Green Jounal#3: Fun, Fresh, Farmers Market
May 14, 2007
Posted by CindyC in : Green Journal , trackback
This weekend was the first farmers’ market of the season in my town, which for me heralds the impending approach of summer. We started shopping at the farmers’ market several years back when we started our family and our meals weren’t delivered in paper boxes anymore. In the beginning, we really went to the farmers’ market for the fun and community atmosphere and to get a bit of fresh produce to supplement my normal grocery trips.
As I began to have conversation with the growers, I became more aware of the community and environmental impact of supporting local farmers. According to sustainabletable.org, the produce you get from the supermarket on average travels 1500 miles from the farm to the store, and about 40% of the produce is grown overseas. Just think about all the fuel it takes to transport a head of lettuce, the emissions generated from the transport, not to mention the loss of nutrients and flavor during this voyage. I recently saw a Safeway commercial where it proudly advertises carrying fresh, in season fruit from Chile. Why is that a selling point? Even as summer is approaching and fresh local crops are hitting the grocery stores, I still see plenty of summer produce shipped from overseas. With different health and labor standards worldwide, how fresh and safe are the berries that I put on my table?
The point of my tirade is that I have become not only a believer of organic foods but I am resolved to do better in buying organic AND local. There have been many discussions on advantages of eating organic and local including benefits to the environment, supporting local economy, lack of pesticides and chemicals, fresher food and saving money, so I don’t want to belabor those points here. In the spirit of my green journal, I want to figure out how to integrate organic and local in my daily life to prevent me from slipping back to my old ways.
My action this week was to buy organic and local as much as possible. Since all the seasonal, local farmers markets are now opened, it made my action much simpler to implement. I looked around for local farmers markets and discovered that I can go to 2 farmers markets within 3 miles from my house, a main trip and a supplemental trip for the weekend if needed. These markets are about the same distance as my usual grocery stores. Not only did I pick up my produce and herbs, but I also got my baked goods and cheeses at these markets. The only issue I had was getting the meat and fish since these items are not available at the farmers’ markets I go to (even though they are in the Ferry Plaza market in San Francisco). So for meat, I made a trip to local grocery store and bought organic and sustainably raised meats like we have been doing, along with other items that you just can’t get from farmers markets, like cereal. My conclusion from this week’s action is that buying organic and local really isn’t that hard, I just had to do some initial research to find the right markets opened at the right times. I can’t cut out the local grocery store trip (and not advocating to do so) but since I usually make 2 store trips a week, there’s really no additional work for me.
So for my action impact tally this week:
Number of times forgotten: None
Time consumed to implement this action About 10 minutes to research the local farmers market to find locations and times
Amount of resources sparedThis is a tough one. My best calculation is 210 gallons of fossil fuel saved. I couldn’t really figure out how to calculate the real distance traveled for the grocery store produce or how to calculate it based on my consumption. So for now, I am just use a single 1500 miles traveled mentioned above with the average transport truck’s 7 MPG. Of course, we didn’t consume the thousands of pound of food transported on the same truck, but I figure this will offset any overseas produce not in the average and if we all ate locally, there would be fewer transport trucks. By the way, if anyone finds a better way of calculating the impact, I’d love to hear about it.
Extra Upfront Cost None. I didn’t have to drive any further or make additional trips to other stores. In fact, I saved about $12 at the farmers market where organic strawberries were $8 for 3 pints compared to $15 at the store plus cheaper vegetables and breads I found.
Also, there is the added benefit of taking my child to the farmers’ market to reconnect with neighbors and showing her food that is not already packaged in cellophane and bags.
Before signing off, I just want to mention that I am still working on all of my previous actions and will try to summarize the cumulative impact on a monthly basis. So if anyone feels inspired to join me, just submit your results to me and I will add them in.
Previous Entries:
Bring your own cup or bottle
Bring you own reusable bags
CindyC
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Comments»
I feel lucky living in California. There is so much locally produced produce. Yesterday I went to the farmer’s market in my town and found abundant late spring/early summer fruit: strawberries, raspberries, cherries, peaches, apricots. There were so many varieties of vegetables that I can’t begin to list them all. I LOVE summer. Going back to the price. We got half a flat (6 wired-boxes) of organic strawberries at $10 - $2.5 per box, cheaper than what you can get from Safeway. And I know these strawberries are from within 50 miles of my home and I appreciate the fact that I could chat with the farmer who actually grew those. This strawberry farmer told me that they used special spiders to control pests. I also spoke with a butcher’s wife who was selling pork at the market. They got pigs from a ranch 20 miles away from my home. She told me the whole process from raising pigs and making various cuts. Do you know that the gestational period for pigs is exactly 3 months 3 weeks and 3 days? We also bought salmon caught right at the northern California coast.
With all that, I have no need to go to Safeway to buy the “fresh produce” from Chile. Fresh? Last time I checked the map, Chile is a half a world away from us.
I just found this blog. DH and I are semi-green - we are willing to be green when it is convenient, affordable, and fun (and it usually is at least 2 out of 3). Like, our car broke down just after we moved to Seattle and we refused a family member who offered to give us the money to fix it, opting instead to borrow vehicles from family until DH quits his job (already planned on this before the car broke) and ride busses, walk, bike, etc. Bussing and walking is much more fun for our twin one-year-olds, healthier, etc. Oh, yeah, we also will be able to ditch insurance, gas, garage rental, and maintenance costs plus the time to clean the vehicle. I also get a little time to read on the bus on my way to work. Downside: We can’t drive to visit out-of-town friends and relatives.
More in line with this post - We’re also going to start using the Farmer’s Market for our produce starting next Saturday - DH works Saturdays until this Saturday, and it’s easier to do as a family. We’re lucky to live one bus away from the market. We’re mostly just sick of Safeway’s stuff goign bad in less than a week, when the local / organic stuff lasts for three weeks! We waste *soooo* much food from Safeway just because it spoils before we use it and we throw it out!
I’ll watch your blog for more ideas. I need to start bringing my own cup in for work - I have a great coffee mug already, but need to get myself a water glass too. We don’t do reuseable bags, since we re-use the bags as trash or recycling bags at home and would just need to buy bags to replace them - when we have enough bags already at home we just put stuff in the stroller’s carrier on the bottom and go bag-free.
My next green / cheapskate goal: Figure out how to clean using baking soda, vinegar, and other basic things and try to ditch all or most of our cleaning products. This is probably more about money than being green for us, but fortunately the two usually go hand-in-hand.
Thanks for the great call to action!