While the world endures one of its fiercest economic crises, eating locally seems to be the new trend. This trend claims exceptional contributions to society as a whole: we eat better products, we are healthier, and we support our local economies. Ostensibly, we end up with a strengthened community and a happier society. Unfortunately, this is quite far from the truth.

Firstly, eating locally lacks a real definition. Is it buying food from your county? Your state? (This would lead to mass starvation in Washington D.C.) Or from within, say, 100 miles? Technically, then, if I buy food from Ontario here in Michigan, I am still eating ‘locally,’ but I am not supporting the local economy. The very loose and convoluted definition of the term draws a fne line between benefits to the local consumers and propaganda from the local producers.

Considering health care is one of the primary sectors of expense in advanced economies, any simple idea to improve health without spending more money is always welcome. With regard to the specific health problems that Americans face – obesity, heart disease, diabetes – the way we cook our food impacts our health far more than the origin and quality of the food itself. Using reduced fat oil on your fries, for instance, will alleviate your cardiovascular problems – not buying sweet potatoes from Michigan instead of Yukon Gold’s from Idaho. Then again, maybe Idaho is considered local.

Secondly, eating locally seriously jeopardizes the diversity of products available to us. Michigan may have plenty of products to choose from, but, for example, we cannot grow oranges, bananas, chili peppers, chocolate or many other goods we eat on a daily basis. Forget your morning tea or coffee, the banana before jogging or the olive oil in your salad. By producing locally, we would have to eat differently depending on the seasons, or have certain vegetables and fruits canned to last the entire year.

Trying to produce exotic products locally would be disastrous, environmentally and economically speaking. To grow, say, oranges in Michigan, we would need greenhouses and a lot of fertilizer, traces of which we will find in the fruits and in the soil. Given that more than 80 percent of the greenhouse gases associated with food are emitted during the production phase, we would be choosing to pay the price of higher pollution and reduced efficiency in order to grow our goods at home.

The environmental and health benefits from eating locally may seem trivial but what then, about the economical benefits? Buying foods directly from the farmers could reduce the price we pay by eliminating global distribution from c o r p o r a t i o n s . The farmers could sell their small production- scale goods for a higher price to the consumer than what the big firms such as Wal-Mart would have bought them for, and consumers could still buy goods at a lower price than Wal-Mart would have sold them for; both would be happier.

However, this process excludes the distribution chain. When the distributor buys the farmers’ entire harvests – the unit price of the food is lower, – but because the farmers sell everything, they earn more money than in the retail market. Also, the time and resources spent by the farmers to package, transport, and sell their products presents a significant opportunity cost; farmers lose money conducting processes in which they do not specialize. Thus, the production cost of local foods would be higher, especially if we put more effort into producing exotic crops. Customers would be unable to afford the high cost of local food, and consequently, the government would have to subsidize domestic producers in order to sustain their competence amongst non-local ones. Unfortunately, that extra money spent subsidizing local agriculture could be taken from research, education, and innovation in other aspects of society.

Any rational economist knows protectionism is one of the worst avenues to pursue during a global downturn.

We are reluctant to buy from far away what we can naturally produce locally. We are ready to pay more for local goods because we feel they are important to our local culture. Ultimately, though, imported goods are higher quality, more competitive on the market, and much more diverse – not to mention that they are lower in cost. It would be a waste of precious resources to try to produce crops that would be less efficiently produced.

It is true that many Western growers are anxious about the future of their profession. The way to fight exploitation on the behalf of big corporations and distributors is to speak out on behalf of the exploited farmers, not to stop buying their goods altogether. The money we save by not buying local food, by not attempting to preserve our local culture at all costs, could actually be better invested to make it thrive.