By Nancy Schneider, Consultant earthpeopleco.com
Two weeks ago we took our annual “big” vacation. As much as I live in an eco-friendly manner most of the time, vacation is where I splurge on the burning of fossil fuels to get to my destination. Although, I will say my Honda Fit gets a pretty good 33 to 37 mpg, making me feel a little less guilty.
So that is the background for this year’s vacation of driving the 10 hours to the upper part of Maine from Philadelphia. It was a little over 500 miles each way.
As we drove into Maine, we saw a sign that said Maine is the largest producer of blueberries in the country. August is prime blueberry picking and we were ready to pick, eat, have blue fingertips and smile blue smiles.
When we got to Portland, about an hour past the state line, we stopped at Whole Foods for some supplies, lunch and a potty break. Organic blueberries were for sale at $4.79 a pint. Not the best price of the season, but heck, we were in the blueberry capital, we had to purchase some.
By evening we arrived at our cabin located a little more than halfway up the state’s jagged coastline. Feeling tired, dirty, sleepy and anything but fresh, we showered and settled down to eat some blueberries. As I opened the plastic container, I was horrified to see that the blueberries were not from Maine, nor anywhere else in New England. They weren’t even from New Jersey! My blueberries drove all the way from California to the blueberry capital of the US! Talk about feeling blue!
If we felt worn out after a journey of just 500 miles, how do my blueberries feel after a journey of over three thousand three hundred and on average, seven to ten days behind the wheel?
Isn’t there an immigration office at the border of Maine turning away immigrant blueberries due to the abundance of local blue residents? This was starting to make me see red, as I learned that most fresh fruits and vegetables produced in the US are shipped from California, Florida, and Washington*. Which now explains why I couldn’t get any descent, inexpensive produce when I lived in Florida; it was all being shipped out of state.
Including synthetic fertilizers, it takes 20 calories of fossil fuel energy to produce two calories of food energy. One hundred years ago it took only one calorie of fuel energy to produce the same of amount of food energy. This doesn’t even include the fossil fuels used to manufacture the plastic container.
On average, food travels 1500 miles to reach your plate. This also contributes to food’s carbon footprint and with the rising price of oil and dwindling supplies; our current system is not sustainable.
Part of the answer is choosing to buy and eat locally grown non-processed foods; and in the winter months choose foods that were grown as close to home as possible or frozen locally grown foods.
Shop at farmer’s markets, where you know who grew it, even how and where. According to the USDA, there are over 3000 farmer’s markets. Buying from local growers keeps local dollars in your local economy. Your food will be fresher, taste better and be of better natural quality, picked at the height of freshness, not weeks before. (For more information see: http://www.foodroutes.org)
So as a wild act of patriotism to the state of Maine and to my taste buds, we went to a U-pick blueberry grower on the last day of vacation to pick our own wild blueberries.
As a child growing up in New Jersey, we went blueberry picking, so I was prepared. Those were the same big fat blue berries you buy in the store, growing on high bushes where we could pick at a wild pace; their wild equivalent, not so much. I was not prepared. Who knew wild blueberries grew about ankle high, or less? Wild blueberries are about the size of a pea. My one warning to my picking partner – whatever you do, don’t drop the box of berries! We hadn’t packed a magnifying glass.
We did manage to pick four pints. That was all my back allowed for. At $2.00 a pint, I was happy to pay the grower for the opportunity to breathe the clean Maine air, on top of a picture perfect mountain top, on a picture perfect day, picking pea sized wild blueberries. For some reason I kept singing to myself, “Wild, wild blueberries couldn’t drag me away.”
*USDA. 2002. Leading Producer States by Commodity Groups, 2001. Economic Research Service Web site. http://www.ers.usda.gov/data/FarmIncome/firkdmu.htm.
