Why and How to Eat Local

This is the general environmental reason that most people have for eating local. For example, shipping a head of California lettuce back east uses 36 times as many calories of fossil energy as it contains (Deep Economy, page 65).

Whether you care more about the environment or your own body, please join with me in moving toward eating food that farmers in your own area grow. You might want to start, as I have, by boycotting food that comes from far away.

Please also join with me in encouraging your Whole Foods Market to start by putting up signs telling us what produce they sell is local – and then buy more of those foods. I hope that you have as good luck when you contact your local store manager as I did when I contacted Tom Rich.

As always, knowledge is the first step. Then, the next step will be for our stores to offer more. The third step will be for us to buy more local food and enjoy its benefits.