Shoppers Choose Local

Forget the aisles stocked with organics. If local foods are not available, 30 percent of consumers will purchase groceries elsewhere, reports a new study by global management consulting firm A.T. Kearney.

A new study finds that if if local foods are not available, 30% of consumers will purchase groceries elsewhere.

According to the study, named “Buying into the Local Food Movement,” 66 percent of consumers surveyed said they prefer local food to organic food because they believe it helps local economies. 60 percent said local delivers a broader and better assortment of products and 45 percent said local provides healthier alternatives than organics.

When asked if they believe organic and local food contribute positively to sustainability, 68 percent of respondents said that local food contributes positively, while only 50 percent said organic foods contribute. The study also found that across all income segments, 70 percent of consumers were willing to pay more for local food.

“Clearly, local food cannot be ignored as a growing segment for the grocery industry,” said James Rushing, A.T. Kearney partner and leader of the study.

A similar survey by Whole Foods Market released late last year reiterates this claim. Forty-seven percent of the 2,274 adults polled said that they would be willing to pay more for fruit, vegetables, meat and cheese produced near their homes – beating the 32 percent that said they would pay more for food without artificial ingredients, the 30 percent willing to pay more for meat made without antibiotics or hormones and the 20 percent willing to pay more for “handmade, small-batch, artisanal and specialty foods.”

“Ten or fifteen years ago, the organic label was more important to our customers,” A.C. Gallo, the president and COO of Whole Foods, told The Huffington Post. “But we started to feel, over the last five to seven years, that our customers were more interested in buying produce that’s local. If we went into a period of extremely high fuel prices, then it would be an advantage to source as much local as possible.”

Local can also mean safer food in comparison to imported organic foods from China. China’s increasingly serious pollution has heavily contaminated its irrigation water–leaving crops imported to the U.S. and elsewhere laced with heavy metals like mercury, industrial toxins, pharmaceuticals and raw sewage.

“I have seen farmers in Hebei use contaminated water, because there’s nothing else to use,” said Hu Kanping of the nonprofit Chinese Ecological Civilization Research and Promotion Association, based in Beijing. ”Farmers won’t eat what they produce. They have fields for themselves and fields for the market. This is a very serious problem, not just for farmers but also for everyone else. It’s not just about water safety; it’s about food safety as well.”

Holding our collective breath for change won’t help. The healthy food movement needs to speak more loudly and preferably in unison on these issues. Otherwise we’ll get more of the same: food and agriculture policy that is clueless about the real problems we face in the years ahead.

This article appears courtesy of E - The Environmental Magazine, where it was originally published. To subscribe visit: www.emagazine.com/subscribe. For a Free Trial Issue: www.emagazine.com/trial.