Food Secuirty- what is it anyway?

By Carmen Rosen

Our neighbourhood is blessed with the Renfrew-Collingwood Food Security Institute, which is a fancy name, but what does food security really mean and why should we care?

The term food security has many levels, from being able to get enough to eat to back yard gardening to issues of global food marketing and distribution that affect our access to local food.

How has food become so cheap and available?
Why is New Zealand lamb less expensive than Salt Spring Island lamb and why are apples from China cheaper than apples from the Okanogan?

In the past 50 years, North Americans have become disconnected from the sources of their food. The miracles of modern supermarkets and worldwide transportation mean we can get just about anything—from anywhere, at any time of the year and for a smaller portion of our monthly expenses—than in previous generations.

Cities are no longer surrounded and supplied by farms. Farms have been replaced by car-oriented suburbs. With the rise of trucking came the “just-in-time” factory farm-to-store-delivery service. Big semis now move our food across the continent, and large ships that load containers onto those trucks ply the oceans.

Small local producers do not have enough product to fill big semis and therefore don’t fit easily into the system that favours massive farms and big players that control the delivery and access to the market. Ironically, it becomes more expensive to bring in local lamb and apples than lamb and apples from across oceans. Small producers cannot make a living at the prices they’d have to charge to be competitive, so they shut down and the local supply of food becomes compromised.

Is the current system of getting food from the farmer to our table really sustainable?
Now, at any one time in our city, there is no more than three days of food for our citizens. If a disaster shuts down the border or prevent use of the highways, or even if oil prices become too high, the Lower Mainland would quickly become seriously food “insecure.”

People have begun thinking that they want to be more connected to their food, know where it comes from, and know that it will still be available in difficult times.

Luckily, as a region, we have done many things right
One of the big things that make the Lower Mainland the envy of other cities is the Agricultural Land Reserve, which keeps land affordable for farmers to continue farming. Each year, however, land gets taken out of the Reserve and big box stores and subdivisions are creeping onto our precious farmland, a trend that has food security people concerned.

Another positive trend has been our tourism and restaurant industries that highlight our local foods and wines and make it possible to have a small agricultural business. The recent worldwide interest in the Vancouverites’ 100-Mile Diet challenge has further enhanced people’s interest in and demand for locally grown food.

What we can do to be promote food security
We all have to eat. How we make choices about where our food comes from has implications for our community, our region and our planet.

It is worth spending money on healthy local food. It is worth paying farmers a living wage for producing our food. When our food is grown far away, we lose our connection and our sense of responsibility to the earth and to our fellow humans who bring us the bounty of the earth.

Food security is an exciting and dynamic field with implications for everything from global trade to community building, the environment, human rights and basic delivery of meals to people in need.

Let’s all become more conscious around the effects of our food choices—our choices shape our society.

Happy and conscious eating!