The Economics of Local FoodBy Jane Black
All We Can Eat Blog (washingtonpost.com), September 8, 2009Straight to the Source
(Ben Woloszyn -- Associated Press)
You feel pretty virtuous when you buy local food. It's fresher,
maybe even more nutritious, proponents say. Now advocates are pushing
another selling point: Local food strengthens the economy. It keeps
money in local communities and helps create jobs, which in turn can
help reduce crime.
Wow. And you thought all you were getting was a really good peach.
Sarah DeWeerdt rounds up the facts about local food and economic development in a new, excellent article in World Watch.
The money farmers earn goes in large part to buy seeds, animal feed and
fertilizers from outside the region. In southeast Minnesota, farmers
spend $996 million to grow $912 million worth of crops. Similar
patterns are found in Iowa, Arizona and Washington.
Producing local food could change that, DeWeerdt reports. If those
people in southeastern Minnesota bought just 15 percent of their food
from local sources, it would generate two-thirds as much income as all
the region's farmers receive from subsidies. If the population in and around Seattle bought 20 percent of their food
dollars at local businesses, it would inject an extra billion dollars
each year into the local economy.
"Every
time money changes hands within a community, it boosts the community's
overall income and level of economic activity, and fuels the creation
of jobs," DeWeerdt explains. "The more times money changes hands within
the community before heading elsewhere, the better off the community
is. And spending money at a locally based business has a greater
multiplier effect, the theory goes, because locally owned businesses
are more likely to respend their dollars locally."
The article draws on pioneering work by Ken Meter,
president of the Crossroads Research Center in Minneapolis, who has
studied the benefits of local food for more than 20 years. The
argument, Meter told me, is catching on. It's not only foodies who are
interested in local food. It's state and county economic development
officers. This is happening even in the Midwest, where production
agriculture has long ruled supreme.
Of course, DeWeerdt rightly notes that many of the potential
benefits of "shifting food dollars to the local food system are just
that: potential." To date, she reports, no community has actually
undertaken a sharp enough shift to see if predictions come true. And,
it's hard to tell how a change to consumer behavior would affect the
larger economy.
Still, government officials appear willing to explore how local food
can help bolster rural economies. Last week, Deputy Secretary of
Agriculture Kathleen Merrigan sent out a memo
that highlighted USDA funds available to help build local food systems.
The total amount of money available: up to $1.24 billion.
Good for you. Good for the economy. You have to admit, it makes that
local corn or peach or tomato taste just that little bit more delicious .
Food Is Power and the Powerful Are Poisoning UsBy Chris Hedges Truthdig.com, Sept 6, 2009 Straight to the Source
Our most potent political weapon is food. If we take back our agriculture, if we buy and raise produce locally, we can begin to break the grip of corporations that control a food system as fragile, unsafe and destined for collapse as our financial system. If we continue to allow corporations to determine what we eat, as well as how food is harvested and distributed, then we will become captive to rising prices and shortages and increasingly dependent on cheap, mass-produced food filled with sugar and fat. Food, along with energy, will be the most pressing issue of our age. And if we do not build alternative food networks soon, the social and political ramifications of shortages and hunger will be devastating.
The effects of climate change, especially with widespread droughts in
Australia, Africa, California and the Midwest, coupled with the rising
cost of fossil fuels, have already blighted the environments of
millions. The poor can often no longer afford a balanced diet. Global
food prices increased an average of 43 percent since 2007, according to
the International Monetary Fund. These increases have been horrific for
the approximately 1 billion people-one-sixth of the world's
population-who subsist on less than $1 per day. And 162 million of
these people survive on less than 50 cents per day. The global poor
spend as much as 60 percent of their income on food, according to the
International Food Policy Research Institute.
There have been food riots in many parts of the world, including
Austria, Hungary, Mexico, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Morocco, Yemen,
Mauritania, Senegal and Uzbekistan. Russia and Pakistan have introduced
food rationing. Pakistani troops guard imported wheat. India has banned
the export of rice, except for high-end basmati. And the shortages and
price increases are being felt in the industrialized world as we
continue to shed hundreds of thousands of jobs and food prices climb.
There are 33.2 million Americans, or one in nine, who depend on food
stamps. And in 20 states as many as one in eight are on the food stamp
program, according to the Food Research Center. The average monthly
benefit was $113.87 per person, leaving many, even with government
assistance, without adequate food. The USDA says 36.2 million
Americans, or 11 percent of households, struggle to get enough food,
and one-third of them have to sometimes skip or cut back on meals.
Congress allocated some $54 billion for food stamps this fiscal year,
up from $39 billion last year. In the new fiscal year beginning Oct. 1,
costs will be $60 billion, according to estimates.
Food shortages have been tinder for social upheaval throughout history.
But this time around, because we have lost the skills to feed and
clothe ourselves, it will be much harder for most of us to become
self-sustaining. The large agro-businesses have largely wiped out small
farmers. They have poisoned our soil with pesticides and contaminated
animals in filthy and overcrowded stockyards with high doses of
antibiotics and steroids. They have pumped nutrients and phosphorus
into water systems, causing algae bloom and fish die-off in our rivers
and streams. Crop yields, under the onslaught of changing weather
patterns and chemical pollution, are declining in the Northeast, where
a blight has nearly wiped out the tomato crop. The draconian Food
Modernization Safety Act, another gift from our governing elite to
corporations, means small farms will only continue to dwindle in
number. Sites such as La Via Campesina do a good job of tracking these
disturbing global trends.
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