The Locavore's Dilemma (17 page)

Another general conclusion of the LCA studies is that the distance traveled matters less than the mode of transportation employed, whether boat, railroad car, truck, or individual car. Using 2002 data, the authors of the aforementioned 2005 DEFRA study developed two different types of measurements for food transport. The first was vehicle kilometers—the distance traveled by vehicles carrying food and drink regardless of the amount being transported. The second was ton kilometers—the distance multiplied by load, which gives a better sense of the amount of energy required for each item transported.
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The researchers observed that 82% of the estimated 30 billion food miles associated with U.K.-consumed food are generated within the country, with car transport from shop to home accounting for 48% and tractor-trailers (what they call HGVs—heavy goods vehicles) representing 31% of food miles. Remarkably, air transport amounted to less than 1% of total food miles. The large share accounted for by cars was the result of individual families making numerous trips to the supermarket. By contrast, delivering these goods to stores using much more efficient means required much less energy per item. In other words, transporting a large volume of broccoli in a refrigerated container that had been moved around on a boat, a railroad car, and a truck to a distribution point required a lot less energy than a few thousand consumers bringing the same volume of broccoli back to their homes.

Significant differences also exist between transportation modes. By far the most efficient is maritime transportation, as modern container ships float on water and are powered by highly efficient diesel engines that can cover huge distances using very little fuel. According to the authors of the DEFRA study, in the U.K. sea transport accounted for 65% of food miles—the actual distance traveled by numerous food items that were imported from distant locations—but overall
maritime
food miles accounted for less than 1% of the total vehicle kilometers of the country. So moving New Zealand apples to the U.K. using highly
efficient container ships consumed very little energy per apple, when compared to moving the fruit by car and in very small volumes from a supermarket to relatively close residences. Distance may be important, but in truth the transportation mode is typically a much more significant issue.

Advances in transportation have historically been associated with the increased outsourcing of perishable food items at the expense of local production and storage. Not only were imported items fresher than stored local produce, but they also reduced the costs associated with storage, especially in terms of energy (refrigeration) and spoilage. As we have already discussed, the timing of local harvests has long influenced the geographical distribution of food production. This consideration is lost on food activists, but was tackled head-on in a study published in 2006 by New Zealand researchers Caroline Saunders, Andrew Barber and Greg Taylor. Their work took into account the energy required for out-of-season cold storage as well as the related carbon dioxide emissions equivalent for U.K. apples and assumed that they would be kept in this state for an average of 6 months.
³³
According to their scenario, the amount of energy needed to store these apples was 2,069 megajoule per ton (MJ/ton), and emissions for production was 85.5 kilograms of carbon dioxide per ton (CO
₂
/ton). These amounts are comparable to the energy consumption required to ship New Zealand apples to the U.K. (2,030 MJ/ton), but far exceed those required to produce New Zealand apples (60.1 kg of CO
₂
/ton). In other words, because New Zealand is located in the Southern Hemisphere where the growing season coincides with the Northern Hemisphere's winter, shipping freshly picked New Zealand apples and quickly selling them to U.K. consumers during their late winter season results in less greenhouse gas emissions than the purchase by U.K. consumers of U.K. apples that have been in storage for several months. Another study published by Llorenc Milà i Canals et al. in 2007
factored in seasonal storage and storage losses and reached a similar conclusion.
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In this scenario, local apples stored between 5 and 9 months with normal storage loss rates increased the energy used by 8–16%. What these studies show is that the smart thing to do is also the most economical: avoid cold storage as much as possible and purchase produce grown in different latitudes instead.

The LCA and other studies have also highlighted additional considerations that, while less crucial to our argument, help put the food miles rhetoric in broader perspective. For one thing, consumers' transportation choices, such as walking, biking, or taking a crowded bus (as opposed to driving) can obviously reduce the total carbon dioxide emissions associated with food purchases. The authors of the DEFRA study showed that, in the worst-case scenario, a U.K. consumer driving 6 miles to buy Kenyan green beans emits more carbon dioxide per bean than does flying the vegetables from Kenya to the U.K. There are, however, good reasons why most of us use a car to shop. Among other things, when we drive to the store we are able to buy more groceries and thus reduce the number of shopping trips and amount of time devoted to this activity.

Another largely overlooked issue is the amount of food that is wasted. According to some estimates, between 30 to 40% of raw food materials and ingredients are lost between the points of production and consumption.
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In less advanced economies, food losses in the production, harvesting, and on-farm storage stages are primarily attributable to the lack of infrastructure, knowledge, or investment in the means to protect agricultural products from damage and spoilage due to rodents, insects, molds, and other microorganisms. (Postharvest losses as a result of these factors are believed to account for at least 30% of the harvested crop in some parts of the world, a dramatic waste of seeds, water, fertilizer, and labor.) By contrast, in industrialized countries, food losses are
more significant in retail and food service establishments and in homes.
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For instance, a 2008 British study conducted by the Waste & Resources Action Programme analyzed the trash of 2,138 households and estimated that more than 6.7 million tons of food—roughly a third of the food bought by consumers—was thrown out every year. According to its authors, 61% of this food waste (consisting mostly of fresh fruits, vegetables, and salads, and amounting to approximately 70 kilograms per person annually) could have been avoided with more care and planning. The costs involved were estimated to be about £10.2 billion (about $19.5 billion USD) and the cause of 18 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions per year in the U.K.—an amount equivalent to the emissions of one fifth of the British car fleet during this time period.
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We have already documented in chapter 2 how locavore initiatives such as Community Supported Agriculture result in more waste of fresh produce than is the case when people shop at supermarkets. Another misconception promoted by activists is that the absence (or much smaller volume) of packaging material at farmers' markets has significant environmental benefits, a notion that conveniently ignores the fact that food packaging has the dual advantage of protecting food from microbes and greatly prolonging shelf life. These advantages, in turn, significantly increase the probability of the food being consumed instead of ending in a landfill or incinerator.
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Clearly, if we are serious about decreasing the overall environmental impact of food production, food miles are nothing but a misleading distraction. To quote one of the world's leading authorities on the LCA analysis of agricultural productions, Dr. Adrian Williams of the National Resources Management Centre at Cranfield University (U.K.), the “concept of food miles is unhelpful and stupid. It doesn't inform about anything except the distance travelled.”
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A much more constructive approach to further minimize the environmental impact of agriculture would instead focus on further reducing production and postharvest losses as well as educating consumers on their food handling behaviors.

In recent years, about 40% of the U.K.'s air-freighted fresh fruit and vegetable imports have originated in sub-Saharan countries such as South Africa, Ghana, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, and Kenya. These goods drew the ire of uncompetitive European producers and activists who claimed that they were the epitome of unsustainable consumption and therefore deserving of retaliatory measures. In the words of Patrick Holden, Director of the U.K. Soil Association (the main U.K. organic certification organization and lobbyist), Britain should aim “to produce most of its organic food domestically and import as little as possible” because there “is a strong demand” for this “from the public and many of our licensees.”
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Yet, as the basic facts surrounding Kenyan products convincingly illustrate, in order to truly do what is best for the environment, one should avoid decisions based on emotional reactions and poorly disguised protectionist rhetoric and embrace instead price signals.

In 2004, Kenya's export of vegetables, roots, tubers, and other edible plants totaled $161 million, making it the 27th largest exporting country in this category.
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Kenyan producers also exported $470 million worth of live trees, plants, bulbs, and cut flowers, making the country the 7th largest such exporter in the world at the time. Indeed, Kenyan cut flower exports amounted to $250 million, accounted for about 10% of the agricultural sector's contribution to the country's gross domestic product that year, and had a 25% market share in the European Union.
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Not surprisingly, the livelihood of millions of Kenyans has come to depend on those export-based industries.

Because of their light weight, high value, and perishable nature, 91% of the fresh fruits and vegetables exported from Kenya to the U.K. were air freighted,
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adding, for example, an additional 2–18 pence to the cost of each pack of organic Kenyan green beans.
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Intercontinental air freight adds to the atmosphere 8 kilograms of carbon dioxide per kilogram transported—about 200 times more emissions and 12 times more energy than sea transport.
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However, a much larger volume of carbon
dioxide emissions is released by U.K. passenger flights each year. In fact, passenger flights amount to 90% of all emissions from airlines, with cargo amounting to about 5%. Furthermore, air freighted imports of fresh fruits and vegetables account for less than 0.1% of the total U.K. emissions of carbon dioxide. Interestingly, 60 to 80% of Kenyan fresh agricultural products are transported in the cargo hold of passenger flights.
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When the passenger-related emissions are factored in, carbon dioxide emission levels for air freighted exports are actually much lower.

A study from 2007 provided another striking illustration of the impact of environmental differences between production locations. Here the authors considered the contrast between cut flowers grown in Kenya and the Netherlands and destined for the U.K. market.
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For each 12,000 cut roses produced, Kenyan producers released 6,000 kilograms of carbon dioxide as opposed to 35,000 kilograms of carbon dioxide for their Dutch competitors. Overall, Kenyan rose production is said to be much more efficient and environmentally friendly compared to Dutch production, reflecting, among other things, the fact that 99% of Dutch emissions were caused by heating and lighting intensive production systems, whereas Kenyan flower production relies mostly on sunshine. In contrast, 91% of Kenyan emissions were attributed to the 4,000-mile air-freight transport from Kenya to the U.K.

When the food miles controversy over African perishable products reached its peak in early 2007, supporters of Kenyan exporters were quick to point out that greenhouse gas emissions associated with air-freighted produce were miniscule in comparison with the impact of tourist air travel by citizens of importing nations. They further argued that Kenyan agriculture typically relied on manual labor and organic fertilizers because they couldn't afford sophisticated farm machines and chemical pesticides and fertilizers. As such, the carbon dioxide emissions attributable to the production phase are rather negligible. Another relevant fact is that while carbon dioxide emissions per capita vary widely from country to country, the global average is currently estimated to be about 3.6 tons per person per year, with the U.K. average being
approximately 9.2 tons, the African average 1.04 tons and the Kenyan average 0.2 ton.
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Another environmental consideration that is directly relevant to any discussion of locavorism is urbanization. As we argued in chapter 1, there can be no sustained economic development without cities, and, for at least a few millennia, urbanization has been impossible without significant long distance trade in food. Locavorism, though, is inherently anti-urban as it effectively mandates low density settlements distributed over the arable landscape (in our experience, though, a number of locavores do not grasp this implication). This vision of small and self-sufficient communities obviously holds much appeal for people who are not fond of the greater densities and sprawling suburbs of metropolitan areas, to say nothing of the associated higher air pollution and noise levels, crime, and failing public schools.

While most people, including those who are not willing to live there, will acknowledge the unique economic and cultural opportunities offered by thriving metropolitan areas, their environmental benefits are less readily understood, especially if one pictures congested, unpleasant, and unhealthy third world shantytowns. And yet, as observed by commentators whose basic argument parallels that of defenders of high-yield farming, thriving cities are not an environmental problem, but rather the best means to lighten up humanity's impact on nature. To quote the applied scientists and policy analysts Peter W. Huber and Mark P. Mills, the skyscraper is “America's great green gift to the planet” for it “packs more people onto less land, which leaves more wilderness undisturbed in other places, where the people aren't. . . . The less real estate we occupy for economic gain,” they add, “the more we leave undisturbed as wilderness. And the city, though profligate in its consumption of most everything else, is very frugal with land. The one thing your average New Yorker does
not
occupy is 40 acres and a mule.”
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In the words of economist Edward L. Glaeser, “residing in a forest might seem to be a good way of showing one's love of nature, but living in a concrete jungle is actually far more ecologically friendly . . . If you love nature, stay away from it.”
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The journalist David Owen further observed that because spreading people thinly across the landscape would increase environmental damage, “even part-time agricultural self-sufficiency . . . would be an environmental and economic disaster.”
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The basic point made by the likes of Huber, Mills, Glaeser, and Owen is thus that, by virtually any measure, residents of high-density urban areas drive, pollute, consume, and throw away much less than people living in greener surroundings.
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Apart perhaps from self-selected migrants to environmentalist meccas such as Portland, Oregon, or Missoula, Montana, urbanites are not intrinsically greener than rural inhabitants, but when space is at a premium, wastefulness turns out to be prohibitively expensive.