Opinion: Why Small, Local, Organic Farms Aren’t The Key To Fixing Our Food System
The food movement has a problem: It’s right about what’s wrong with our system, but wrong about how to fix it.
But what is the “food movement?” I hear you asking. For these purposes, we’ll call it the loose coalition of sustainability-minded people calling for the food system to be more focused on environmental and human health. There are lots of players with lots of agendas, but the key issues boil down to a familiar few: We have a chemical-intensive system that crowds out biodiversity, depletes the soil and pollutes the water to grow corn and soy for cheap meat and processed food, which make us fat and sick. While we can talk about the extent to which these things are true (and I have, in eye-glazing, patience-trying detail), it’s hard to look at the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico or the inexorable rise in obesity and deny that they’re problems.
How do we fix it? You’ve seen the bumper stickers. Buy fresh, buy local. Support the small, diverse, organic (or organic-ish) farm that supplies the farmers market and local restaurants with fresh vegetables. And that’s a great idea; local agriculture brings a host of benefits, from delicious strawberries to a much-needed reminder that food has to come from somewhere. . .