The Local Trap

It seems other disciplines are waking up to the fact that "local foods" are not the panacea they're often made out to be.  Here is an interesting article by Born and Purcell in Journal of Planning Education and Research aimed at city planners.  An excerpt:

“The local trap refers to the tendency of food activists and researchers to assume something
inherent about the local scale. The local is assumed to be desirable; it is preferred
a priori to larger scales. What is desired varies and can include ecological sustainability,
social justice, democracy, better nutrition, and food security, freshness, and quality. For
example, the local trap assumes that a local-scale food system will be inherently more
socially just than a national-scale or global-scale food system. This article argues that the
local trap is misguided and poses significant intellectual and political dangers to foodsystems
research. To be clear, the concept of the local trap is not an argument against
the local scale per se. We are not suggesting that the local scale is inherently undesirable.
Rather, the local trap is the assumption that local is inherently good. Far from
claiming that the local is inherently bad, the article argues that there is nothing inherent
about any scale. Local-scale food systems are equally likely to be just or unjust, sustainable
or unsustainable, secure or insecure.”

Milan Food Expo

“World’s Fairs used to be an opportunity to examine a better future for society. They were about innovation, progress and development, and brought together inventors and businesses eager to demonstrate technological advancements designed for the greater good of all.

This year’s Expo Milano 2015, with the theme “Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life,” could have followed the same mold. Since the Industrial Revolution, the West has experienced what economic historian Deirdre McCloskey has called “the great enrichment.” With prosperity, nutrition has made huge leaps forward: Better preservation and refrigeration systems, agricultural advancements and antiseptic packaging have made our diet both richer and more varied. There is much to celebrate.

Instead, the Expo has fallen prey to an anti-industrial ideology dressed up as romantic nostalgia.”

That's from a piece in the Wall Street Journal by Alberto Mingardi.  He concludes:

“We didn’t become richer and wealthier by eating locally. One thing that made us richer and wealthier was the ability to trade and better preserve food. We have enjoyed much progress since our grandfathers’ time, and progress is precisely what developing countries long for. Why feed them with fairy tales of a romanticized past that never existed?”

Local Foods Advocates Fight Back

Pierre Desrochers (co-author of the excellent book The Locavore's Dilemma: In praise of the 10,000 mile diet) alerted me to this paper just published in the journal Agriculture and Human Values by Helen Scharber and Anita Dancs.  The authors asks, "Do locavores have a dilemma?"  The authors take issue with the sorts of arguments made by folks like me, Pierre, and a host of economists and other writers.  They write:

“Local food critics have recently argued that locavores, unaware of economic laws and principles, are ironically promoting a future characterized by less food security and more environmental destruction. In this paper, we critically examine the ways in which mainstream economics discourse is employed in arguments to undermine the proclaimed benefits of local food. ”

The article provides an excellent literature review of the case against local foods (even if they did miss my article on the topic with Bailey Norwood in Library of Economics and Liberty).   But, ultimately, I find their case against the case for local foods unsatisfying.  

In the end, they seem to conclude that the typical economic critique ignores power dynamics, externalities, and choice.  In other words, "big food" is warped by capitalism that generates market power and externalities, and local food is a solution to these evils of capitalism.  

They argue that local foods are not an either/or and they should exist alongside other markets in a way that increases availability and choice.  I agree!  As I've said many times: I'm not against local foods, I'm against bad arguments for local foods.  And, I'm against government policies that subsidize local food activities.  Why?  Precisely for the reason opposite of that argued in this paper: I see no compelling evidence that local foods meaningfully internalize any of the important adverse externalities associated  with food production.  Moreover, I don't see the local food movement as one that is anti-capitalistic: precisely the opposite! Lots of competition, innovation, competition and entrepreneurship is at the heart of the movement. Sellers who don't offer high quality, affordable products won't be at the farmers market for long, and those that do will grow bigger. Finally, what is it about local foods that meaningfully changes the power dynamic that so worries these authors?  Let's be frank, the local food movement has largely gained steam because it is desired by relatively rich, largely white Americans.  As Charles Mann put it in a New York Times interview:       

“if your concern is to produce the maximum amount of food possible for the lowest cost, which is a serious concern around the world for people who aren’t middle-class foodies like me, [local food] seems like a crazy luxury. It doesn’t make sense for my aesthetic preference to be elevated to a moral imperative”

I'll wrap up by pointing to this new paper I just came across published in the journal Appetite. The authors, "conducted a detailed cross-sectional assessment of all [farmers markets] in Bronx County, NY, and of the nearest store(s) selling produce within a half-mile walking distance (up to two stores per [farmers markets]). The study included 26 [farmers markets] and 44 stores." Here are the author's highlights and findings:

“•Farmers’ markets (FMs) may offer a means to get fresh produce into needy communities.
•But FMs operate overwhelming fewer months, days, and hours than nearby stores.
•FMs carry less-varied, less-common, more-expensive produce than nearby stores.
•FMs offer many items not optimal for good health (e.g., jams, pies, juice drinks).
•FMs might provide little net benefit to food environments in urban communities.”

Local Foods are Subsidized

Given some of the things I've written about local foods, people often get the impression I'm against the movement.  But, as I like to remind people: I'm not against local foods - I'm against bad arguments for buying local foods.  And I am in no way convinced we should subsidize local foods.  When I say that people often retort that local foods aren't subsidized.  That's baloney.  Aside from the various calls for additional subsidies, this news release reminds us that local foods are indeed subsidized.  

“Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack Tuesday announced more than $5 million in grants for 82 projects spanning 42 states and the U.S. Virgin Islands that support the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) efforts to connect school cafeterias with local farmers and ranchers through its Farm to School Program. The program helps schools purchase more food from local farmers and ranchers in their communities, expanding access to healthy local food for school children and supporting local economies.”

If the goal is to help schools expand access to healthy food, why not give them money to do that?  Why add the extra restriction that it needs to be local?  You can get more healthy food for a lower cost without the constraint that it must be local.  If the goal is to enrich certain farmers, why not simply give the money to them? Why add the further restriction that it needs to go to schools?  If the goal is rural development, why not let rural communities decide what is the highest value use of additional grant dollars rather than tying it to a particular cause?  The idea that local foods are "good for the economy" is one that has been thoroughly debunked in chapters in my Food Police book and in Norwood's soon-to-be released Agricultural and Food Controversies book.  For more general critiques see The Locavore's Dilemma: In Praise of the 10,000-mile Diet by Pierre Desrochers  and Hiroko Shimizu or Just Food:  Where Locavores Get It Wrong and How We Can Truly Eat Responsibly by James McWilliams.

In praising the latest announcement, U.S. Senator Debbie Stabenow, Chairwoman of the Committee on Agriculture said, somehow without the slightest hint of irony:

“As I visit schools with local farm to table programs, I continue to be impressed to see students enjoying broccoli and pineapple from salad bars”

Unless you happen to live in Hawaii, I doubt the program is supporting local pineapple.  And, unless you live in California or Arizona, there isn't a sufficient amount of broccoli grown to support local schools either.  All of which goes to show, if you really want kids to eat a diverse, nutritious diet, it pays to look a little further away from home.  

In the grand scheme of things, this isn't all that big a deal.  An extra $5 million on local food grants isn't going to be the thing that breaks the bank.  And, there are likely much more distortion policies that could be picked on.  But, I think what bothers me the most about this one is that so many people buy into really poor economic arguments for promoting local foods.  It makes me think we haven't done a very good job as economists educating our students and the public.

Local Food Bad News

The New York Post ran a story this weekend on toxic metal content in several community gardens in NYC (HT Jeff Stier).  The article was based on a paper published in Journal of Environmental Pollution.  

“Tainted vegetables — some sold in city markets — were found in five of seven plots tested, according to data obtained from the study by The Post through the Freedom of Information Law.”

and

“A previous soil study by the same researchers found lead levels above federal soil guidelines at 24 of 54 city gardens, or 44 percent of the total, and overall toxic soil at 38 gardens — 70 percent of the total”

The findings led to reactions like the following:

“Shoppers at a farmers market outside East New York Farms in Brooklyn — where a carrot was tested with nearly three times the safe amount of lead — were stunned by the study.
“I thought it would have been more natural getting it from here than anywhere else,” said one 38-year-old grazer.

Donel Lykes, 68, said he noticed something funny about the veggies there.

“Their vegetables, for whatever reason, are not as tasty as the ones you get in the store,” he said.”

This isn't some kind of overall condemnation of local foods, and no doubt such results might be found in non-local food sources.  However, the results do suggest caution in ascribing hype to foods or production practices that aren't firmly based in scientific evidence.

While we we're at it, here's other news on the local food front confirming that we've known for a while (and yet still doesn't seem to be widely acknowledged): fewer food miles do not equate with lower carbon emissions.  

“A Bangor University-led project into the social and environmental benefits of food grown locally and overseas has found that no straightforward relationship between the transport distance and the overall environmental impact of the commercial life-cycle of crops exists.”

and

“The results show that transport or ‘food miles’ was only a very small percentage of the CO2 expenditure related to any crop. “The emerging picture was a highly complex one of inputs and outputs concerning everything from the type of soil on which a crop is grown, to where and how it is stored and packaged for sale to the customer. It’s true to say that the picture is far from complete, with current interest focusing on the CO2 released from different soil types.””

This echos what I've long said: carbon emissions are likely to be lowest when we grow food where it can be most efficiently produced and then shipped to the final consumer.