The silver lining in high food prices

Related to this, Ezra Klein had a great piece on this.

http://www.prospect.org/csnc/blogs/ezraklein_archive?month=03&year=2008&base_name=meat_should_not_be_cheap

The human body doesn't need anywhere the amount of protein (especially animal protein) that Americans on average consume.

Grains, insofar as they are primarily used to feed livestock rather than people, are expensive because of market distorting agricultural and energy (ethanol) subsidies. Along with sugar, we effectively subsidize foods that are really detrimental to human health, driving up our health care costs. A lot of organic farmers do very well without any subsidies at all, and it's gratifying to see more and more consumers choosing this path.

"Does anyone care to compare our life expectancy with the life expectancy of a country that exclusively "eats local"?"

Mark, looking at it that way may definitely skew your data. If "eating" local means digging for roots and eating bark because your local warlord/president for life shuts down productive farms (as was the case in Zimbabwe) then no. The best counter example would probably be Japan, especially residents of Okinawa, who, IIRC, have the longest life expectancy on the planet. A diet in locally grown vegetables, rice, and locally caught fish, etc. is very good for you.

Mark,

Read the middle third of "In Defense of Food" for an answer to that question. The comparisons are made. Life expectancy is not a great measure since our gains in that statistic are primarily from defeating the diseases that kill children (thus raising the average). Pollan makes the point that a person who lives to be 60 nowadays has just about the same chance of living to 65 as his/her counterpart 100 years ago. The health effects are seen in the increase of heart disease, cancer, diabetes, and diseases related to tooth decay (major cause of disease in children--a point Pollan does not mention) wherever the "Western Diet" is present. Conversely, these diseases immediately decline when people go off of the "Western diet."

While one can understand the you would not want salt pork and corn meal exclusively for six months, there are plenty of ways to extend vegetables into the winter and you can always resort to the grocery store.

In the end, if you can only eat locally six months out of the year, that is still better than never.

Well, there IS canning and such. But I do note Mark's concerns. I mean, I live in Minnesota too. And people who live in desert climates. Its not just a limited growing season. In some cases, its also a limited range of options that will grow where you live (without some VERY unenvironmental methods. See.. golf courses in places like Arizona.)

Though I have no idea of the economy of canning vegetables you didn't grow yourself. Being a person with a very limited food budget, I have a feeling that's above both my skill AND my wallet. And no, where I live, a garden is simply impossible beyond a few pots in the window.

I eat local as much as possible because I'm a vegetable snob and because I live in California and know what an honest peach is supposed to taste like.

However, is there any scientific evidence that transport affects the nutritional value of foods? I see this assertion more and more.

"Though I have no idea of the economy of canning vegetables you didn't grow yourself. Being a person with a very limited food budget, I have a feeling that's above both my skill AND my wallet. And no, where I live, a garden is simply impossible beyond a few pots in the window."

A small initial investment in some mason jars, water, stove, some salt. That is it, at least for canning vegetables (tomatos, green beens, etc.) It's actually very cheap, and we were able (late last fall) to can about 50 jars of tomatos in a single afternoon. I will confess, it is not that pleasant a task (sterilize the cans, boil and peel the tomatos) but worth it in the end.

Karen--the optimal way to store fruits and vegetables in the smallest amount of space is to dry them. And as pointed out above, eating local/eating seasonally doesn't have to be an all-or-nothing proposition. Preserve/dry/store/save SOME food for the off-season, and you (and the environment) come out ahead.

In our climate that is not an option unless one wants a diet that is so boring that it is not worth the trouble of eating.

And no, where I live, a garden is simply impossible beyond a few pots in the window.

Does your city have community gardens? If they do you could get a plot or put a note up saying you'll volunteer with a plot in exchange for veggies.

Another fun thing I have seen is off a bike trail here in Seattle ( an old rail right of way) someone has a vegetable garden growing off the shoulder. Its been there for over a year, and someone leaves their buckets and tools off to the side. "Guerrilla gardening ;-) "

I'd love to get back to the old family homestead and have a garden, but like the authors say, you'll be able to sell more if you live close to a city (the land will be expensive, though). In rural West Virginia, where nearly everyone has a garden, I don't see how one can make a living. I guess with organic farms, it's about location, location, location!

Rod,

Your blog, more than any other, tends to make me hungry. Your post about Cassoulet awhile back made me crave the stuff so badly I went out and bought a 7qt Le Creuset French oven. Then I made lots and lots of Cassoulet, so much that I was rather sick of it by the time I finally ate it all :)

Mmm, local grass-fed beef. I'll have to go to WF after work tonight.

I try to support my local farmers by buying produce from them. It's not organic, but it's fresh and tastes good. I buy from the supermarket what he doesn't sell in the winter.

Too bad about the pickle farmers. It started in textiles and continues. We really need to support tax cuts and laws that encourage businesses to keep labor in the USA.

Uh, if beef is a luxury item, then ...

Umm... to most of the residents where I live (in a homeless shelter), beef is definitely a luxury. Meat usually means chicken, some kind of processed product like hotdogs, or tuna, almost used like a condiment in some carb base like mac and cheese.

Karen, not to take the discussion off topic ... but how do you get access to a computer in a homeless shelter? Serious question.

On my drive to work every morning, I pass the Stewpot, a ministry of a downtown Presbyterian church, where they feed the homeless in Dallas. I was startled to see a Rolls-Royce parked outside! Dallas is an interesting place; I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to find that some local skrillionaire Christian was inside cutting up potatoes.

Karen Brown, yes, I've priced hamburger. Around here it's between $1.99 and $2.69 a pound. Free-range, "ethical" beef is just too expensive for us.

I don't believe the "low protein" mantra across the board. Michael Pollan and others sing that tune, too. For one thing, "one size fits all" does NOT work with diet and nutrition.

Some people have fairly high protein requirements (if I had to guess, I'd say it was because - if Caucasian - they were descended from largely-non-agricultural Northern Europeans.) Some of our ancestors were pastoral until about 1500 years ago (or less.) Meat and dairy are their "bread and butter." IMO there are substantial genetic differences that make up for some tolerating a largely plant protein, even vegan diet, and others to be unhappy (or gaining weight) eating that way.

Mark, I had to chuckle when I read your comment about how "eating locally" in MN means salt pork six months out of the year.

I have an amateur interest in how our 19th c. forebearers lived, especially in the Midwest and Upper Midwest, Plains, etc. My husband's German-speaking farm ancestors put in huge crocks of sauerkraut, and ate that with boiled pork and potatoes for many, many weeks in the winter.

Michael Pollan, I notice, lives in Berkeley, CA.

You aren't going to have it both ways - fresh produce year round, especially of the crispy green variety - *and* "local eating" where there's only one relatively short growing season. 19th c. Midwestern people ate a lot of pie, jams, canned meats, root vegetables, breads, salted meats etc. because that's all that would winter over.

Remarks on canning: personally, I don't think canning is cost-effective unless you do it for many years (the jars are a pretty expensive startup investment, and natural gas or electricity aren't getting any cheaper), and canning destroys a lot of nutrients. Canning was a "hit" after Napoleon's logistics engineers invented it because there really was no better alternative.

The upside to canning is that freezers fail. They will; you can take that to the bank. I count power failures as failing, too. You're safe for about 8 hours, but if you have days without power (as we have had here), you will lose *everything,* especially that half a beef you drove out to the country to buy. It will happen - just budget it in.

Karen, I have found that the cheapest cuts of beef are boneless chuck roasts (about the same or slightly cheaper than hamburger.) I would have said blade roasts IF you could still get them. Around here they're about $2.49 lb (about $9-$10 a lb. grass-fed organic.)

Pork and chicken are great meats. Bones in meat are good - if you make a slow-cooking stew, make sure to leave bones in. People are always popping calcium supplements, but I am sold on the Weston Price foundation idea that boiled-bone broth (like a soup stock) is a great way to get calcium, and more absorbable than the pills. The flavor of the bones is a real plus.

I don't know what kind of setup you have in your shelter, but it seems to me that cheap cuts of meat, with bones, made into thick stews with potatoes and root vegetables would be far more nutritious than hot dogs or other "cheap" processed meats.

Hmm.. depends. I mean, you can buy three boxes of mac and cheese for a buck, on sale. Hard to beat that. And if you use the cheap meat strictly supplemental, that's quick, cheap, and almost no nutritional value.

Hence, a low income population that can be fat, but also suffering from malnutrition.

The rest can require heavy time investment, cooking skill, and cooking gear. (They cook for themselves here.)

Oh, I should add that I only learned about the local meat delivery from word-of-mouth, so sometimes there are resources available that we might not be aware of. Ask around!

A few things to keep in mind:

1.) As it relates to cash cost and greenhouse gas cost: local is more important than organic. I can understand the aversion to the price of organic. If you can't afford it don't buy it. But it doesn't cost any extra money to read the labels on two cans of vegetables to find out which one come from the U.S. and which one was shipped from the southern hemisphere.

2.) I don't understand why people think they have to have beef at every meal. Yes, local grass fed beef costs more. Eat it one night a week instead of three and you're probably now saving money. Protein comes from lots of sources. Beans are excellent sources of protein minus the cholestorol and plus the fiber. Eggs are good protein, and cage free eggs run only a buck more than factory farmed ones.

3.) Poor people can eat ethically. My wife and I are both students and we don't make much. By eating just a little less meat each week, we can have delicious grass-fed beef on Sunday nights and Wild Alaskan Salmon on Friday nights. And as far as vegetables go, the stuff we get from the farmers market is no more expensive than the supermarket--and tastier.

Local and organic foods are now popular ideologies for upper-middle-class folks trying to be better than the next person, and the idealistic fog generated blocks out most rays of common sense.

Yeah that it. Let's not be worried over the recent beef recall, the even more recent recall of cattle heads because the tonsils were left in or the fact the gov't won't even expand or allow private testing for BSE. Yep, I just want to feel better than the poor sops who eat those $1 McD's double cheeseburgers, or the poor schoolkids who consumed the recalled beef, if by feeling better you mean I'm protecting myself from possible BSE infection. Hey I also don't mind eating vegetables laden with pesticides and herbicides because they soak into the skin and simple washing won't work, or all the E Coli I can get from eating spinach or onions or whatever lettuce. I should just plow over my garden plots right now, chop down my fruit trees and pave over the whole damn thing.

Furthermore, and I know I'm just being faddish and want to feel better about myself, I should prefer drinking polluted municipal water supplies because excess nutrient runoff from industrial farming/golf courses/lawn treatment will cause higher levels of THM's in the water, a cancer causing disinfection byproduct when chlorine encounters organic carbon in the water. Let's not even talk about all the prescription medicine, OTC's and personal care products in said water supplies, at least I feel better than the next person because I'm, picky about my shampoos/soaps/detergents.

And God forbid Mr. Upper-middleclass me piss all over the peons because I reduce my electrical usage through conservation, efficient appliances, and using a variety of active and passive solar technologies. I mean, all the mercury emissions from coal plants, radioactive waste from nuclear plants, and ecological damage from hydroelectric plants are good for the peasants while unconscionable dandy me gets my jollies in making myself feel better than the next.