Sustainable Table?

We all know that sometimes buying local puts a hole in our pocket difficult to stitch up. Many have become aware of the dangers of food preservatives , additives, genetically modified crops and other mass corporation market issues.  Setting aside possible “dangers” of not buying local I think it is important to look at an often over looked bigger issue here, the benefits to our environment.  I questioned co-workers and fellow students and collectively heard most are just concerned on the individual or family level about the possible harm from transported or chemically altered food.  Would more people buy locally if they knew the impacts this had on the environment?

Environmentally, buying locally is a large step in the right direction.

What’s all this talk about global warming? Well rather you agree or know much about the term global warming,  there are benefits of eating locally grown food correlated with reducing global warming.  Food that you consume that is not local has to get to you somehow right? Well usually that is done with gas-guzzling transportation. What else does buying local do for our environment? It maintains our farmland and green open space, minimizes the industrial agricultural which can adversely pollute the air, surface and groundwater. It can also degrade soil quality including erosion and can cause loss of biodiversity. The two websites I included before have much more detail on the issue for further reading.

In short, would buying local help save our environment? Food for thought.

http://environment.about.com/od/greenlivingdesign/a/locally_grown.htm

http://www.dosomething.org/tipsandtools/why-buy-locally-grown