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Eating local
Will Wilkinson serves up his wisdom:
How far your food travels matters a lot less than what kind of food it is, or how it was produced. According to a recent study out of Carnegie Mellon University, the distance traveled by the average American's dinner rose about 25 percent from 1997 to 2004, due to increasing global trade. But carbon emissions from food transport saw only a 5 percent bump, thanks to the efficiencies of vast cargo container ships. [TC: do note that precedes the rapid run-up of oil prices.]
A tomato raised in a heated greenhouse next door can be more carbon-intensive than one shipped halfway across the globe. And cows spew a lot more greenhouse gas than hens, or kumquats, so eating just a bit less beef can do more carbon-wise than going completely local. It's complicated.
Addressing the cool folks, Will adds:
Should we minimize our “music miles” and boycott bands on tour? Thankfully, our next-door neighbors have a band, Dead Larry. We don’t have to go anywhere to hear them.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on August 28, 2008 at 11:31 AM in Food and Drink | Permalink
Comments
In my view we do have duties to behave more responsibly at the dinner table but the simple admonition "eat less meat" will do.
Tyler (or anyone), can you give us a back-of-the-envelope calculation of the PDV of global warming damages we avert by, say, eating beef one fewer time per week? I'm guessing in a Nordhaus framework, it might avert 0.001 cents of damage in present dollars.
So is this a symbolic act of solidarity, or do you think my guess is way way off?
Posted by: Bob Murphy at Aug 28, 2008 11:54:03 AM
Sardines are meat
Posted by: JSTR at Aug 28, 2008 11:58:27 AM
Just a whiny point: There is a substantial misrepresentation of the Eat Local argument in the premise that a "tomato raised in a heated greenhouse next door can be more carbon-intensive than one shipped halfway across the globe."
To the true eat local advocate the point is not to replicate the global food economy locally. One eats foods adapted to one's region, and seasonally as well. The better question is if canning a garden raised local tomato uses more energy/imposes a larger carbon load.
I can answer for the fact that it tastes better anyway.
Cheers.
Posted by: Alger at Aug 28, 2008 12:04:56 PM
This is another job for Pigouvian taxes.
Asking consumers to guesstimate the carbon impact of eating local food is hopeless. It will be orders of magnitude from correct and just add noise and confusion to purchase decisions.
If gas and other fossil fuels are priced correctly, then the price of the food, and every other product that is transported or produced locally, will automatically reflect its carbon impact. The consumer just looks at the price and decide if the benefits > the costs. Simple.
This is exactly like factoring in the costs of iron, labor, water, capital, land, palladium, jet fuel or any other input in any one of the products and services we consume. It would be nuts to try to educate consumers about each inputs costs and tell them to conserve accordingly for the good of society.
That's the whole point of the price system. Save moral suasion for areas where we can't use prices.
Posted by: a student of economics at Aug 28, 2008 12:06:48 PM
I've long argued that miles-to-farmers-market trump miles to farm.
Food shipped to your local super is at optimum fuel/ton, and your commute is only a couple miles. If you drive 10 (or 20?) to get "local" food you've blown it. You just burned the advantage.
(and the farmers going to local markets seem to be driving dodgy old pickup and vans ...)
Posted by: odograph at Aug 28, 2008 12:13:22 PM
GREAT point on local bands.
Posted by: Speedmaster at Aug 28, 2008 12:28:13 PM
Eating less meat? But that's unhealthy. See Gary Taubes's Good Calories, Bad Calories. Should we all get sick to avert a little bit of global warming?
Posted by: ivan at Aug 28, 2008 12:30:48 PM
As I don't have any plans to travel rural Mexico any time soon, I need a good Mexican "simple and easy" cookbook. Recommendations?
Posted by: Kyle at Aug 28, 2008 12:38:20 PM
Cows fed their natural diet - grass - emit few greenhouse gases. It's because cows are fed grain and corn that they emit so much. If you're concerned about it, keep eating beef but switch to grass-fed.
Posted by: Joshua Holmes at Aug 28, 2008 12:40:14 PM
Odograph makes a good point. I always feel a little bit guilty about driving right past a supermarket a mile from my house on my weekly ten mile trek to the farm to pick up my fresh vegetables. I think that the locavore movement does itself a disservice by focusing as it does on the distance food travels from farm to market when there are so many other variables that make calculating the carbon footprint of any individual piece of food in my fridge almost impossible.
The reason I buy food locally has more to do with my belief that the presence of small- to medium-scale agriculture in a community benefits the culture of that community. I buy local because I don't want local farms to go away. On top of that, I like knowing a bit more about how my food is produced than I would if I bought it wrapped in plastic in a supermarket.
Posted by: jonvw at Aug 28, 2008 1:44:10 PM
I echo Bob Murphy's comments ... what exactly is the expected magnitude of the decision to eat less beef? I'm guessing Bob's PV $.001 figure is high.
Posted by: Jake at Aug 28, 2008 1:45:17 PM
Loved the post, ivan. I suggest anyone who thinks low fat is healthy eating buy a copy of Good Calories, Bad Calories. Now go eat more cow.
Posted by: subrosa at Aug 28, 2008 1:57:00 PM
" In my view we do have duties to behave more responsibly at the dinner table ..."
Could you please post a list of all our current post-modern "duties?" I have such trouble keeping up with the burgeoning list of "requirements" these days. I would value your outline of what currently represents a "dutiful" and obedient human being.
Posted by: vanderleun at Aug 28, 2008 2:18:07 PM
Now, I don't mean to refute all of the scientific studies that I'm sure are represented in "Good Calories, Bad Calories" but I'm skeptical that it's not just a flavor of the week diet book. For the sake of argument I won't refer to any of the studies proffered by Pollan or Lappe, but I do think the fact that every traditional staple in nearly every culture has revolved around complementary proteins rather than meat. Historically, a low-meat, high-whole grain/legume diet has sustained most civilizations.
Only recently has meat become affordable and available to the general public. Simultaneously, obesity has become a country-wide epidemic where such high-red-meat diets have become popular.
The individual impact of foregoing meat is obviously limited. Still, popularizing the movement and representing a growing demand for grass-raised meat or vegetarian options accelerates the adoption of the marginally beneficial ethic.
Posted by: Zach Piso at Aug 28, 2008 2:44:03 PM
Another whiny point.
Many of the comments are discussing the CSA/Farmer's Market system as it stands now. I will agree that there are many dis-economies of scale involved as it is configured now.
How many of those objections would be mitigated by a system that uses markets smaller and more dispersed than the giant supermarkets, and actually shorten the travel to market distance of both the food and the consumer?
Also, it is explicitly a more costly system in some terms, but Local Food is not supposed to compete on the same terms with the agribusiness/superstore system. The value is elsewhere.
Posted by: Alger at Aug 28, 2008 2:48:41 PM
Well, as for me, the distance my dinner travels hasnt changed much for many years, perhaps since my late teens. About 50 feet, as I recall from my high school anatomy class. Now the volume, unfortunately, has changed somewhat.
Posted by: john at Aug 28, 2008 3:18:51 PM
I nominate "a student of economics" for post of the month.
Posted by: Mercutio.Mont at Aug 28, 2008 3:21:11 PM
Kyle,
I recommend Rick Bayless's "Mexican Everyday" cookbook. It contains the simplest Mexican dishes of any of his many cookbooks.
http://www.amazon.com/Mexican-Everyday-Recipes-Featured-Season/dp/039306154X/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1219951468&sr=8-2
Posted by: larry at Aug 28, 2008 3:29:31 PM
Local Food Movement = Conspicuous Consumption for fashionable modern Bourgeoisie
Since just about every consumable is mass produced, and easily affordable by most people - and things like jewels and opulent clothing are no longer acceptable to distinguish social class (even rich people wear blue jeans)... There has to be a new way to demonstrate your class status.
Since the farmed land that is local to an urban area is very limited (an urban area can't possible produce enough food within a 50 or 100 mile radius to feed everyone), local food has built in scarcity. Local food will never be plentifully available to the masses city dwellers. Since it is scarce by design, it makes a perfect item for conspicuous consumption.
And not only does it act as a social status signal to buy local food, it gives the higher status person a socially acceptable reason to look down and morally judge the vast majority of people who inevitably won't be able to share that lifestyle choice.
Of course "eating local" tastes "better", because local products are a luxury item (or at least a 'premium' item). When you are catering to the privileged classes (or their bohemian hippie children), you are naturally going to produce a high quality product.
And of course your local farmer carrying a couple crates of veggies produces more carbon emissions that cargo-ships and trains which have economies of scale, but that is not the point... it isn't really about reducing carbon emissions.
Posted by: Rex Rhino at Aug 28, 2008 4:08:13 PM
@Alger: That's not a whiny point, that's an important point. The anti-eat-local people seem intent on setting up straw men to knock down.
Posted by: David at Aug 28, 2008 4:13:58 PM
Rex Rhino is right that the local food movement is a luxury trend. But, I would add the further refinement that restaurants that advertise local ingredient cooking are a clear signal of both high quality ingredients and gourmet cooking (at least where I live). Chains and "ordinary" restaurants can't be bothered with cooking from scratch, so their dumpsters are loaded with restaurant supply pre-fab food boxes. The best restaurants now signal their non-use of the restaurant supply food by using local ingredients.
Posted by: liberalarts at Aug 28, 2008 8:34:26 PM
Historically, a low-meat, high-whole grain/legume diet has sustained most civilizations.
Once humans switched from hunting and gathering to farming, they grew smaller, frailer, weaker, and more disease-ridden. The positive effect was a reduction in inter-tribe violence.
The bone of pre-civilization humans show that we were tall and extremely strong. The bones of civilized humans up until the 1800s or so show us weak, short, and frail.
Only recently has meat become affordable and available to the general public. Simultaneously, obesity has become a country-wide epidemic where such high-red-meat diets have become popular.
I could say the same thing, replacing "sugar" with "meat". Are you sure you know which one is causing the damage?
Posted by: Joshua Holmes at Aug 28, 2008 9:25:30 PM
Current definitions of obesity are damage?
Posted by: rluser at Aug 28, 2008 10:10:13 PM
I could say the same thing, replacing "sugar" with "meat". Are you sure you know which one is causing the damage?
Both. Now we come to step three. This... drives... most... people... crazy.
Posted by: at Aug 28, 2008 11:59:46 PM
Just to pile on against the notion that "grain is what people at for milenia, so it's what we should eat now", most of those people were also field laborers working 10+ hours a day, 6 days a week. If we ate the type of diet they did (which included TONS of calories from grains), we'd get insanely fat. Calorie per dollar used to be the main consideration when it came to buying food, since your primary worry was having enough energy to do all of the crazy physical labor you had to do. Now... not so much.
Posted by: mravery at Aug 29, 2008 1:03:10 AM
