We've come to rely so much on imported food. What would we do without it? But it hasn't been that way for long. Think back to Sunday dinner at grandma's house when you were a kid. The roast beef, mashed potatoes garnished with a dollop of butter, yellow beans and peas from a can and fresh-from-the garden asparagus were all from local sources. So were the apples for the pie grandma bought at the neighbourhood bakery.

From necessity, eating local has been the norm through most of our history. It was certainly that way when Dublin-born Anna Brownell Jameson trekked across Upper Canada in the 1830s, commenting on the quaint shenanigans and culinary practices of the colonials. Brownell Jameson described the pioneer cuisine in her book, Winter Studies and Summer Rambles in Canada:

Our table … is pretty well supplied. Beef is tolerable but lean; mutton, bad, scarce, and dearer than beef; pork excellent and delicate, being fattened principally upon Indian corn. The fish is of many various kinds and delicious. … Venison, game, and wild fowl are always to be had. … The wild goose is also excellent eating when well cooked.

In the 1950s, TV dinners and McDonald's restaurants sparked Canadians' love affair with fast, convenient food, much of which came frozen and shipped long distances. The food revolution really heated up when new Canadians enriched our national diet with their culinary mysteries and a boom in technological advances opened our kitchens to exotic imports.

But is the revolution coming full-circle? Driven by concerns about rising fuel prices, food safety and the desire to reduce our carbon footprint, the demand for freshness and the wish to support the regional economy, consumers are taking another look at the advantages of local food. "Eat local" and "the hundred-mile diet" might have started as fringe movements, but they are concepts that seem well on their way to becoming mainstream.

Cobourg resident Gail Rayment is one of those who believes it's important to eat things that are grown close to home. "I go out of my way to look for places that specialize in local food," she says. "I like the freshness and I don't want to have to buy something that's spent a lot of time on the road."

By all accounts eating local is on the upswing, Andy Rankine, Foodland Ontario manager, believes. The next step is to survey producers and retailers to determine by how much. Rankine says the number of consumers who say it's important to buy local food, and the number of restaurants that promote local food has grown dramatically in the past year. Nevertheless, he says the battle hasn't been won yet. "Successful brand building and consumer awareness campaigns take time and consistency," he says.

Ontario Agriculture Minister Leona Dombrowsky represents Prince Edward-Hastings in the Ontario legislature, a riding that relies heavily on food production and tourism. "You're going to hear a lot about the benefits of growing and buying local food," Dombrowsky says during a stopover in the Town of Hastings to announce a grant for a local food initiative. As government works with farmers to spread the word about the benefits of eating local, Dombrowsky believes a lot of farmers who might have contemplated leaving the business have gained a new sense of optimism.

Add to that the opportunities for establishing new links between food and tourism. Rebecca LeHeup-Bucknell, executive director of the Ontario Culinary Tourism Alliance, says 80 per cent of Ontario's tourists are from this province. Restaurants, bed and breakfast operations and farm markets can work with local farmers to open tourists' eyes to local and Ontario food.

But how reasonable is it to believe that the local food movement will grow to more than a niche market - from one based on tourism and shoppers who take a Sunday spin in the country, to one that takes hold in our supermarkets? How prepared are we to return to grandma's day? Can the dream of eating local ever become a reality again?

The good news is that while the number of Canadian farmers continues to decline, productive acreage remains stable and the amount of food produced grows, so the supply is strong. The bad news is that we can't do anything about the climate. Ontario is cold five or six months of the year, so farmers normally grow a single crop a season, compared to two or three in California and Florida. Even with a warmer climate, we won't be growing tropical food anytime soon so there is a limit to the variety we can produce. Do we really want to return to the days when our winter diet consisted of meat and root vegetables?

Geoff Heinricks thinks a lot about these matters. In 1995, Heinricks and his wife sold their Toronto home and bought a 40-acre farm in Prince Edward County where he runs his Keint-He Vineyards and Winery. He is convinced that once society accepts the inevitable and permanent rise in energy prices, the logical result will be the evolution of a new food system based on local production.

The seeds of potential crisis are around us: Despite the recession, fuel prices have been creeping up again. Food contamination scares are a common occurrence: tomatoes, lettuce, peanuts, beef and lunch meat contaminated by salmonella, bse (bovine spongiform encephalopathy), listeria and E. coli. What happens if another, more general food emergency shuts down the Ontario Food Terminal? What happens if it simply becomes too expensive to import the amount of food that currently comes from beyond our borders? Will we be ready?

Government and private agencies, as well as individuals, are acting already to help usher in the return to local food. As part of the Ontario government's awareness program, the Foodland Ontario agency is expanding its "Good things grow in Ontario" campaign. Shoppers are turning to farmers' markets, farm-gate sales and grocery store produce that originates closer to home. Producers are teaming up with restaurateurs and bed and breakfast operators and forming alliances to lure tourists with pledges of fresh, local ingredients. In our own region, the counties of Prince Edward, Northumberland and Hastings have all published consumer guides to let people know where they can buy local.

"People who come here really seem to care where their food's from," adds Behan. "They tell us they look for the source when they shop in grocery stores and the grocers are telling us the same thing. That pressure from shoppers is also opening up new stores to our products, stores that didn't used to be interested."

Jim Tunney, former Liberal senator and long-time Grafton-area farmer, believes safety is a key factor for those who seek local food. But he says Canada's farmers are at a disadvantage with offshore food suppliers because Canada does not require the same strict rules on the production of those imports that it requires of its own farmers.

"Our farmers want to produce safe food," Tunney says, "but they want full disclosure of what's in the imports. How did the farmer from China produce a perfect-looking carrot?"

At the University of Guelph, Professor Alfons Weersink specializes in agricultural economics. He says the eat-local and organics movements are both part of a growing segment of the food business.

It's a business driven by shoppers such as Rayment who are looking for the freshest food possible, which they believe tastes better than products flown halfway around the world. These people also want to support local producers and, if they have to, are willing to pay a bit more, Weersink says.

But are they the typical shopper? Weersink's colleague, University of Guelph landscape architect Karen Landman, studied the local food movement in her region and discovered that one of the biggest impediments to its growth is that a large percentage of shoppers will select cheap over quality every time.

If Heinricks' prediction is correct, though, and rising fuel prices start driving imported food prices upwards, local food, buffered from long-distance shipping fees, could start to look a lot more attractive to the bargain-hunters.

Landman's study also identified deficiencies in the distribution system: Our current system is stacked in favour of big foreign producers and against small independent farmers in our own counties. Large grocery chains need guaranteed and significant supplies of food, guarantees they receive from big industrial food producers in the United States and Latin America. Small local suppliers are often ill-equipped to offer those same guarantees.

Farmers might have to become more proactive and band together to market and distribute their produce. Warkworth restaurateur Paul Smith believes this is the biggest challenge the local food movement faces and wonders if the answer is the establishment of regional co-operatives or delivery systems. For example, farmers could pool their efforts to sell their produce in central locations, or hire distributors who would collect food from the farm gate and deliver it to grocers.

Tunney, for one, believes this is unlikely to happen. "Ontario's farmers are very independent. Co-operatives have not worked very well here," he points out.

Some farm operations have taken matters into their own hands and become distributors themselves. Knights Appleden Fruit Ltd. near Colborne not only produces its own apples, it buys them from other growers and ships them across the continent in its own fleet of refrigerated, air-ride vehicles. On a smaller scale, Burnham Family Farm Market at Cobourg buys others' produce to sell alongside the food grown on the Burnhams' own land.

Grafton resident Lorne Aronson, a senior equities trader for BMO Nesbitt Burns in Toronto, says he'd like to see more farm markets spring up around the region. He shops at Burnham's and "on Saturdays it's jammed with people who are looking for freshness and food they believe is safe," says Aronson.

But the fact is that most of our food dollars are still spent at the large grocery chains. And while some chains encourage buying local food, local managers at others say they are locked in to contracts dictated by head office. The only way to make those companies change their practices is for shoppers to complain.

Loblaw director of public relations David Primorac says that retail giant has not detected a huge customer outcry for more local products, but adds that could be because the company is going in that direction anyway, as evidenced by Loblaw president Galen Weston's Grown Close to Home campaign.

Primorac adds that it's not feasible for Loblaw to purchase small quantities of local food to supply more than 1,000 stores. But "if consumers aren't seeing enough Ontario produce, go to that store manager and ask that question. Say 'I know you have access to it, why don't you have more?'"

Once local food gets into the stores, how can grocers promote it? Gail Rayment suggests: "It would be great if grocers could have a section of the store devoted to local produce."

What comes next for the local food movement? Untold riches await the man or woman who can predict that and cash in on it. But Heinricks has a few thoughts.

First, as fuel prices rise and add to the cost of food, consumers will get angry again, just as they did last July when the price of crude sailed to $140 U.S. a barrel. Once they discover high fuel prices are here to stay, more people will grow more of their own food, in backyard gardens and on rented farm plots, a trend that could add another revenue stream for farmers.

Farm markets and neighbourhood markets in larger cities will increase in popularity, opening up new opportunities for small family farms. There'll be a return to home-based canning and preserving of food. Perhaps some enterprising individuals will see some value in re-opening local canneries - and perhaps freezing operations - that shut their doors in the past couple of decades. Once the canneries are re-opened, shoppers will have renewed, convenient access to locally produced food beyond its season.

Whether the movement takes the big leap beyond those searching for organic food, locally produced food and fresher tasting food will depend on another factor, however: the price of imports. It's a question of economics. Will imports become so expensive that a local full-service food system flourishes once more? Keep an eye on that barrel of oil.

Snapshots
These can be used as marginalia, pullouts or sidebars.
The grocer
Carey Rogers is produce manager at David's No Frills in Cobourg and says buying local simply makes good sense. He says it helps that he has the support of head office. When Galen Weston Jr. took the controls at the Loblaw Companies and introduced the Grown Close to Home campaign, it was a green light for Rogers to go out and find local producers.

"It's not more work," he insists. "The farmers come right to our back door. And the customers respond. They say 'I love to see this local produce, thanks so much.'"

Rogers believes local food is fresher and in season is often a better deal than the imports. "When they (farmers) find out I can sell 400 flats of tomatoes, it eliminates their need to drive all over the countryside selling them and I get them for a better price. As for the strawberry guys, it's better to bring them here than have people come and pick their own."

While he also sells local corn, asparagus, potatoes and mini potatoes, apples, onions, carrots and mushrooms, Rogers says he can't find enough Romaine lettuce, celery, cauliflower and broccoli to meet demand. "If I could get more local produce, I'm sure I'd have the demand for it."

Not all grocery chains treat local farmers equally. An assistant manager at another chain in Belleville laments that all the buying decisions are made at head office. "I have no leeway to buy local," he says. "And what they buy is ruled by price."

The tourist
Rebecca LeHeup-Bucknell is executive director of the Ontario Culinary Tourism Alliance, an industry-led initiative to marry farm-fresh food with the tourist industry. Earlier this year she spoke to a gathering of Northumberland producers, restaurateurs, shop owners and grocers.

Prince Edward County's Taste the County marketing strategy has been a huge success, she told them. Tourism spending rose from $25 million in 1999 to a current $100 million. Spending in the fall season was up by 300 per cent in the period from '99 to 2005.

The alliance envisions a series of regional identities around Ontario, based on its food and wine. The five original regions were Niagara, Toronto, Muskoka, Prince Edward County and Ottawa. Now the opportunity exists for places like Hastings and Northumberland, if the food and tourism industries are "market-ready."

But are they? For instance, participants must be prepared to advertise and guarantee consistent hours of business. It might seem like a no-brainer, but there's no better way to turn customers off than to advertise your hours of operation and then decide to knock off early because you had a slow day.

LeHeup-Bucknell's advice to the participants in the workshop is to begin by creating an inventory of market-ready "experiences." The culinary and tourism industry needs to buy local food and then promote it.

The caterer
Lolly Prinzen buys local food as often as she can because she says it helps boost the economy and the customers of her Port Hope catering business appreciate the better flavour of fresh food. She acknowledges this requires a great deal of running around, from supplier to supplier. And, she adds, margins are sometimes tight as she weighs freshness against a reasonable price her clients will be willing to pay. As a small buyer, she says, sometimes it's difficult to negotiate the best possible price. But through a lot of experience and hard work, she gets to know her suppliers and "when they know you're promoting their local food, they reciprocate with fair prices."

The restaurateur
Jeff Bray and John Devlin, co-owners of The Northside in Cobourg, have teamed up with area food and drink producers and revised their menu to emphasize local content. "We're both from the area and we want the restaurant to represent who we are," says Bray. He says while customers weren't demanding more local ingredients, now that they're being provided, the feedback is very positive. "You can go to your farmer and pick up live trout and serve them for dinner that night," he says. "It's a great marketing tool, working with people from the county and creating new partnerships." Besides rainbow trout, The Northside menu features locally grown lamb, bison, draft beer and wine, says Bray.

The chef
In Picton, Merrill Inn chef Mike Sullivan is widely praised by Prince Edward farmers for his commitment to locally grown food. But he's not driven by ideology, only pragmatism. "If you're not buying from your neighbour, where's the money going?" he asks. As well, customers are increasingly interested in the "provenance" of their food, Sullivan says.

Sullivan often picks up food from farmers on his way into work and the garden he maintains out back grows larger every year. Still, he's frustrated by his inability to obtain even more and welcomes visits by farmers with new and different products. There's plenty of room for the eat-local movement to expand, Sullivan believes.

The government
Good things grow in Ontario. Through the Foodland Ontario and Ontario Market Investment Fund programs, the government is trying to get that message across to consumers.

Andy Rankine is manager of Foodland Ontario and says the agency's campaign is three-pronged: building consumer awareness of Ontario farm products, branding the Foodland Ontario concept and encouraging the use of more local food in fine dining and culinary tourism through the Savour Ontario program. He believes that not only are consumers responding, but that grocery retailers are, too. Grocery chains have introduced grown-local campaigns, he says.

The author
Paul Roberts' book, The End of Food, looks at the worldwide food industry and says the industrialization of production, processing and distribution have led to a breakdown in the system, leading to more food-borne illnesses and lower nutritional value. The American author says drought, population increase, the growing affluence of formerly poor nations and now fuel price increases have all pushed prices up.

Roberts believes the trend toward local food is on the rise and that producers, distributors and food wholesalers and retailers are studying the feasibility of a grow-regional model. He believes globalized food has reached it peak and can only decline.

The greenhouse operator
Kristen Callow is director of the Ontario Greenhouse Vegetable Growers Association. She says Ontario has 1,750 acres in greenhouse production, mostly in southwestern Ontario and Niagara, which produce $1.2 billion a year in vegetables, mostly tomatoes, cucumbers and sweet peppers.

The greenhouse growers are the only group of producers in North America who voluntarily regulate the safety of their food, Callow says. The association's 250 members require licences, which can be pulled for safety infractions. Callow says concern for food safety is driving the demand for locally produced food.

That, says Annette Anderson, manager of greenhouse crops for the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture and Food, creates an opportunity for Ontario producers and greenhouse growers. She says the industry is looking at fuels and growing techniques that will enable the industry to expand.

The tomato man
Alf Casteels has 40,000 square feet under plastic and produces 300,000 pounds of tomatoes a year at his Centreton farm. By cutting out the middle-man and trucking around his tomatoes in his own truck, Casteels has been able to keep costs down as he sells to grocers and farm markets in Peterborough, Belleville, Port Hope, Cobourg, Trenton, Belleville and Prince Edward County.

Casteels starts a new season of seed in December and by April his plants are producing hydroponic tomatoes. His season continues through into December. If he wanted his business to grow much he'd have to hire help, he says, and as he nears 60 years of age he's not inclined to be interested.

Staying small has its difficulties, though. Casteels recognizes that big grocery chains must count on having a steady supply and that sometimes he runs out. "If I don't have enough product, sometimes I have to cancel my orders," he says.

The farmers' market
Gail Rayment thinks the farm shops that are so popular in her native Britain offer a great opportunity to expand the local food industry in this country. "A visit to one of these becomes an outing for the family," says the Cobourg resident. Often located in a converted stable at the end of a farm laneway, farm shops offer everything from meat, baked goods, preserves and vegetables to seasonal fruit.

She and her husband, Tony, are big fans of the farmers' markets and farm stands that are dotted around Ontario and when they take off for a Sunday drive they also take along a cooler so they can collect fresh goods along the way. But the traditional Ontario farm stand is no substitute for the better stocked farm shops so popular in Britain, she says.

The agriculture and food ministry agrees. There's plenty of room for growth in local food through the farmers' market system, says Clarence Haverson, a ministry spokesman. Haverson says just 75 of Ontario's 138 markets operate year-round. The rest normally are open from June to Thanksgiving. If they expanded the selection of goods they sold, they could stay open longer and contribute substantially to sales of grown-in-Ontario food.

Consumers aren't satisfied with farm stands that open to sell strawberries and cherries during their short seasons, says Haverson. They want to go to places that sell dairy items such as artisan cheeses, fibre products and organic meats.

Paul Burnham owns and operates Burnham's Market at Cobourg's west end. He grows his own berries, sweet corn, beans, peas, apples and pumpkins, plus a few tomatoes and melons, and buys other items from local producers. Burnham believes there is a greater awareness among customers of the benefits of local food. "It's snowballing," he says.

He also sells at the Cobourg farmers' market which is open from May until the end of December. With more people moving to Cobourg's waterfront condo community, he says, the future for the town's farmers' market looks bright.

The educator
After a 10-year run, Northumberland County's Rural Ramble has come to an end. "Attendance was in decline," explains Marion McComb. "And with the price of gas last year, a lot of people weren't interesting in driving around from farm to farm."

Organizers were having trouble getting farmers to open their properties to visitors, adds McComb. Health and safety regulations and virus scares were chief among their concerns. Maybe the concept has run its course as a teaching tool, McComb says. But it's not the only way to bring urban dwellers up close and personal with food production.

For instance, she's involved with the Field to Food program that targets Grade 3 schoolchildren and introduces them to food-producing activities such as how cows are milked. Then there's the Warkworth Long Lunch, which is one of the activities the Rural Ramble found itself competing with last year. It's a different concept entirely, but it's another way to make people from across the region give some thought to life in rural areas and the value of eating food produced close to home.

These I envisioned as factboxes
Farming in Canada

• 57,211: Number of farms in Canada, 2006
• 3,591: Number of those farms with organic production
• 16.5: Percentage that are certified organic
• 4.1: Percentage in transition to becoming certified
• $10.3 billion: Ontario's total farm receipts, 2005

Farming in our region

• 27.8 million: Pounds of apples grown in Northumberland County, 2007
• 301,187: Acres of Hastings County devoted to farming, 2006
• $150,000: Value of tomatoes grown in Prince Edward County, 2007
• $1.87 billion: Capital value of all farms in Northumberland, Prince Edward and Hastings, 2006

Local production at a glance

• Local apples are available every month of the year but July
• Local greenhouse tomatoes can be bought every month except January and February, and cabbage every month but May
• Local cooking onions, lettuce and rutabagas are available year-round
• You can buy local maple syrup, honey, bison, elk, emu, ostrich, trout, artichokes, apple cider - and, of course, wine

Further reading

• In The Long Emergency, futurist thinker James Kunstler says rising fuel costs require the creation of sustainable, community-scale food systems. See: www.kunstler.com/
• Geoff Heinrichs explains why he moved to the country in his This Magazine article, Back to the Land. See: www.thismagazine.ca/issues/2007/05/backtotheland.php

First published Watershed Magazine, Summer 2009