The purpose of the Institute for Food and Development Policy/ Food First is to eliminate the injustices that cause hunger. Food First shapes how people think about food issues by analyzing the root causes of global hunger, poverty, and ecological degradation and developing solutions in partnership with movements working for social change.
Watershed Media is promoting a new vision for a more environmentally beneficial and sustainable agriculture based on farms that gracefully meld within landscapes and pulse with a wide range of native species. Their vision combines implementation of landscape-level restoration efforts, natural systems farming research, and the community spirit of farmers markets and local watershed stakeholders groups.
WHY is a leading advocate for innovative, community-based solutions to hunger and poverty. WHY challenges society to confront these problems by advancing models that create self-reliance, economic justice, and equal access to nutritious and affordable food. WHY manages the Food Security Learning Center. From getting local food into school meals to promoting farmers’ markets in food insecure communities, the Learning Center offers blueprints and examples of models that work.
A plant-based diet is significantly less land and energy intensive than a diet with a high proportion of meat, seafood, and dairy. A recent study found that a low-fat vegetarian diet needs 0.18 hectares per person per year while a high-fat diet with lots of meat needs 0.85 hectares because animals need so much more room. And because meat production drives deforestation and requires high inputs of energy for processing and transportation, it also comes with a high carbon footprint price tag. Globally, it has been estimated that up to 18% of all greenhouse gas emissions are associated with animal product consumption.
Two important variables affecting your food footprint are food miles (or miles to market) and the amount of processing and packaging. If your food comes from far away – such as out of season produce imported from across the world – it requires lots of energy for transportation and refrigeration. If it is highly processed and comes in copious paper packaging, it puts a strain on forests. Buying fresh local foods from farmers markets and other locally owned sources or natural foods markets reduces these impacts.
Transitioning from global to local food systems is one of the most important challenges in the era of peak oil, climate change, and growing economic and political insecurity. Small scale food production at the local level relieves the enormous environmental impacts associated with industrial agriculture and is an essential source of nutrition for those in need. The Food Security Learning Center has found that community gardens – particularly those in underserved areas – address lack of access to fresh produce, making them a critical piece of a community's food security. One study estimates that home or community gardening can add $500 to $1200 worth of produce per year to a family's diet – a big difference for low-income families.
Ecological Footprint
