YOU CAN SHOP LOCALLY YEAR-ROUND

First, there’s the fact that our money isn’t supporting our local farmers and food producers. Local farmers often struggle to survive while we import our food or support those large corporations that have been catching onto the organic trend. Organic food is the fastest growing sector of the agriculture industry in North America , and the CEOs of the huge multi-national companies dominating the ‘conventional’ food industry have been quick to take note of this trend. Huge brand name food processing and producing companies, such as Coca Cola, Kraft and General Mills, have been buying organic farms and processing companies, then shipping the organic food long distances to market, while creating vast amounts of pollution en route. Also, these companies don’t necessarily embody the organic values of treading lightly on the land and running a diverse and sustainable farm – for most, profit is the bottom line.

Disappointing, isn’t it? For more information on this, check out: www.certifiedorganic.bc.ca/rcbtoa/services/marketing.html and you’ll find a chart created by Phil Howard of the University of California at Santa Cruz that reveals which ‘conventional’ corporations own which organic food processing companies.

There’s also the transportation pollution to consider. Trucks, trains, boats and the worst - refrigerated aeroplanes transport food on average over 2000 kilometres from the farm where it’s grown to your dinner table. The wealth of large and powerful companies in Canada depends on moving food around North America , often for no reason other than creating profit for another of their subsidiaries. 

Supporting those local farmers and businesses operating with environmental integrity shows them that you believe in what they are doing and enables them to continue to exist within your community. As more and more people move into the organic industry the offerings become more diverse and now we can buy such delicious foods as fresh fava beans, garlic chile chutney and seaweed tofu grown and produced here in BC.

Even in mid-winter you can show your support for local farmers. Depending on where you live, there may not be much fresh produce available at your favourite organic food store or food box delivery service, or there may be various types of salad greens, apples and root crops from the fall harvest, and frozen berries or soft fruits. As well, they may carry locally grown and produced organic tomato sauces, jams and fruit spreads, pickled vegetables, exotic chutneys, and dried fruits and herbs - all are produced in BC. Year-round, dairy products and meats from local farmers are on the market. So are locally-produced tofu, locally ground coffees and locally mixed teas, even though the ingredients are imported. 

When you are food shopping, get into the habit of looking carefully at the labels of what you are buying and choose the item produced nearest to home. It doesn’t have to take a lot of time. Learn more about one new item each time you shop and soon enough you’ll have a good grip on what’s being produced in your surrounding area and other nearby regions. 

I think when we give ourselves a few minutes to think about where we want our food to come from and our money to go, we all have opinions about these matters. I am not advocating giving up imported foods entirely, yikes, that would mean no coffee, chocolate or bananas! But I am encouraging you to think about who you want to support with your food dollars and hopefully, to try to shift the focus of your diet more toward what is produced in your local agricultural region.