Mad Cow

Gail Feenstra: Is 'buying locally' better protection?

Gail Feenstra

Gail Feenstra is the food systems coordinator at the UC Davis-based UC Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program. She coordinates the program's Community Development and Public Policy Program, which includes managing community development and public policy grants, conducting research that strengthens community-development efforts and coordinating education and outreach to community-based. She is a nutritionist with a background in nutrition education and discusses how consumers can improve the security of their food supply by purchasing locally produced and marketed foods.

Q. How can consumers lessen their vulnerability to food-borne illnesses, including bovine spongiform encephalopathy, by buying locally produced and marketed foods?

A. “Shorter supply lines" between producers and eaters means that consumers are more likely to know where their food comes from and how it is produced. They can choose producers whose production methods, distribution and/or marketing methods they trust. Consumers can choose to avoid buying from producers if the food includes (or may include) ingredients they don't want to be exposed to. Because there are fewer distribution steps and/or shorter distances between producers and consumers, food is likely to be fresher and tastier.

Q. In what ways is our nation's food system vulnerable to threats such as food-borne illnesses?

A. Food travels approximately 1,500 miles from farm to fork, about 25 percent further than in 1980. On the food-distribution journey, there are many more opportunities for contamination compared to food that is grown locally. Also, if food contamination does occur somewhere in the current food system, it will spread considerably further and faster than if the food were produced locally. Many more people will be exposed to or consume contaminated food. It has happened and it will continue to happen in the current food system. The question is whether these incidents will convince consumers, temporarily or permanently, that there are alternatives and that they can choose to know the sources of their sustenance.

Q. How can the principles of sustainable agriculture, in general, strengthen the security of the nation's food supply?

A. Sustainable agriculture relies on production practices that are ecologically sound, economically viable and socially responsible. Producers use fewer agricultural chemicals on the crops and generally avoid concentrated production operations, such as feedlots. Producers using sustainable practices, for example, might opt for raising cattle on grass rather than grain. They attempt to work within nature's constraints, using local inputs. Some have adopted production practices that allow them to be certified organic.

Certainly, sustainable and organic production practices contribute to a less chemically intense food system. In addition, local/regional food producers, known by their consumers, contribute to a food supply that the nation's eaters feel more
confident about.

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