July 6, 2009

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Food for Thought
Eating Green

By Brian Humphreys

Hybrid cars. Efficient light bulbs. Recycling bins that seem to accept almost anything. Many of us are genuinely making the effort to live our lives in a way that lessons our destructive impact on Earth. Perhaps we flirt with the idea that mankind was on this path before we were born, and maybe we even wonder why it is our job to halt the progress of generations, but still we accept the responsibility with resolve. Earth is great, and if there is even a chance we are endangering her with our lifestyle then our lifestyle needs to change.

Even though I live in an area where having a car is presently a necessity to be the most productive, I do not drive a hybrid. Not only that, but I own a truck. I turn off the lights in my home when I leave a room, and I do not leave the water running while brushing my teeth, but those changes are relatively insignificant. All the changes I would like to make like buying a hybrid car or installing solar panels on my house are expensive. It would be great if our economy did not hinge on cheap, efficient energy from oil, but it does, and my giving up oil tomorrow would not save the planet. In fact the planet would remain very much the same and my family would suffer from my lack of ability to get to work and classes quickly. I make sure that I vote pro-Earth, but what else is there for a middle-class guy from Fairwood with little-to-no extra time to do that contributes to the cause? Well, I suppose there is my money.

Yes, the worst time to discuss being others-centered with our finances just might be the middle of a recession. Then again, the fact that so many of us are being forced more than ever to think about how we spend might mean this is an excellent time to reconsider our priorities. Between the cost of living in King County and trying not to drown in graduate school tuition, my finances are stretched extremely thin. Some people are probably apathetic about the environment, or doubtful that there is really any harm being done, and for others this truly may not be the time to be thinking about significant changes due to legitimately being in survival mode. But for those of us that do care and want to be a part of the solution, I would like to acknowledge that I have tried to address the issue of food.

I first started thinking about locally grown and produced foods over this past winter. I have always taken for granted the knowledge that any grocery store will have anything I want at any time. However, during the worst of our snow and ice storms this year, there was about one week during which no commercial trucks were rolling and most people were staying home from work. When I walked down to the closest grocery store, I was shocked to find shelves very close to being empty. There was almost no bread besides bagels and various buns. It looked as though people had lined up to hoard canned foods. Refuse containers everywhere where overflowing onto parking lots after just one week.

It made me think about how delicate our infrastructure really is. Bill McKibben, author of Deep Economy, wrote that most food Americans consume travels 1,500 miles before being served onto someone’s plate, the percentage of Americans involved in agriculture has fallen from its peak of 50% to about 1% of the population, and the margin of profit for those still in the industry is pitiful. Perhaps there will be no change in our access to cheap, efficient energy in the near future, but between issues of global warming and the increase in the world’s demand for energy as a result of globalization, I would not rule out the possibility that the avocados which I love could become very expensive to transport here.

There are two considerations for residents of Fairwood that want to eat locally produced food; cost and availability. Obviously, cost seems like it would be the most significant issue. Indeed, it is costly to eat green when your food is not being mass-produced and distributed. But changes in lifestyle do not necessarily need to be immediate grand gestures, only a reflection of our changing priorities.

I started with my dairy products. Smith Brothers Dairy now weekly provides my milk, cheese, yogurt, cream, and eggs. My other two primary considerations were meat and fruit and vegetables, and my struggle with trying to satisfy my grocery list within Renton’s borders was my first motivation to write this article. I was excited to try out several small providers that boasted locally grown products until I discovered many of them had closed in recent month as a result of difficult economic conditions. After spending quite some time visiting little shops and grocery stores, I resorted to driving out to Issaquah or Kirkland to visit a PCC. I have been looking forward to the opening of the Renton Farmer’s Market for quite some time now.

It is important to acknowledge that there is a degree to which the difference between what is available at places like PCC and your neighborhood Safeway is a matter of semantics. If you are truly interested in locally produced food, a larger grocery chain is not going to provide those products. However, there are plenty of options available at almost any grocery store that are excellent ways to start.
When I realized the irony of consuming the amount of gas required to go to and from a store that sells local products, I turned my attention to being picky about what is available around me. Buying local fruits and vegetables is certainly an option during this part of the year when there are farmer’s markets everywhere, but even in the off seasons I consider those attempts at buying local produce more an experiment of what it would be like to have my diet limited by what can be grown around me if there was a slowing down or our infrastructure than a change in lifestyle that benefits the planet. However, there is a huge opportunity to respect nature by choosing to buy products that are humanely produced, especially meat. There is an ever-present need for investigation into companies’ claims along these lines, so I will let the readers search out these products in their own ways.

It is perhaps a sad commentary that it is so difficult to eat green living in Renton. This recession will come and go, followed by others that will do the same, and someday we will be gone and Earth will still be here in whatever condition we choose to leave her. I am a new participant in this struggle to balance environmental responsibility with taking care of my family and trying to assure us safe living full of opportunities for work, growth, adventure, and fun. For me the differences between a $2.50 box of cereal and a $3.50 one is significant enough that I will choose the cheaper every time, but I will still commit to spend a little more if that is what is required to add green eating to my arsenal of small changes that will hopefully add up to doing my part in making a difference in the world.

And if there are those out there in our city that desire to start selling local produce and meat that is exclusively humanely treated at the fairest price possible for a small provider selling those products then, well, rest assured you would at least have my business.