Local Food

As I continue to discover, we must research environmental decisions carefully. The use of ethanol and growing crops to produce it has demonstrated that our best intentions can have a negative effect when we divert what was a crop for cattle and people to fuel for our vehicles thereby causing farmland to be allocated for other purposes. The other negatives are that the cost of food increases and the actual amount decreases especially in areas that are already experiencing difficulty producing enough food for the local population.

Our 100 mile diet does not always support economic efficiency or best farming practises in. New Zealand researchers have found that the country's natural abundance of clover-filled fields mean it can ship its lamb 24,000 kilometres to Britain and still only produce one-quarter of the carbon footprint of local British lamb raised on manufactured food.

Canada's Atlantic halibut is obtained by using the highly destructive practise of bottom trawling which other nations (not all I will admit) have banned.

What these examples point out is that we must keep examining our assumptions about the 100 mile diet and other practises. Things are not as clear as they might seem at first glance.