Introducing the 20-Mile Grocery Aisle

Day 2: Go on a Sustainable Shopping Spree

Check out all of the delicious food shopping alternatives just waiting to be discovered: small organic markets, local farmers' markets, and big supermarket chains with new organic food aisles. 'Google' a local artisan baker or track down a local cheese maker. Print out our list of great sustainable pantry staples and rediscover real food for real people. Use our Get Local Info Module to find your local farmers' market, CSAs and more.

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We've witnessed the rise of the natural and organic aisle in the supermarket, where you can buy everything from beer to beets with a wholesome feeling about the dollar you're spending on your health and the health of the environment.

But why not an aisle for local foods? As many have pointed out, if taste, health and the environment are on your mind going into a store, local food is often a better choice than organic. It's fresh (so more tasty), it hasn't traveled across the world to reach you (so it often is responsible for less carbon dioxide emissions) and it still has all the vitamins and antioxidants it was endowed with when it was picked.

Why not a "20-mile aisle," Noah Richler asks in today's Toronto Star. The perverse logic of grocery store supply chains, as he points out, often sees the fresh sweet corn grown locally shipped to regional distribution centers only to be trucked back to the neighborhood grocery store older, less flavorful and with a greater carbon footprint. It won't be easy to remake that system, but it would be a worthwhile effort.

Some traditional grocery stores, and many of their upstart cousins that cater to the burgeoning market for organic and natural foods, do try to source local foods, and even label them as such. But a local aisle would reinforce just what each season produces to customers whose jobs and lifestyles are often far divorced from the rhythms of the growing season. And it would make it easy for customers to see when their grocery stores are failing to stock whatever is abundant at the farm stand down the road – and let the store manager know it's time to make some calls.

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