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by Margaret Auld-Louie
In Part 1,
January, 2014,
we discussed how to achieve better health and get tastier foods by
buying direct from farmers. It is not as expensive as one thinks and we
believe the benefits far outweigh any increase in cost. We continue with
Part 2 of Margaret's article originally published last month.
Buying from farmers vs. stores
Buying direct from farmers is very rewarding
because you get the meet the person producing your food
and ask them
questions about how they are producing it. You may even get to go to the
farm and see where your food comes from. If you are used to buying food
from a supermarket, you have to adjust your expectations about certain
things. For instance, small farmers may want to get their food
containers back so they can reuse them. If they have to keep buying new
food containers, that adds to their cost. That may mean returning things
like jars and egg cartons to the farm, instead of tossing or recycling
them. Also, it can be very helpful to the farmer if you clean the
containers before returning them, instead of expecting the farmer to
scrub out the dried-on food.
Availability of food
Buying direct from farmers also
means adjusting your expectations about food availability. With
supermarkets sourcing from huge, multinational producers, and bringing
in food from around the world, almost all foods are available all the
time. When you buy from small, local farmers, foods are only available
when they are in season. This applies not only to fruits and vegetables
but to milk, meat and eggs. Chickens may not lay in the winter, or not
as much, unless supplemented by UV light. Raw milk and cheese may be
seasonal unless the farmer is able to rotate the breeding of their
stock. Large animals like lamb, beef, bison or pork are typically only
harvested once or twice a year. If you are buying meat in bulk, you will
need to find out when the farmer will have animals available and you may
be required to put down a deposit months in advance. This takes more
planning on your part than running to the supermarket, and you may have
to put out large amounts of money at one time, but the payoff is better
health for your family and a lower cost per pound for meat. And once you
have your freezer stocked up with meat, you will not need to buy any for
several months. Instead, you just go to your freezer to do your daily
“shopping” for meat for the next day’s meals.
When you buy from small, local farmers, you
need to realize that no matter how hard the farmers work,
sometimes you
will not be able to get the products you are counting on getting. So you
need to either do without or find another source. Do not jump to
conclusions, blame the farmers and get mad at them unless you have all
the facts. Most farmers are trying really hard to meet customers’ needs.
Problems happen in farming and farms go out of business. Crops or
animals can be impacted by droughts, storms, floods, etc. and delay or
reduce what the farmer can produce. Or the farmer may have personal
issues that interfere with tending the farm (caring for elderly parents
or getting sick, for example). Because they are a small farm with
limited resources, they may not have staff available to pick up the
slack when a personal issue arises, like a big corporation would.
Rather than getting upset because you cannot
get what you ordered when you expect it, it makes more
sense to be
understanding and supportive of the farmer. Farming has ups and downs.
The farmers are doing their best to produce the products you want, and
if you are supportive of them, they may reward you when they have a
surplus of products. So, it helps to change your mindset from the
“supermarket mentality” of “everything is available all the time”, to
the understanding that food is available seasonally, when the farmer is
able to produce it, and it requires the cooperation of Mother Nature.
And if the farmer is slow responding to your e-mail inquiries, please
realize that this is probably because they are busy tending the farm
rather than sitting in front of their computer. It can take a while for
the farmer to have time to sit down and compose a response to you.
To really understand the challenges farmers
face, and why, for example, pastured chickens cost many times more than
supermarket chicken, I highly recommend the books by
Joel Salatin, the
farmer featured in The Omnivore’s Dilemma as well as the movies Food,
Inc. and Fresh. His book
The Sheer Ecstasy of Being a Lunatic Farmer is
especially eye-opening. Visit his website here:
www.PolyFaceFarms.com/books-dvds/.
You can order his books from Amazon as well.
How to find local farmers
Obviously you can find
local farmers at the farmers’ markets in your area. But depending on
where you
live, you may not be able to find good sources of pastured
meat, eggs and dairy at these markets. There may be numerous farmers in
your area that sell direct to consumers but they do not go to farmers’
markets. So how do you find them? If there is a local chapter of the
Weston A. Price Foundation (WAPF) in your area, contact them. All
chapters are required to connect members with local sources of food that
meet the standards of the WAPF. Membership in local chapters is free.
Also, you can go to the website:
www.EatWild.com/ to find local
sources of grassfed meat, eggs and dairy. Another good web resource to
find small, local farmers is:
www.LocalHarvest.org/. There may
also be “Slow Food” chapters in your area, that can connect you with
local farmers. See: www.SlowFoodusa.org/. Some cities have food
coops where members band together to purchase from local farmers.
Choosing your farmer
Just because a farmer is small and local,
does not necessarily mean they are raising their plants or animals
the
way you want them raised. Small farmers may still use pesticides and
herbicides, they may feed
genetically modified (GMO) grains to their
animals, and they may still finish their cattle, bison or lamb on
grains, rather than 100% pasture-raising them, as nature intended. Also,
they may not be aware of the toxicity of soy or be unable to afford
soy-free feeds, and thus feed soy to their animals. For optimal health,
you should avoid eating meat or eggs from animals fed soy, even organic
soy, or any GMO grains. If you do not know why soy is bad for your
health, read The Whole Soy Story by Kaayla Daniel.
How farmers raise their products depends on
their budget and their level of knowledge. So, do not
assume anything.
Ask the farmers about how they raise their plants or animals, and do not
buy from them if you are not happy with the answers. You can learn more
about what questions to ask farmers and the optimal way to raise plants
and animals for health from the
Weston A. Price Foundation (WAPF). At
the annual WAPF conferences, there are seminars specifically for
farmers, teaching them how to farm in a way that produces the healthiest
possible food, while healing the environment and keeping the plants and
animals healthy.
Conclusion
Why go to all this trouble buying food direct
from farmers when you can just run to the supermarket or health food
store to get it? Food bought from small, local farmers is usually
healthier and tastier than food from stores. Your body will thank you
when you buy from farmers. The only improvement on this would be to grow
your own food, which you can do with a vegetable garden, but unless you
have your own farm, you need farmers to get grains, fruit, milk, meat,
eggs, etc. And it is fun to buy food from farmers! Start talking to the
farmers you buy from and you can learn some really interesting facts
about how they produce the food, and the challenges and rewards of
farming. Maybe it will inspire you to become a farmer yourself someday.
The most common complaint we hear is that all
the above is too expensive. So is medication for diabetes, high blood
pressure and high cholesterol and their subsequent side effects. One can
spend even more money on treating obesity, weight loss diets and
supplements that
never keep the weight off two years later. How much is adding 10-20
more years of life with your family worth to you? The choice is up to you.
We have made our choice.
If you want to know the "wholistic" food
principles we follow and the holistic research we used to
educate
ourselves, get a copy of our e-Book, Secrets of Longevity: Optimum
nutrition for people.
Margaret Auld-Louie was raised on
supermarket food in a suburban environment, so she had to make a total
mental shift when she started buying food direct from farmers. She is
the resource list editor for the
Denver chapter of the Weston A. Price
Foundation and enjoys meeting farmers and finding new sources of
healthy foods.
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