You may be wondering what exactly a locavore is. A locavore essentially is a person who strives to eat locally grown foods. A true locavore will eat a full diet of foods grown, raised, or produced as close to home as possible. Many people say that true locavores should eat a diet of foods that are found within a 100-mile radius of their homes.
Now you may be thinking that this is an environmental movement. You would be correct, as the concept and the terminology did grow from a growing group of environmentally conscious consumers who are concerned about how far away their foods are from. They were seeing that the foods they were eating were grown, raised, and produced not in the farm down the road but rather from Mexico, Chile, Brazil, or some other faraway locale. Eating a locavore diet will certainly help the environment by reducing the waste associated with shipping foods long distances. Many locally grown foods are deemed organic, but a locavore diet doesn’t generally specify that the local foods must be organic.
Eating a locavore diet also, however, also helps the local economy, and many people are trying to eat a more locavore diet for this reason, too. When you eat a locavore diet, you essentially keep your money inside your local community. You aren’t sending money to an international location when you buy a bag of tomatoes but rather to the farm just a few miles away.
Now as you can imagine not every food you regularly eat is grown close to home. Some people will strive to buy local with the foods that they can. This may involve heading down to the local farmers’ market and picking up fresh milk, eggs, meats, fruits, and veggies that are grown by local farmers. Typically a farmers’ market will also have some homemade treats like baked goods, and even soaps, facial care products, and more, too. Many grocery stores have now adopted signage to indicate which products are produced locally, too.
Yet you cannot buy everything you normally eat and drink from a farmer’s market or from local vendors. Some people will attempt to buy everything they can from locals within a 100 mile radius of their homes and then buy the rest of the items from whichever sources offer them. Others are more conscientious about following this plan fully. They may grow their own garden to get the foods they want, and often they will forsake some items that they have been consuming as well if they just aren’t available locally.
It may be a struggle for you to transition to a locavore diet at first, but rest assured that it will get easier for you as you learn more about your local economy and what is available locally.
