Local Food Movement—changing our landscape

An afternoon tour of Clockshadow's rooftop garden in Milwaukee's 5thWard.

Last night, as I enjoyed my simple, yet delicious, Minestrone Soup of locally grown Yellow Eye Beans, red onions, Purple Stripe Garlic, and green cabbage from farm markets, as well as Beaver Dam Peppers, an array of heirloom tomatoes and herbs from my garden, I thought about how rooted the concept of eating locally has become in our culture.  The 5^th annual Eat Local Challenge kicks off soon and if I look back over just the last 5 years of good food advocacy, I find that we can see and taste the fruits of our labor.  

At home in Milwaukee, the landscape of our city has literally changed—with gardens and restaurants and markets and production facilities and festivals and food carts dedicated to local food cropping up all over the city. Nationally, the cultural landscape has shifted as well—the local food movement having reached the ears of corporate marketers who now place pictures of farms in ads and farmers in commercials and label anything they can “local” or “fresh.”   

Back in 2007, when Milwaukee’s first Eat Local Challenge began, many aspiring locavores were struggling with the question of whether eating locally all year long (much less for two weeks in September) was even possible.  Five years later, the question has been answered agreeably (yes, one can eat locally year round in Wisconsin, but especially during harvest time) and the setting in which we’re making choices has dramatically changed.  Not only can we find local food on the menus of dozens of restaurants and in our local groceries, it now seems standard fare to feature, if not to build one’s entire menu, around locally grown foods and to label local options at the co-op or grocery store.  Five years later we have farmer’s markets year round, giving eaters and producers more options.   Community gardens, backyard gardens, front yard gardens, rooftop gardens, school gardens have grown by the hundreds due to the efforts of so many individuals and organizations.   Grant funding for programs connecting local food and healthy residents is reshaping neighborhoods and helping create wellness in our communities.

The Eat Local Challenge continues to grow—in reach and depth.  This Saturday, August 25^th, at the Urban Ecology Center, the planners of the Eat Local Challenge & friends are once again bringing our community the Eat Local Resource Fair.  Local food vendors, workshops, and tips and tools from local organizations will be available for free to anyone interested in deepening their knowledge of our foodshed.  

While celebrate we should, we do have a long way to go—the one size fits all, industrial approach to feeding people still prevails globally our food system.  We need to continue working to become more diverse, making room for farms and food businesses of many sizes and shapes.  But.  There are real, measurable impacts to the food movement.  And the feel of our foodways has changed as well…with more terroir at our tables, there’s more poetry on our plates.