Saturday, May 12, 2012

Why Buy Local

I have another list for you. I do love lists. Does that say something about my personality type? Hmmm. That may be a topic for another day! Haha.

Ten Reasons to Buy Local
  1. The Walton family doesn't need another mansion, but your local farmer's kid does need new cleats for baseball season. 
  2. Local farms create jobs for many uneducated laborers who cannot find employment elsewhere. 
  3. If your local economy is struggling, your job may depend on keeping your money local. 
  4. Small family farms are less likely to use pesticides, herbicides, hormones, and antibiotics on the food they grow. 
  5. Feed lots are disgusting. Thousands of animals crammed into small spaces, standing in their own feces, eating genetically modified grain, are given high doses of antibiotics because the conditions make them sick. You want to eat those animals?
  6. Produce in America is shipped an average of 1500 miles to get from the grower to your table. Do you know how much gas those airplanes take? How much smog that creates? How much heat is produced by all those trucks driving lettuce cross-country? 
  7. Local products typically have less or even no packaging because they don't travel far. 
  8. Most produce is picked 4 or more days before it gets to the shelf, so it must be picked before it's completely ripe. Local produce is typically picked the same day and at it's peak, meaning it will look better and taste better. It will also have more nutrients.
  9. Preserve open spaces. If local farms cannot create enough income, they sell their land for development. 
  10. Strengthen your community. When you buy local, you meet the people whose products you buy and form relationships with farmers, artisans, bakers, shopkeepers, and more. 

7 comments:

  1. I love buying local and shop at our local farmer's market!

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  2. I LOVE this post! I really wish more people would try to buy local products. We try to buy as much as we can from local merchants..I visit the Farmer's Market weekly and we buy a lot from craft fairs and art markets! Every year for Christmas I try to buy at least half of our gifts handmade.

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  3. wow that great we do buy here only since we do the
    sotre and farmer market and then the yard sale and thirft stores

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  4. What a great post! We all need to support our local growers, farmers and fruit and vegetable markets. They indeed have families to support and bills to pay. I support them as much as I can! It would help too, if we supported the small business or places owned by families that serve good food. Your calling attention to this is very helpful:)
    Cyndee Thomas cyndee.thomas0@gmail.com

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  5. I love going to the farmers market on Saturday mornings! thanks for the post!

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  6. wow never thought of that. its kinda of hard here in NYC to get to a local farm but when i lived in RI i used to go strawberry picking and loved it.

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  7. I think it's awesome when you know where your food is coming from, especially knowing that it was grown nearby. Great post!

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