Emile DeFelice, sometime contributor to this blog, said it this way: "Put Your State On Your Plate."
Hugh Weathers, the man who beat Emile to remain state agriculture commissioner, has a more succinct way of putting it: The word, he says, is "locavore."
Read about the concept, and what South Carolina is doing to promote it, in Mr. Weathers’ op-ed piece today, if you haven’t read it already. Then take the challenge — eat local for a day.
Then, do it again.
Related Posts
Eating locally is fine, but our farmers benefit from exporting their goods to markets that will pay a bit more when they can do so.
I’ve convinced about 30 residents of the Commonwealth of Virginia that the Palmetto State’s peaches are the best of the best simply by purchasing a basket at the Farmers’ Market on my way out of town to NoVA (northern Virginia, the DC suburbs). My mom, my sister and her family, some of her neighbors, and my colleagues up there all enjoy the feast. I take two to the 77-year-old Italian / naturalized American who makes the best sandwiches in all of NoVA; he claims that the best way to eat them is after dinner with a glass of Chianti, although a Merlot will do in a pinch. He’s quite the fan of our peaches and would love to get them regularly during the season. For a while the Safeway chain in NoVA advertized Palmetto State peaches, but alas, they’re no longer available.
(Don’t tell you-know-who, but I drive faster than 55 mph to ensure the fruit’s freshness…)
The downside of being exclusively a locavore is diversity — variety — and seasonal availability. Bananas, kiwi fruit, truffles, and countless other varieties of fruits, veggies, and fungi are not grown locally. Come winter, most fresh stuff is of foreign origin, but ain’t it great that we have the choice?
When I first arrived in Germany in 1972, supermarkets were rare and even in the big cities folks had only what we used to call “greengrocers” for their food. Come December cabbage, turnips, and potatoes were plentiful, but the only fruit regularly available was apples, and each had enough wax to make several candles. At that time the German economy was starting to zoom ahead of the other Western European economies, so citrus (from Israel) and other fruits gradually became more widely available.
I’ve no quarrel with Weathers but just wanted to point out that free trade lets folks put a greater variety of foods more cheaply on the table all year long.
Just watch our for the locavore extremistswho want to ban food based on carbon footprint or whatever.