Sustainable Agriculture : food miles

Governor Linda Lingle Proposes Initiatives to Improve Food Self-Sufficiency.

VincentD — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 22:37:00 GMT

Governor Linda Linda speaking at the 5th Anniversary of the KCC Saturday Farmer's Market. Hawaii's Governor Linda Lingle in her 2009 State of the State address to the people of Hawaii shared her Administration's plan to achieve greater food...(read more)

Slow Food Nation: Are you ready for the "Woodstock for Foodies".

VincentD — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 01:06:00 GMT

Are you ready for Slow Food Nation '08? This weekend, in San Francisco, will be the largest celebration of food in America. Come celebrate at the Taste Pavillions; not a double cheeseburger in sight!. A "Woodstock for Foodies" say some ...(read more)

Do Food Miles Matter?

VincentD — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 19:13:00 GMT

Do food miles matter? Well, if you are concerned about the impact on greenhouse gases, then maybe not. A recent paper from Christopher L. Weber and H. Scott Matthews in the journal, Environmental Science and Technology ( Environ. Sci. Technol. 2008. 42...(read more)

Do you know where your food comes from??

VincentD — Wed, 10 Oct 2007 05:46:00 GMT

Grist , the Environmental News and Commentary web site has launched a new series articles about food, farming and agriculture. Sow What? is your opportunity to think about where your food comes from, how it got there and what were the environmental consequences...(read more)

Do you know where your garlic comes from?

VincentD — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 01:29:00 GMT

Gilroy, California - right? Home of the Gilroy Garlic Festival? OK, the central valley of California? Have you considered China? According to the UN FAO, the value of China's exports of garlic has increased from $145 M in 2000, to $482 M in 2005. To put it in perspective, the 2005 farm gate value of Hawaii agriculture (all of Hawaii agriculture) was $565 M. The U.S. became a net importer of garlic in 1998, according to a 2006 UC-Davis report on garlic. Seventy-six percent of the imported garlic is fresh product and most comes from China. Over the same period, the value of California garlic has declined from a peak of $200 M in 1999 to $136 M in 2005 (source USDA Economic Research Service). Demand for garlic has not declined, in fact, has increased. Per capita consumption of garlic has risen from 1.3 pounds in 1990 to 2.6 pounds in 2004.

So despite all the talk about the importance of buying locally produced fruits and vegetables, according to Grist Magazine, the globalization of our food supply grows stronger and by comparison produce farming in the U.S. weakens. In their article, posted August 30, 2007, globalization is smothering U.S. fruits and vegetable farms. Why so? Aren't American consumers being encouraged to consume more fruits and vegetables? Of course, but most consumers don't buy produce from where it comes from -- they buy on price. And Chinese garlic is cheaper than California garlic. But Chinese garlic has to travel so much farther to get here? But American costs are much higher. And consider the recent crackdown on undocumented workers, many of whom worked in American fields, some estimates have it at 70% of U.S. farmworkers are undocumented.

So one factor affecting the cost is the lack of workers to harvest the crops in the fields.
With all the unfortunate recalls of produce and concerns about the food safety -- there is growing demand from politicians and others to increase the FDA or USDA oversight on farms, to prevent contamination of our produce. Another cost that will eventually be passed onto consumers.

But it's much more than costs - the cheaper Chinese garlic is just one part of the equation. American consumers want year round asparagus or grapes or oranges or blueberries. And it has to come from somewhere! China or Chile or Argentina or Brazil or Australia or New Zealand, take your pick. In the same trip to Costco, I've seen grapes from Chile, bell peppers from Holland and tomatoes from Mexico.

It's an interesting challenge. Globalization of our food supply has now provided us with year round produce and in many cases, of excellent quality. The post harvest treatments and the innovations in packaging and shipping, make this all possible. Look carefully when you buy your produce in the grocery store or at Costco or Sam's. Where from? I buy about 90% of my produce at Hawaii farmer's markets (we still can't grow peaches). I know where it comes from. Yes, I pay more but I try to support our local farmers.

U.S. Garlic Imports, from the UC Davis report on Garlic, original source USDA Foreign Ag Service:

Eating Local and Food Safety Issues

VincentD — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 00:26:00 GMT

I think we were all disappointed when we opened up the Tuesday, August 10, 2007 Honolulu Advertiser when Jan TenBruggencate article about the E. coli outbreak traced to lettuce on Kauai. It seems that 8 people were sickened due to E. coli contamination after eating lettuce. The E. coli was the O157:H7 strain that has been so devastating in the contamination of bagged spinach from California. In both cases, it appears that the fields were contaminated somehow by runoff containing E. coli due to neighboring livestock farms and the fact that both products are consumed raw makes it a risk. In the spinach case, the contaminated spinach was mixed with other spinach, bagged and shipped nationwide. In June 2007, USDA Economic Research Service presented a study in their on-line magazine, Amber Waves, that illustrated the impact of the outbreak on spinach shipments and sales. Even in 2007, almost a year after the contamination, bagged spinach sales lag behind sales before the outbreak. The California spinach growers were forced to lay off workers and plow under their crops. And the impacts went way beyond the Salinas Valley in California. The Marler Blog put out by Bill Marler of the Marler-Clark law firm, reported that an Indiana salad-processing plant closed as a result of the down turn in bagged salad products. A Brevard County, Florida produce broker filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The estimated cost to California spinach growers was at least $50 million in lost revenue in 2006.

In Hawaii, if we are to focus on the importance of "buying local" produce, shouldn't we also be fairly confident in the safety of the food that we eat that comes from our local farms? I'm not sure that we can. Considering the impact that the E. coli contamination had and continues to have on California spinach growers, what would be the impact to our local produce industries, especially greens and herbs which are eaten raw with minimal processing? Frankly, a more severe outbreak than what was reported on Kauai, would devastate the "buy fresh, buy local" movement in Hawaii. So how confident are we about our produce growers' ability to reduce the risk of contamination? I want to believe that they are doing their best to reduce my risk. I don't particularly want to parboil my Manoa lettuce!

CTAHR's Jim Hollyer and Lynn Nakamura-Tengan have been working with farmers to help them prepare for third-party food safety audits. To pass these audits, the farmers must "clean up their act" with respect to how they manage their products as they grow, harvest, process and package their product. With Whole Foods coming to town and their higher standards, along with more and more retailers and even wholesalers concerned about the source of their products, the whole idea of food safety for these "local" products becomes an idea whose time has come.

Buying Local...

VincentD — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 23:24:00 GMT

On August 6, the New York Times featured an op-ed piece, "Food That Travels Well" from James McWilliams, the author of the 2005 book, "A Revolution in Eating." McWilliams makes many good reasons for eating local:

"...freshness, purity, taste, community cohesion and preserving open space -- but none of these benefits compareas to the much touted claim that eating local reduces fossil fuel consumption. In this respect eating local joins recycling, biking to work and driving a hybrid as a realistic way that we can, as individuals, shrink our carbon footprint and be good stewards of the environment."

Iowa State University's Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture has done extensive research on the impact of food miles on Iowa consumers. Our location in the middle of the Pacific automatically adds a greater "carbon footprint" to our imported food supply. All the more reason to buy local. Bon Appetit Management Company, which supplies cafe and catering services to corporations, colleges and universities, encourages the chefs to think about how there food choices can help ease climate change. Such as:

Reduce the use of beef by 25% - Livestock production is resopnsible for 18% of greenhouse gas emissions.
Sourcing all meat and poultry from North America - 80% of the energy used by the food system comes not from growing the food, but by transporting and processing it.
Sourcing nearly all fruits and vegetables from North America, using seasonal local produce as a first preference and using tropical fruits only as "special" occasion ingredients -- Most bananas have traveled 3,000 miles in high-speed refrigerated ships to reach an American breakfast plate. A local apple might be grown within 10 miles.
Serving only domestic bottled water and reducing waste from plastic bottles -- Americans throw away 40 million plast water bottles every day
Reducing food waste -- Goal of 25% reduction in three years or less.
Auditing the energy efficiency of kitchen equipment - In home or commercial kitchen energy losses of up to 30% can be easily corrected for very low cost.

While the context of their suggestions are based upon the mainland, we face these impacts and more. Consider beef consumption in Hawaii -- only 5% of the beef consumed in Hawaii is locally finished. When the last of the feedlots closed in Hawaii, Hawaii rancher's were forced by economic necessity to find other options to market their cattle. What evolved is the current situation of shipping calves to the mainland, following by finishing and processing in mainland feedlots and slaughterhouses and the beef coming back to Hawaii, as commodity beef in boxes. That's potentially two trips back and forth to the mainland. Imagine the "carbon footprint" and the food miles that are involved. Will that stop me from eating beef, not likely but I am certainly more inclined to support locally produced grass-fed beef (and which some would argue is healthier). Unfortunately, except for North Shore Beef, there is little local beef available on Oahu. The markets on the neighbor islands have more of the local product. But until more local beef is produced, eating beef will exact a greater carbon footprint than many other products. But then again, don't get me started on poultry...

Buying "Fresh" and Buying Local

VincentD — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 17:31:00 GMT

It's all about "food miles" isn't it? Food miles are the distance food travels from where it is grown to where it is ultimately purchased or consumed by us. Being out in the middle of the Pacific automatically adds an enormous transportation cost to our food. For processed foods, each of the individual ingredients may have traveled thousands of miles to the processor, only to be assembled, packaged and shipped to Hawaii. The "cost" may be more than the additional monetary costs that cover packaging and shipping, it also comes as a freshness cost. Dr. Marion Nestle, in her 2006 book "What to Eat," contends that most of us have forgotten what "fresh" really tastes like. That what we eat as "fresh" produce, may have been picked weeks ago and traveled long distances to reach our grocery store shelves. Let me be clear and not wanting to risk running afoul with the "Five-A-Day" and "More Matters" nutrition crowd, eating "fresh" fruits and vegetables, regardless of where they come from is better than fried foods and loco moco. More recently, the case for eating closer to home has been made by Barbara Kingsolver in her book "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle." Currently on the NY Times Best Seller List, Ms. Kingsolver's book narrates the story about the year she and her family resolved to buy local, within 100 miles of their Virginia farm, or grow their own foods. The family shopped at their local farmer's market, or made arrangements with other local growers, or grew it and processed themselves. In the winter, they ate from the bounty of their harvest, either canned or frozen from the previous season. Their family marveled at the freshness of their home- or locally-grown fruits and vegetables. But that freshness came with a price -- you couldn't eat fresh tomatoes in January in Virginia. In Hawaii, we are blessed (and some might argue, cursed) by our year long growing season. We can grow many crops year round. All the more reason to shorten the fuel miles and eat "closer" to home. But where to shop? Our farmer's markets provide us with opportunities to buy fresh and buy local. You can cut out all but a few of the food miles. True, it may cost a bit more but the money stays local and you can pretty much guarantee that the produce hasn't accumulated frequent flier miles. The Hawaii Farm Bureau sponsors three farmer's markets on Oahu - Kapiolani Community College on Saturdays; Kailua Parking Garage on Thursday nights (5:30 - 7:30 pm); and on Sundays at the Mililani High School. Farm Bureau also sponsors farmer's markets at Keauhou and coming soon to Hilo. A comprehensive listing of all the farmer's markets can be found here: http://www.hawaiiag.org/Markets/WelcometoMarkets.html. You can also buy local by looking for the Hawaii Seal of Quality on products throughout the state. The advantages of buying local is that it keeps the funds in the state, supports farmers directly and it helps me remember what "fresh" tastes like. June 4, 2007