State and Local Governments Promote Sustainable Food

by Katherine Gustafson · 2010-03-29 10:33:00 UTC
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The City Council of Alexandria, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, D.C., unanimously passed the "Healthy Food Alexandria" resolution last week, making the town the first in a major metropolitan area (and the second town in the country) to pass a "Green Foods Resolution."

The resolution affirms the city's support for the creation of community gardens, the expansion of access to farmers markets and other methods of increasing access to locally grown foods to promote healthy eating.

Meanwhile, the Idaho Senate last week approved its own non-binding resolution to encourage the local food economy. The resolution, according to the Idaho Reporter, "urges Idahoans to get to know their local growers and to buy and eat more food that is grown in or near Idaho."

The resolution in Alexandria was sparked by a campaign led by the nonprofit Farm Sanctuary, which defines these Green Foods Resolutions as being "designed to counteract the health threats and massive environmental damage caused by animal agriculture by calling on citizens to eat lower on the food chain," according to a press release.

For the lawmakers in Idaho, it is more about bolstering the local economy than counteracting environmental damage, but both of these reasons are good ones to support such efforts. Idaho State Senator Nicole LeFavour said that 90 percent of the $4 billion a year that Idaho residents spend on food goes to buy food from outside the state. "The power of food systems as an economic engine is a real one,” she told the Idaho Reporter.

Photo: John-Morgan via Flickr

Katherine Gustafson is a freelance writer and editor with a background in international nonprofit organizations.
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