The Locavore's Dilemma

Pineapple by giniger via Flickr.

Two economics professors in the Department of Agricultural Economics at Oklahoma State University have written an interesting piece about local food, titled The Locavore’s Dilemma: Why Pineapples Shouldn’t Be Grown in North Dakota. Jayson L. Lusk is Professor and Willard Sparks Endowed Chair of Agribusiness and F. Bailey Norwood is Associate Professor.

In short, the economists argue “there is a tradeoff between providing a larger quantity of more-nutritious non-local foods and a smaller quantity of more-nutritious local foods”, particularly when it comes to school lunches. Individual consumers are free to make whatever shopping choices they wish, but, according to the authors, mandates for public spending on local food aren’t economically sounds and don’t actually provide benefits that promoters of local food say it has.

This is the most comprehensive article on the subject that I have read. Every time I thought “but what about this” the next section covered it. I’m particularly glad they mentioned taste, which in my opinion is the most sound out of all the arguments for eating local.