The Local Food Issue
As you continue to make small changes to your life (water bottles, reycling, tote-bags, and the food you buy), your realize your shopping cart is filled with products you never would have filled it with one year ago - Seventh Generation, Burt's Bees, Ecover, Earthbound Farms and so on. Fantastic!Another small but crucial change The Brooklyn Green Team is making is toBuy Local foods.With spring on the horizon a trip to your locals farmer's market is a great way to enjoy the tastes of local fruits, vegetables, cheeses, and so on. The tasty local food you purchase travels a shorter distance, thus using less fuel to arrive in your kitchen, while simultaneously supporting your local farmers.
Why Buy Local?- With each purchase, you ensure that money goes directly to the farmer that grew/raised your food.
- Local food is fresher and tastes better than food shipped long distances (On average American food travels 1,200 miles to reach your plate).
- Produced picked and eaten at the height of ripeness has exceptional flavor and, when handled properly, is packed with nutrients.
- Local farmers often grow a large assortment of unique varities, providing interesting choices every season.
- Local traditional livestock operations can operate under more sanitary conditions than factory farms without inputs from antibiotics because animals may be raised on grass in less crowded conditions.
- Family Farms are an important part of the American tradition of self-sufficiency. Since 1935, America has lost 4.7 million farms. Fewer than 1 million claim farming as thier primary occupation. Yet corporate agribusiness profits have nearly doubled since 1990.
- Virtually every region in New York State and the country has the capacity to grow basic food products.
- Local food systems can repair the environment. Low input, sustainable farming practices establish restorative systems where every output becomes an input for the next level of production.
REAL LOCAL FARMS
East New York Farms: is a collaborative project that organizes youth and adult residents to address food issues in their community by promoting local and regional sustainable agriculture and community based economic development. East New York Farms also develops economic opportunities for local farmers and gardeners and holds a hands-on youth internship that provides agricultural training and leadership skills.
www.eastnewyorkfarms.orgFact: In 2005 East New York Farms grew over 10,500 pounds of organically -farmed produce.
Farmer's Market: New Lots & Schenck Ave.
New Project: East New York Farms has begun to produce "urban honey" and is training aspiring, neighborhood beekeepers.
Added Value/ Red Hook Farms is a non-profit organization promoting the sustainable development of Red Hook by nurturing a new generation of young leaders in South Brooklyn.
www.added-value.orgFact: Red Hook Community Farm/ Added Value has transformed a once dilapidated playground into vibrant community resource - a 2.75 acre urban farm. Here they host a variety of educational programs during the school year.
New Project: Currently they work with two locally owned business Restaurant 360 and Restaurant ici. The restaurants purchase produce from the farm and a portion of the dollars you spend on an excellent meal goes to support the growth of new generation agricultural youth leaders.
Farmer's Market:
Wednesday Market - 6 Wolcott (Intersection of Wolcott and Dwight) 10am - 2pm
Saturday Market - The Red Hook Farm, Columbia and Beard Stree
t 9am - 3pm
WHAT YOU CAN DO. Frequent your farmers market.
Request local produce at your grocery store.
Join a CSA.
Eat at restaurants which feature a Local menu.
Remember, the goal is not to ban long-distance food. The goal is to restore a balance of local and long-distance food for the health of our communities, our farms, our land, and ourselves.Links
www.foodroutes.orgwww.farmaid.orgwww.nysawg.orgwww.localharvest.org/csa/ -- find out about how to join a CSA, (for Community Supported Agriculture) and buy produce directly from a farm!
http://www.cenyc.org/greenmarket -- find your local greenmarket, right here in NYC!
www.justfood.orgwww.100milediet.orgRelated ReadingThe Omnivore's DilemnaSlow Food Nation: Why Our Food Should Be Good, Clean, And FairAnimal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life
Brooklyn Green Team
www.brooklyngreenteam.blogspot.com
