At the premiere of human civilization all peoples were hunters and gathers. This means that they hunted their food or gathered it by finding it on bushes and trees. Once the food ran out they moved on to a new location. But then someone got the brilliant idea to plant and harvest their own food. Thusly they planted the seeds of the foods they were eating and the farmer was born. Some of the early foods that were consumed consisted of grain, barley and wheat. After that farming communities sprung up. Instead of aimlessly moving just to survive early man learned to flourish. They learned to settle communities and build towns and cities. Today there is a much different and more disturbing story.
There are over 313,000,000 people living in the United States in which less than 1% claim farming as a full time jobs. 45% of farmers claimed farming as their principal occupation and a similar number of farmers claimed some other principal occupation as of 2007. In all the number of farms in the U.S. stands at about 2.2 million. (http://www.epa.gov.) That is a significantly reduced number. Most of this is due to more people living in suburbs and cities rather than on the farm combined with the recent economic hard times the availability of locally grown produce has become scarce. In some areas even the availability of a grocery store is far and wide. This creates in urban areas a new problem called urban food deserts.
According to the USDA a food desert is identified by “low-income communities“, based on having: a) a poverty rate of 20 percent or greater, OR b) a median family income at or below 80 percent of the area median family income;In short this is an area without access to fresh local produce. In addition to that they go on to say the other identifying factors are “low-access communities“, based on the determination that at least 500 persons and/or at least 33% of the census tract’s population live more than one mile from a supermarket or large grocery store (10 miles, in the case of non-metropolitan census tracts).-http://apps.ams.usda.gov/fooddeserts/foodDeserts.aspx.
The solution is not really more supermarkets. It might be something more demanding and bold. The true solution lies in the philosophy of teaching a man to fish rather than giving him a fish. If you live in the suburbs or inner city you can start producing urban food. Most likely you don't have the land area to start a real farm and raise livestock. But can you use what you have? Do you own a backyard? You can plant a garden. You can empower yourself to have fresh produce. If you live in a apartment complex check and see if they have a place to have a community garden. Maybe you could take the initiative to start a community garden in your complex? Check with your landlord and work something out. Get your neighbors in on it and it will be fun! Urban gardening could be the wave of the future?! Think how much better meals will be with your own urban food! You set down at the table and eat some green beans and corn on the cob from your own back yard. Support a local farmer and buy some fresh farm products. Maybe they’ve got milk, honey, produce, fruit or some other item? If you have a large enough freezer buy a side of beef, pork or some chickens. Yet another great resource is Communitygardens.org.
The long and short of it is that their is not enough fresh food available for all and especially for those in food deserts. The solution is urban food. The solution is an empowerment mindset that you yourself can create a positive change. Urban food can the answer that is very sorely needed.
For more information on this subject please see my article on my site: http://secondthoughtfarming.com/ and my Hub Pages: http://seanfliehman.hubpages.com.
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