[Foodplanning] JPER article

[Jill Rubin]

Hello,

I just read Avoiding the Local Trap.  I think it makes some good points
(relevant to almost anything) that local should not be embraced without
examination.  And yes, academics and advocates often interchange local
with other goals probably more often then we should.  But, I am not
convinced it is as big a problem or as neutral as the authors suggest.

The loftier goals of sustainability, democracy, and social justice are
very difficult to define and manufacture (ie. one of the major
criticisms of both organic and fair trade labeling schemes is that they
fail to capture the essence of social justice and sustainability by
their inherent reductive approaches).  Local is a tangible approach that
sometimes, but not always, compliments these broader goals.  I think the
reason local has gotten a lot traction in the food movement is because
it is not an idealistic concept but a physical reality (even if it is a
socially constructed, relative, relational, and fixed reality).  What
makes local an effective organizing tool is that it is a hook.  I think
the challenge is that in defining a local food system, or community food
system, as I prefer to call it, is in understanding the components you
have, you don't like, and you want to change, and what side-effects that
change will have...but this is not a critique of local, but a prudent
approach to any endeavor. 

Another important feature of local is that it is "human scale."  Local
is something people can relate to, grab onto, and get to know.  The one
clear advantage local always has over broader geographic scales is
proximity.  When a New Yorker eats hamburger raised in California on
mid-west feed, it is hard to know (except by books like Omnivores
Dilemma) the environmental and social impacts.  Local presents a much
more feasible scale to understand the good and bad of the food system
ie. my lake is nutrient loaded because of fertilizer run-off and I
cannot fish there or I appreciate the aesthetic of farms on the
landscape.  I think the intimacy of a local food system is a very
important feature of local...that you are buying tomatoes that are
keeping a farm in production and preventing sprawl is not insignificant
phenomenon of local food systems.

My point is local is not a misguided approach, but it needs to be
tempered with understanding of the diverse consequences and ultimate
goals.  And I would happily throw out the concept--"local food system"
for a much more diverse and descriptive concept such as community food
system...but there are plenty of problematics with "community" too...

-Jill  

-----Original Message-----
From: foodplanning-bounces at mailman1.u.washington.edu
[mailto:foodplanning-bounces at mailman1.u.washington.edu] On Behalf Of
Joseph Nasr
Sent: Friday, January 05, 2007 10:03 AM
To: Janet Hammer
Cc: foodplanning
Subject: Re: [Foodplanning] JPER article

Thanks Janet for getting this discussion started on a good footing.  I
look
forward to hearing the thoughts of others on this.
Joe


Joe Nasr
joenasr at compuserve.com
(alternates: joenasr at cyberia.net.lb
                  jnasr at ryerson.ca)
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