Eating locally grown food is great for all the reasons that have been endlessly debated with fervor of a gospel choir.
But even those of us who think we understand the health, economic and environmental benefits of the locavore crusade sometimes chafe at the “we’re right and all the rest of you are wrong” attitude that often is served up with lettuce, beets, spinach, beans and other fresh-from-the-garden goodies at the closest farmer’s market.
Check out this OP-ED piece in the New York Times today by noted liberal curmudgeon Stephen Budiansk.
He says the local food movement now “threatens to devolve into another one of those self-indulgent — and self-defeating — do-gooder dogmas.”
“Arbitrary rules, without any real scientific basis, are repeated as gospel by “locavores,” celebrity chefs and mainstream environmental organizations. Words like “sustainability” and “food-miles” are thrown around without any clear understanding of the larger picture of energy and land use,” he wrote.
For instance, he writes, it is sinful in New York City to buy a tomato grown in a California field because of the energy spent to truck it across the country; it is virtuous to buy one grown in a lavishly heated greenhouse in, say, the Hudson Valley.
Budiansky offers some pretty specific stats on the real energy savings and environmental harm, but smartly stays away from the which-tastes-better debate.
Andrew Schneider
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The truth is that there are so many metrics to consider. Distance, energy intensity of production and transit, organic or not organic, water footprint, the treatment of the people growing food, and the treatment of the animals producing food.
In general, it seems better to eat things grown nearby, in season, but the American foodshed is global. Unlike reducing energy use, where there is often some direct feedback in terms of lower energy bills or fewer stops at a gas station, there are few metrics to tell us when we’re choosing food well and making a difference.
http://zeroresource.com/2010/05/27/finding-data-the-water-intensity-of-food/