An onion grown in Iowa travels an average 35 miles to the Iowa supermarket. An onion from the usual sources in other states treks an average 1,759 miles to the Iowa store. Thought you might want to know.
We’re talking “food miles,” a growing concern of governments, environmentalists and gourmets. Food miles refers to the distance food travels from farm to plate. Locally grown food is generally a good thing.
It used to be that all food was local. New England has lousy soil and a cold climate. But the people there managed to feed themselves 300 years ago, even though there were no highways or state of California. They couldn’t have asparagus in February or bananas ever, but they didn’t starve.
Early in the 20th century, most food was still produced close to home. Even urban homemakers canned vegetables and fruits, buying bushels from nearby farms. Nowadays, food consumed in the developed world travels enormous distances.
Rising oil prices give the issue of food miles new importance. Transportation costs account for 6 percent to 10 percent of the retail cost of produce. A study at Iowa State University found that produce trucked to Des Moines from states outside Iowa used four to 17 times more fuel than that grown locally.
The environmental connection is obvious. The farther produce is trucked, the more oil is burned. Fossil-fuel use contributes to global warming. Japan is actually studying how a reduction in food miles could help it comply with the Kyoto Protocol.
Iowa State’s Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture has come up with some amazing numbers. Researchers there added up the distances that 16 types of locally grown fruit and vegetables traveled to markets in Iowa. Crops grown in the state traveled a total 716 miles, the distance between Des Moines and Denver. The produce coming to Iowa from the typical sources in other states journeyed 25,301 miles. That’s the equivalent of circling the globe and going an extra 400 miles.
It is odd that even big farm states now import their produce from far away. “In the Midwest, most of what we grow is corn and soybeans for livestock feed,” explains Rich Pirog, the Leopold Center’s marketing and food systems program leader.
But agriculture in an urbanized state like New Jersey centers on fruit, vegetables, seafood and some dairy. So in terms of feeding its people, Pirog says, New Jersey may be more self-sufficient than Iowa.
Measuring food miles is not easy when it comes to processed fare. Beef cows raised in Iowa may get sent to a feedlot in Colorado, then a packing plant in Nebraska, before the steaks get shipped out.
Some foodstuffs are veritable jet-setters. British fish is sent to China for processing by low-wage workers, then returned to the United Kingdom for sale, according to a BBC report.
Locally grown food is usually fresher, but not always. Lettuce at a farmers’ market may have been sitting in the back of a hot truck for six hours. It may be more tired than a head picked in California four days earlier but immediately refrigerated.
When food miles become a consideration, environmentally concerned shoppers face tough choices. Example: Organic broccoli is grown with fewer chemicals. That’s good. But suppose the broccoli was shipped across the continent in a truck belching carbon dioxide. Bad.
States have become sensitive to the food-mile issue as a way to support their farm economies. Many now have food-policy councils that help farmers sell locally. For example, they may change laws requiring governments to accept only the lowest bids. Even if their own farms charge more, keeping them in business has its own economic benefits.
Finally, there’s the emotional angle. We moderns often feel cut off from the natural world. Eating food grown on local soil restores some of that lost bond.
A Leopold Center survey asked consumers: Given a choice, would you rather buy something that is locally grown with some pesticide use, or an organic product of unknown origin? Most consumers picked the locally grown.
Harvest time is a reminder that for almost all of human history, food came from a few surrounding square miles. More of what we eat today can again be local, if people start thinking seriously about food miles.
Froma Harrop is a Providence Journal columnist. Contact her by writing to fharrop@projo.com.
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