I’m pretty lucky in that what I do for a living involves me touting the benefits of buying local and sustainably produced food. But in doing so, I hear a lot of complaints around the price point.
Today I want to write about this – not as an attempt to debunk a myth, but as a way to shift the perspective on the issue.
The question: Is local and/or sustainably produced food (i.e. organic/low-spray, ethical…) more expensive?
The answer? Of course it is! And so it should be.
You get what you pay for. Feel good food, in the ethical sense of the phrase, costs more to produce. Paying people a living wage, treating the ecosystem with care, and treating animals humanely all costs more – it’s that extra bit of time and labour that the globalized, industrialized, impersonalized food system refuses to afford. Social justice advocates and environmentalists alike should take note: the current food system erodes the very things we stand for, and complaining that “conscious” food is too expensive is like wanting our cake and expecting to eat it too.
North Americans spend about 10% of their income on food purchases – this is the lowest in the world! How can we expect our ideals to be realized when we are insisting on maintaining the status quo through our refusal back up our vision financially?
Europeans seem to have it at least somewhat more figured out: their governments have re-jigged the system by putting a lot more money into subsidized housing, and on the whole, Europeans tend to rent their homes more than they own. All of this helps in freeing up more dinero for dinner.
Some would say, “Well the globalized system is highly subsidized, why can’t conscious food be subsidized instead?” Point well taken, and I think this is something we should consider lobbying for. So while we wait for the world’s governments to overhaul the economic system in favour of small & sustainable (it might take a while), let’s consider the ways we can put our money where our mouth is right now – even when purse strings are tight.
1. Redirect more of your disposable income towards food
Cell phones, laptops, ipods, new clothes, travel, eating out, a few too many out at the bar last night… we live in a culture of excess. Downsizing our spending in some areas of our life will allow us to upgrade in others, and it’ll probably make us more human too.
2. Consider conscious food a donation to ‘the cause’
You may not get a receipt for a charitable donation but spending an extra $50 a month on improving people’s lives and the environment sounds like a worthwhile good deed to me.
3. Look at where your current food spending lands
Eating out, buying processed/value-added food, and the not-so-odd “treat” adds up! Not to mention the cost of meat and dairy. Buying whole, unprocessed food, in bulk when possible, is SO MUCH CHEAPER. And did I mention that dried chickpeas cost $1.50/lb? Try tracking your spending for a month and see how it all breaks down. (Just keeping track may make you more conscious of how you’re spending your money.) All the money you save buying dried chickpeas in bulk can begin to go towards dried organic chickpeas in bulk! And that’s just the beginning.
At this point you’re probably thinking, “What about the people who can’t even afford to give charitable donations, or those who don’t purchase the latest gadgets because they can’t afford them?” Another point well taken: it’s true, not everyone has the ability to afford that extra spending. Probably it’s because most of their money is going to paying rent, and possibly feeding multiple people on a low (if even living) wage. The fact that our government has created a system where that kind of disparity exists is heartbreaking. It’s an institutional problem, however, that must be fixed institutionally; farmers’ incomes and the health of our ecosystems around the world should not have to bear the cost of this kind of political shortfall.
Most of us don’t want to support a food system that pays farmers pennies for their food. There is no way local farmers, or anyone trying to farm sustainably, can compete with that. Nor should they have to. We may not want to pay more for our food, but real food does cost more. Let’s just make sure its not the farmers or the environment that bear that cost.
I think it’s important to realize that when we buy un-sustainably produced food, we don’t actually pay the real cost of food. So, it’s not only that this food is more expensive, it’s also that the non-sustainably produced food is under priced, because there are negative consequences of its production which are paid by parties not directly involved in the economic transactions.
If costs were internalized, and non-sustainable food producers had to pay the real costs of unsustainable production, I don’t think we’d have any of it.
You make a lot a valid points here Emily, hopefully this will help sway some people to start making a few different choices when it comes to food. One thing which I think you have omitted that may not be obvious to everyone is that the carbon footprint of locally grown food is smaller based on transportation alone. This is just another great reason for everyone to buy Ontario produce whenever possible.
the photograph in this post makes me miss summer.
thanks for the carrot loaf recipe – i’ll definitely be trying that one. :)
100% with you Tristan – excellent point and I shouldn’t have missed that. Growing your own food is another point I didn’t mention here but readers take note: seeds + water + sun + love = lots of free food! =)
Fantastic article Emily. Bang on! As you say, the price of food is not the problem — it’s often where we’re choosing to put the rest of our money. And this raises a related issue…the price of rent! As Debbie at FoodShare says, “We don’t need Food Banks. Food is affordable. We need rent banks!”
Great article. Really spot-on.
Great post Emily! Couldn’t agree more. At times, we see this issue come up in the restaurant…people seem to struggle with the idea of paying actual/fair/higher prices for veggie meals (and would probably be the same for meat meals, too). We are unfamiliar with the real cost of food.
Being another mid-twenty-something on a tight budget, I also wrestle with my food spending choices. However, that feeling fades away with the rewards of biting into local, organic, farm-fresh raspberries and beets! And, I have a bit of a “shopping addiction” that I redirect to farmers markets instead of retail stores ;-)
[...] expensive. And if you’re still not convinced, have a read of my post from a while back explaining why we should be paying the real cost of our food. It’s because it’s not just about food: it’s about the people who grew it, the land that it [...]