For me, there are three tenants at the heart of this growing movement.  The first is to put our food dollars back into farmers’ pockets, as opposed to the pockets of the corporate giants of industrial agriculture (Monsanto, Cargill, Archer-Daniels-Midland).  The second is to stop the inefficiency of using more energy (fossil fuel) calories in the production of our food than actual food calories created, and to stop dousing our farmland with synthetic fertilizers and pesticides.  The third is to treat the animals that we eat with a certain measure of respect and humaneness, which includes letting these animals live the way they were evolved to live.  This includes the apparently difficult-to-understand notion of letting a cow graze on grass, rather than pumping it full of corn.

A large consequence of ensuring the above is that, yes, your food will cost more, though now you will actually be paying a price for your food proportional to the costs it took to produce it.

Often, farmers are getting paid less per bushel of corn than it cost to grow it.  Another example is that for every $1 of corn sweetener produced, the farmer only gets $0.04.  Our food dollars are flowing to the “producers” of value-added products like the chicken nugget, instead of to the growers (the farmers).

The farmers that I have met and whose farms I have also visited are the hardest working people you will ever come across.  To complain about paying a FAIR price for your eggs, produce, poultry, beef, etc., and then turning and blowing $60 on a night of drinking, or even more on the newest iPhone/other gadget is the height of chutzpah.

Naturally there are families out there for whom the increased cost of local/organic/sustainable food represents quite the burden, but I would argue that most of the people I have spoken to on this topic do not fall into this category.

The problem as I see it is a lack of basic knowledge of where one’s food comes from.  I challenge anyone to take this first step of tracking or at least trying to track the food they eat on a daily basis, and to examine the consequences of eating meat and produce grown using industrial methods.

Just start there.  And then please tell me what’s elitist about local/organic/sustainable.

http://www.foodincmovie.com/

Visiting Marin Sun Farms was my first opportunity to see the source of some of the food I eat, in living, breathing color.  And it was incredible!  Just incredible!

For three-four hours we heard about the history of both the land that the farm is on and of the farm itself, and about the philosophy behind the farm as it stands today.  The one word that kept coming up was grass.  Everything on the farm depends on grass.

The operations manager for the farm described grassland in a way I had never thought about before.  According to him, the acres upon acres of grass spread out before us were the same as a forest, at least underground.  What he meant was that the grass had the same extensive root system and capacity to extract carbon out of the air.  It’s only above-ground that there is a visible difference- no trees!

In fact, he said that an analysis had been done on the effects of transforming all of our country’s farmland back to a pasture model (meaning grass!).  The results showed that we could be back to pre-industrial levels of carbon within one year!  Whether or not this is entirely accurate, I was blown away.  I had never thought of grass as having this power.  The same power that most of us now understand a forest as having.

It also makes me wonder about the burgeoning green movement, with its push for sustainable energy and reduction of fossil fuels as a way to reduce global warming.  Don’t get me wrong, I am of course completely behind this movement.  But if grass truly has the power described above, then maybe we ought to also be focusing on increasing grass-land, which could have much more of an immediate impact on our world.  Just a thought…

Back to the farm.  They have goats, chickens, and cattle.  We spent most of our time with the chickens.  Our first stop was to see the egg-layers.  There are no fences keeping these hens (and a few roosters!) from staying.  As they described it, if they don’t keep the chickens happy they’ll leave!  But these chickens are definitely, definitely happy!  And because they have tons of grass to scratch in and find grubs, as well as a chicken house to lay their eggs in and to provide them with a place to roost at night, they are content to stay.

Seeing the hens gave me a very tangible image of where my scrambled eggs come from!  There were no cages to be scene, these chickens hadn’t been de-beaked, and they weren’t crammed together by the thousands.  I couldn’t stop smiling!  Just ask my girlfriend!

The operations manager then said something that really clicked with me and made me proud of the changes I’ve made in my diet.  “Taking scratching away from a chicken is a terrible atrocity.”  Scratching is simply a part of a chicken’s identity.  The eggs that are on sale at your local supermarket for $1.99 a dozen certainly don’t come from happy chickens, let alone scratching chickens.  It’s something to think about the next time you reach for them!  Shopping according to the “bottom line” may in fact not be the best way to shop after all.

We also visited the broiler chickens (the meat birds).  They live in movable chicken coops and are moved to fresh grass a couple of times each day.  One of the workers at the farm actually moved the coops to demonstrate how excited the chickens were for the fresh grass and the new source of bugs to scratch for.  It was great to see these chickens living a nice life, especially considering that the lunch we had at the end of the tour consisted of barbecue chicken!

I could go on about my visit to Marin Sun Farms, but I think I’ve said enough for now.  Even if you aren’t into eating organic/pasture-raised, I highly recommend visiting a local farm to close the current gap that exists for most of us from our food sources.  Make food something tangible again and not just something you buy at the store or something that is concocted in a food lab somewhere.

And you might just have a good time while you’re at it!

Strategically positioned throughout the financial district the abundant flower stands are impossible to miss.  And Fridays are “dollar-a-stem” days, so there is really no excuse not to buy.

Or so I thought.

As part of my quest to live a sustainable and sensible life my goal is to examine each area of my life, to make changes one-step at a time, and to simply do the best that I can.  I have come to realize that sustainable living is much more a process than a single choice.  And I am the first to admit that it isn’t easy (look for my “sustainable living” guide soon!).

A while back I happened to think about an article I had read about the flower industry and how especially bad it was for the environment.  In order to maximize growth, the inevitable (over)use of fertilizers and insecticides follows.

I realized that I had been buying flowers without asking myself what the ultimate cost was, both to the environment and to the people growing the flowers.  This was something I had done in other aspects of my life so I decided to do so in the flower-realm as well.

I knew that the flowers from these stands certainly weren’t organic, but I wondered where they were from.  Upon asking I was told they were from such faraway countries as New Zealand, Australia, and Holland.  REALLY?!  I couldn’t believe it.  I just couldn’t!  I hadn’t expected all of the flowers to be sourced locally, but to think that the cheapest and most efficient way to get flowers is to grow them across the world and then ship them thousands of miles to San Francisco was incredible to me.

Back to “dollar-a-stem” Fridays.  Is the true cost for a few flowers really only a few dollars?  Personally I think it absolutely is not.  The cost to the environment (chemicals used in the growing process and oil used for transport) alone is much more.

My decision was an easy one.  I was done buying flowers from the financial district stalls.  In fact, I was done buying non-organic, non-local flowers. Period.

The cost (not the price) did not equal the few days of enjoyment my girlfriend and I received from the flowers.

Luckily, I quickly realized that the Ferry Building Farmer’s Market in San Francisco provides me with an option to buy locally grown, organic flowers directly from those that grow them.  So my girlfriend still gets flowers (she would argue not frequently enough!), and I feel good about where my dollars are going; who my dollars are supporting.

I leave the choice up to you, but I urge you to begin looking at all areas of your life, especially the consumer side.  Ask yourself if the “buying as cheap as possible” mantra is the right one to have for the long-term health of our incredible planet.

Maybe a better mantra is “buy less, but buy right”.

Anyway, I will leave the whole media discussion for another day.

Since moving to San Francisco and especially since the economy started on its downward spiral late last year, I have experienced a major change in my outlook as a consumer.

Local.

Thinking, supporting, buying, local.

Maybe it goes without saying, but I’ve come to realize the power I have whenever I spend my money- it’s actually quite a bit of power.  With every dollar I spend I make two choices: what to spend that dollar on, but more importantly what NOT to spend that dollar on.

As part of my eco-framework I continually try to live as sustainably as possible.  Whether that means composting, buying organic produce, or using public transportation I try to do as much as I can, whenever I can.  But to this framework I have also added the word local.  So in terms of buying organic produce that means belonging to a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture), rather than buying organic fruit grown thousands of miles away (now how organic is it really to then transport that food using fossil fuels?).

Now even though the economy is what it is and along with most others I am trying to save as much as possible, I am also making sure that I continue to spend money at the same time.

If everyone stopped spending money, what would happen to our neighborhood stores, restaurants, and cafes?  We have all seen the impact that the decrease in consumer spending is having.  Again, as consumers we have an incredible amount of power.  We can choose to support not only a local restaurant, but also the entire network of local ties that the restaurant itself has.

Case in point: I live in the Russian Hill neighborhood of San Francisco and a few blocks from my apartment is a favorite restaurant / wine-bar of mine called 1550 Hyde.  It certainly isn’t the cheapest meal around, but every time I’ve been there I feel great about the money I’m spending.

1550 Hyde uses organic and sustainable ingredients, they work with many local farms, and their grease is recycled for Bio-diesel fuel.  So not only am I supporting this one restaurant (owners, workers, etc.), I am also supporting a secondary network.  My money supports local farm owners and their many workers, and I am supporting meat and produce grown the RIGHT way rather than the CHEAP way.

Can I afford to eat a meal like this all the time?  No.  That’s why most nights my girlfriend and I (ok, ok, mostly her) cook our own meals using the organic produce from our weekly CSA box, and then once a week we try to support a restaurant like 1550 Hyde.

Next time you are planning to go out for a meal or heading out to buy something think about the power you have in the decision of where you will eat or shop.  It’s incredibly empowering and once you make the conscious decision to think a little deeper about where you are spending your money, I promise you that it’s difficult to stop.  1550 Hyde recently had to take another day off per week in addition to the customary Monday day off.  We can all do our part to ensure that our local stores and restaurants make it through these tough times.

And remember, sometimes a more expensive item on the menu or at the grocery store is far less expensive in terms of the human and environmental cost than the cheaper option.

I am all for being frugal, but being cheap is another matter all together.