The Locally Sourced Food Movement
By: Delaney Young
The locally sourced food movement is a movement to grow your own food or consume food grown within a hundred miles. It has gained a lot of traction because it increases access to healthy foods while helping the environment.
According to the United Nations, predictions show that by 2050, 66% of the world population will live in urban communities; a 2.5 billion person increase from the current 54% in the present.
The Census Bureau stated that the United States alone has a population of 280,540,330 people, with 80% of those people living in cities. The urban population boom has lead to a problem of food security.
About 15.6 million homes in the United States were at some point in 2016 food insecure, reported the United States Department of Agriculture. Results from a survey, published by agriculture professor Dr. Nathan McClinton, show that urban farming increases access to locally sourced food which adds to food production, reduces greenhouse gas emissions, and improves public health.
During the Great Depression and WWII, urban gardening plots, backyard gardens, and victory gardens were used to create food and employment for communities, as stated in City Bountiful written by Agriculture professor Laura Lawson.
Internationally, urban farming has been used for thousands of years in developing countries to provide food for locals in terrace farming and plots of shrubs, vegetables and herbs according to a historic overview of urban farming, published by the North American Urban Agriculture Committee.
The future of urban agriculture and locally sourced food is still very unknown. Agriculture professor, Dr. Sarah Lovell found that many city planners and landscape designers have started to integrate urban farms on big and small scales ranging from yard garden beds to horizontal gardens on the side of skyscrapers.
One of the challenges is acquiring land and then being able to keep ownership. Owners of the land might be tempted to use it for more lucrative businesses. One solution to this issue is government funding according to published graduate studies.
Another concern is soil contamination from pathogens and pollution or irrigating with contaminated water. One solution is growing crops in out of ground garden beds but this is more of a potential risk and is almost an equal risk in rural farming according to agriculture professor Dr. David Midmore.