Ashlea Scholl

AP English 10

Period 5

Locavore Movement Essay

Recently, a growing trend has been sweeping the States and it’s dealing with food. No,

it’s nothing completely abnormal like the vodka eye shots that swept through local colleges a few

years back. It’s called the locavore movement. People are buying locally grown produce under

the impression that it’s super healthy and better better for the environment. But under the surface,

there’s actually a lot of drawbacks to this movement. Accessibility, it’s affect on the environment

and nutrition are all problematic factors in regards to this locavore movement.

A nice, fresh bunch of apples freshly picked off of some random farmer’s tree may seem

more enticing than the alternative, the common fruit found at every grocery store in the country,

but there’s not really any direct access to said farmer’s apples. In order to buy apples, or any

natural output for that matter, that was just recently harvested would require residency near some

kind of farmlands. But with “80 percent of [Americans] living in large, densely populated urban

areas” (Source F) farms aren’t exactly waiting in most people’s backyards, fresh produce waiting

to be collected. In fact, most people live “hundreds of miles, often thousands” (Source F) away

from any kind of pastures or orchards. That’s quite the long and rather taxing drive to make

everything the fruit basket on the counter starts to run low. The reality of it is that humans are lazy

by nature and want the easiest possible solution out of any situation, and that easiest possible

solution in this case would be to just buy whatever is needed from a local grocery store. Most

normal people don’t exactly have the disposable funds to go across the country every week or

so.

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 Furthermore, the production of local foods is just as bad as imported in terms of the

environments well being. If everyone were to convert to localism, a lot of urban settings would be

damaging the ecosystem a lot more than they already were simply because all of their fruits,

vegetables, meats, and whatever else comes from the earth would have to be grown within close

proximity to their area. Take the exchange between England and New Zealand, where England

regularly has lamb brought in from New Zealand to, obviously, provide their country with wool and

lamb chops. Sheep in New Zealand leave a “small carbon footprint” (Source C) because the New

Zealand domain has all the capabilities of raising sheep such as pastures and abundant space.

Whereas, if sheep were to be raised locally in England as the locavore movement entails, the

sheep would be forced to be raised “under intensive factory like conditions with a big carbon

footprint” (Source C). Stopping this interaction between the two countries in place of the locavore

movement add more carbon into the atmosphere, thus further polluting an already decaying

planet. Localism, in truth, will hurt the Earth more than it’ll actually help, contrary to popular belief.

Finally, there’s the nutritional value of locally grown produce. There’s a large

misconception that, because the consumer knows exactly where it’s being grown and cultivated,

it must be better for the human body than stuff that is bought in store. On the contrary, locavores

are getting close to nothing concerning extra nutrition from local produce. The fact of the matter

is, “food begins to lose nutrition as soon as it is harvested” (Source B) resulting “close to a

maximum [loss] of nutrition” (Source B) by the time it even arrives in the hands of a customer.

Neither store bought food or locally grown food have any added nutrient values, so the argument

that locally grown food has some kind of added nourishment is null.

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