Who:
Jim Motavalli
Author of two Sierra Club Books, speaker at Sierra Summit
Where:
Fairfield, CT
I wish I could say I spent the day saving the world, but instead I got in my car and drove two miles to Sherwood Farms, where I bought some ears of corn and a few tomatoes.
So what, you say? Well, that farm has been in the same family's ownership for more than 200 years, and it's one of the few that hasn't given way for luxury housing in my part of Connecticut. In recent talks promoting E Magazine's new book, "Green Living," I talked about the importance of farmers markets and community-supported agriculture. Local food rules: According to the invaluable Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture in Iowa, locally grown broccoli travels an average of 20 miles from farm to point of sale. Conventionally grown broccoli moves 1,846 miles. The primary ingredients for an eight-ounce container of strawberry yogurt go on an odyssey of 2,200 miles, the Leopold Center says. Our food travels mostly on polluting, congestion-aggravating diesel trucks.
The family and I also traveled to the Sono Arts Festival in nearby Norwalk, where we bought fresh lemonade and a local artist's numbered print, then listened to great bands from near and far. We heard the wonderful Hot Buttered Rum String Band play original bluegrass with jam band overtones--including a song about their biodiesel-powered tour bus (with used salad oil courtesy of Cracker Barrel outlets). Biodiesel not only reduces emissions but is also less toxic than table salt and biodegrades as fast as sugar. Can the nation's truckers get enthusiastic about this clean-burning, made-in-U.S.A. fuel?
Back home, we cooked that corn and supplemented it with cherry tomatoes from our own organic garden. There were, no doubt, some well-traveled condiments on our table, but at least we'd reduced our "food miles" for one night.
