Thanks (again) Elan.
I was glad--as in very glad--to see that last paragraph too. Really gets down to brass tacks. Pretty much screwed is exactly it! By education it probably meant that alot of the new/old food information, espcially the benefits of plant based eating, tend now to be "esoteric" in a junk food society where ads for crap are everywhere but good nutrition books and mags tend to be expensive ro otherwise out of reach especially to those like so many of our agency's clientas who barely get enough $$ and stamps even to buy cheap food and unfortunately many of whom can not read very well or even at all, or can't readily get to libraries, especially campus ones. Coop Externsion workshops, for example, are invaluable and I will try harder myself to get the info out to those who ned it. Jeanne -----Original Message----- From: Margaret McCasland <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Sustainable Tompkins County listserv <[email protected]> Sent: Sat, 2 Feb 2008 7:42 pm Subject: Re: [SustainableTompkins] Food justice article & question I was glad to see the last paragraph. While I'm ot sure what the authors mean by "education," a ot of traditional knowledge resulted in a much ealthier diet than today. >So, how can low- and middle-income families achieve a healthful diet? “It takes three things, explained Drewnowsky. “Education, money, and time. If you have all three, you’re home free. If you have two out of three, you can manage. But if you only have one out of the three, or zero out of the three, you are pretty much screwed. And a lot of low-income people ave zero out of three Simply cooking from scratch saves money, improves utrition, and cuts down on packaging and ransport. But there are generations of people ho no longer know how to cook, and it does take ime. Growing up in a rural area without much money, we te fruits and veggies year round. But we ate resh only "in season." And it took a lot of ime on the part of women who worked at home, putting food by." A lot of it comes back to an economy where chools can no longer afford to teach basic life kills to middle schoolers (No Child left Behind idn't help either), and where parents need to ork such long hours no one has much time for ooking from scratch, even if they do know how. Now I have to go cook some local turnips . . . >Here's a sobering article about how we sustain or don't sustain all members of our communities. Question: How can we ensure that relocalization/sustainability strategies (policies, economics practices, agriculture, lifestyle, etc.) address this issue? Healthy Diets Out of Reach for Many Eating a healthy diet is getting so expensive that many American families cannot afford it. Not only are fruits and vegetables costly, but food price inflation is reducing the ability of low- and middle-income households to get the nutrients they need. Recent research confirms these findings. A University of Washington study, conducted over a two-year period in the Seattle area, found that good, healthy foods increased in price by almost 20 percent, four times the rate of overall food inflation. Meanwhile, less healthy, high calorie foods held steady in price or actually dropped. “We were shocked, said Adam Drewnowsky, director of the University’s Center for Public Health Nutrition and co-author of the study, The Rising Cost of Low-Energy-Density Foods, published in the December 2007 issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association. “The nutrient-rich calories, the food we should be eating are zooming out of sight, he stated. “So eating well is becoming unaffordable for many, even in the middle class. As healthy foods get more expansive, unhealthy foods stay cheap. “When it comes to empty calories, it’s very difficult to compete with sugar, noted Drewnowsky. In Brazil, for example, sugar made locally from sugar cane “is produced at the cost of 30,000 calories for one dollar. Nothing else comes close. The academic findings were recently confirmed by a federal study. Are Lower Income Households Willing and Able to Budget for Fruits and Vegetables? is the title of a January 2008 report issued by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). It is not surprising that households with income near or under the poverty line spend less money on food than higher income households. But even when they experience a small increase in income, such households will allocate more money to only two of seven product categories – beef and frozen prepared foods. For low-income households to prioritize fruits and vegetables, a household’s income must increase more substantially. So, how can low- and middle-income families achieve a healthful diet? “It takes three things, explained Drewnowsky. “Education, money, and time. If you have all three, you’re home free. If you have two out of three, you can manage. But if you only have one out of the three, or zero out of the three, you are pretty much screwed. And a lot of low-income people have zero out of three For additional information, see the USDA report at: <http://www.ers.usda.gov/Publications/ERR54/> http://www.ers.usda.gov/Publications/ERR54/. The University of Washington study is on the web at: <http://www.mdconsult.com/das/article/body/86804079-2/jorg=journal&source=&sp=20186529&sid=0/N/619891/If07018007003.fig>http://www.mdconsult.com/das/article/body/86804079-2/jorg=journal&source=&sp=20186529&sid=0/N/619891/If07018007003.fig -- Elan Shapiro Sustainable Tompkins Community Partnership Coordinator Sustainable Living Associates, Principal Frog's Way B&B 211 Rachel Carson Way Ithaca, NY 14850 607-275-0249 607-592-8402 Cell "We must be the change we want to see in the world" Mohandas Gandhi _______________________________________________ RSS, archives, subscription & listserv information for: [email protected] http://lists.mutualaid.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainabletompkins free hosting by http://www.mutualaid.org _______________________________________________ SS, archives, subscription & listserv information for: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ttp://lists.mutualaid.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainabletompkins ree hosting by http://www.mutualaid.org ________________________________________________________________________ More new features than ever. 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