’ve leveled at my local beef-eating eco-friends in the past. Nothing new there. Two great items I’d failed to consider are:

1. If you drive to the store/farmer’s market multiple times per week for fresh, local food, you’re negating your eco-gains through wasted gas. Yes, even if you’re driving a Prius.

2. Buying from a farmer’s market stall whose farmer drove in a handful of produce in a beat up old truck means your per-calorie carbon footprint is vastly greater than if you’d purchased items from thousands of miles away that arrived in a container, as the per-item carbon count is vastly reduced for bulk shipped items.

Interesting questions that need to be asked. Interesting ideas to ponder. Great article. One thing it will accomplish, hopefully, will be to reduce, even just a little, that look of smugness found all too often on the “Whole Foods/Prius” crowd (I’m generalizing of course. I don’t support Whole Foods, but I’d drive a Prius if someone gifted it to me. However, Toyota is a very eco-unfriendly company, on the whole - which is why I drive a Volvo, a company dedicated to the goal of a 100% recyclable auto). This smugness does as much damage to the movement toward a sustainable future than an army of Bush/Cheney lawyers.

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This entry was posted on Sunday, December 9th, 2007 at 1:56 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

3 Responses to “Buying Local Foods: Bad for the Environment?”

  1. KirkT says on December 11th, 2007 at 1:05 pm :

    Ah, but I’d rather have the farmer drive his old beat-up pick-up truck than to buy a new truck and throw his old one in the trash. Oh man, will this never end?

  2. todb says on December 12th, 2007 at 12:18 pm :

    Right! Which is why we need the recyclable vehicle, right? Just drive it directly into the compost pile, walk away.

    Oh, it will end all right, Kirk! IN A BLAZING BALL OF FIRE@!!!!!

    Heh.

  3. KirkT says on December 13th, 2007 at 5:38 am :

    But then there will be somebody who has proof that that is worse for the environment that something else but then there will be proof that it isn’t. People, that’s the problem. Time to re-read ‘The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag’ by Heinlein.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TheUnpleasantProfessionofJonathan_Hoag

    Perhaps the answer is in there. :)

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