JMS Kaplan Journal by Josh Babin
April 17, 2008

Parents often tell their children not to put something in their mouths if they don’t know where it’s been. If San Diegans followed this advice, it would be hard to find anything to eat.

Consuming locally-grown food is one way to ease the impact of global warming because the food doesn’t have to be transported as far, thereby cutting down on fuel consumption.  But finding food grown in San Diego can be a difficult task.

“What you choose to eat has a huge environmental impact,” Lions said. “Eating is an environmental act.”

The Environmental Protection Agency spotlights the growing of the food as a contributor to global warming because of the fossil fuels that are burned by tractors and other industrial machinery used during the farming process.

The transportation of food has been sited as another contributor. A longer distance of travel will mean more fossil fuels are burned. Most food travels 1,500 miles on average to get to people’s homes, according to the environmental watchdog research group, Worldwatch Institute .

Even food that’s labeled as grown in San Diego County may have traveled out of the county before landing on local market shelves. Lions said some food grown in San Diego is first shipped to Riverside County to large wholesalers for packaging. Some of this food is then shipped back to San Diego.

While San Diego County used to have packaging companies, most are now nonexistent, Lions said, adding that it’s more cost efficient for farmers to use centralized distributors.

Shopping for Local Food

Since supermarkets bring food in from all over the country, shopping at a farmer’s market may seem like one way to help the environment. But even finding local ingredients there can be a challenge.  While some food is assembled in San Diego, the ingredients have to be brought in from another county. This is especially true with bread, according to Richard Harben of Peggy’s Pasta, a San Diego bread company.

At the Ocean Beach Farmer’s Market, Harben said there’s not enough semolina flour produced in San Diego, among other ingredients, to create the bread using all local products.

And Harben isn’t the only vendor selling food from outside the county.

The Numbers

Farming is the fifth largest industry in San Diego County, valued at more than $1.46 billion in 2006, according to the San Diego County Department of Agriculture, Weights and Measures’ crop report .

The county has 317 registered organic growers, more than any other county in the nation, according to the agriculture department.

The local grower distinction is given to 158 farmers in San Diego County, who are allowed to sell their food at any of the 26 farmer’s markets in the county.

But most of that food is not sold in the county.

“The majority of organic produce grown locally is sold to wholesalers who in turn sell it to markets all the way from San Francisco to New York City,” according to the county’s Web site . 

The county’s crop report shows that in 2006, more than 8,000 agricultural shipments were sold to 67 different countries around the world and 9,405 shipments of agricultural commodities were sold to 21 different states.

Even when food is labeled local, it doesn’t mean it is grown in the county.

Local Food From Far Away

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has no geographic requirements for a food to be labeled as “local.” While Lions defines “local” as a 100-mile radius around the consumer, others might consider local to mean it was grown in the same state.

This open definition has made it easier for supermarkets and vendors at farmer’s markets to brand their food as local, even when it comes from hundreds of miles away.

“Marketers have their finger to the wind. When they hear that people want local food they market it that way,” Lions said.

He is frustrated with major supermarkets that advertise their food as local, when it is really coming from the Central Valley. He said that not all food in California should be considered local because the food still travels a considerable distance to get to San Diego.

According to Cindy Davis, a spokesperson for the county’s Department of Weights and Measures, one purpose of the farmer’s market is for consumers to meet the growers.

Yet while many vendors are from San Diego, a statewide program allows growers to be registered “local” in a different county and then sell their food in San Diego farmer’s markets. So San Diego consumers are not necessarily meeting San Diego farmers.

“There are markets that have more local stuff than others,” Lions said.

And the vendors are not always the ones growing the food. Larger producers can afford to send employees to sell their product rather than going themselves according to, Stephanie Caughlin, a local farmer in San Diego.

Caughlin, who used to sell her food at farmer’s markets, said larger producers had an unfair advantage.  She said she didn’t have time to go to the many farmer’s markets in San Diego and spend the time needed to grow her food, which is why she decided to stop selling her food at those venues. Instead, she now ships directly to her clients – all of them local.

Tilling for Tomorrow

Caughlin’s farm, Seabreeze, sits on less than two acres on the top of a ridge in Sorrento Valley. But from the small amount of land, which also includes her long driveway, she is able to grow hundreds of varieties of plants - including carrots, cabbages and salad greens. She even raises chickens to lay eggs, which she also sells.

Every week, Caughlin ships her products directly to 125 clients in the San Diego area.

She said the largest benefit of this business model is security.

“When I put something in the ground I know it’s going to be bought,” she said.

Selling food at the farmer’s market was time-consuming, required hauling and loading things to and from the market and there wasn’t a guarantee her items would be sold.

Helping local farmers succeed by selling their harvest nearby is one of the goals of San Diego Roots. Lions said if the farmers are able to establish a reliable clientele in advance, they won’t lose money up front on business costs.

He said the arrangement also benefits consumers because they’re getting “gourmet quality food.”

Other San Diego farmers are turning to Community Supported Agriculture, also known as CSAs, to sell their food, where consumers can buy directly from the grower.

Both Lions and Caughlin said the demand for local food is present, but the difficulty is finding a way to get it out there.

“We live in one of the best climates for growing food,” Lions said, but he added, the distribution system will have to be reworked. Ultimately, he said, consumers may not have any other choice but to eat locally if they want to save the environment from global warming.

“I think that’s what’s going to happen,” he said. “Food that’s grown here is going to be eaten here. It’s the only way the population is going to survive.”