Rapidly rising food prices, fuel prices, interest rates, inflation, talk of food shortages.
Friends, I’m sure I don’t need to tell you things are kind of a mess out there right now.
I don’t have the ability to see what’s ahead for sure, but here’s my opinion on what we’re likely to see coming when it comes to food.
First things first though, I’m not panicking, yet. If I feel like we need to panic, I’ll let you know!
But I do feel like our current food system is absolutely unstable and like we saw during COVID, is easily broken with any little interruption.
I think the price of food will continue to rise, especially as the price of fuel and fertilizer continues to increase.
I don’t think we will see widespread extreme food shortages where there’s no food at all, but I do believe we will see more supply chain interruptions with items out of stock more than we’re used to and for longer periods of time.
All the usual advice like stocking up on food if you’re able is useful, but I believe the absolute best ways to protect ourselves against food shortages in the long term is to build a strong local food system and learn to cook with real food.
Our local farmers are already raising all the basics we need from meats, eggs, fruits, vegetables, grains, dairy products. We may not have the wide variety of food we’re used to, and we’ll have to cook more from scratch, but the essentials are here.
When our food is being raised, processed, sold, and eaten all within our communities, we are much better protected against outside supply chain interruptions or extra costs for transportation.
When the initial COVID lockdowns caused empty grocery store shelves, most local farms saw a huge demand for their products. That is AMAZING and we were all thrilled to be serving our communities, but we quickly sold through months worth of inventory in weeks.
It’s important to remember that farms like ours can’t flip a switch and quickly have more beef steers, hogs or chickens ready to process, more acres of produce ready to eat, or more milk to bottle.
As demand for local products increases, more local food will be grown, but it realistically takes months or years for all the infrastructure and systems to catch up to a giant increase in local food demand.
If you’ve ever read my post on The Bigger Impacts of Buying Local, there are so many other businesses that need to grow right along with us as our farm and others start raising more food and selling it to our community.
That takes time, which means now is the time to start supporting local farms and businesses to give all of us a chance to grow and be ready to feed more people.
Please don’t wait until we’re in another empty grocery store shelves scenario. Small farms need your support now so we’re ready for whatever comes next.
Every time we shop from local farms we support a stronger and more abundant local food system. When we shop the grocery store, we tell the dangerously fragile global food system that’s how we want our food produced and sold.
I know it’s cliche, but we truly do vote for the type of food system and world we want every single time we shop for food.
I’ll be real that in times of emergency or shortages - farms like ours will prioritize making sure the families we’ve built relationships with have what they need before we open up sales to the public.
It’s not because I don’t want to feed our entire community, I would love to be able to do that, but we raise meat and eggs based on demand. I feel strongly that my first responsibility is to feed the families who have supported and believed in us in all times, not just when grocery store shelves are empty.
I obviously can't forsee the future, who knows what curveball could be thrown at us next, but whatever happens my solution is the same - food security comes from strong local food systems and communities.
Whether you live in a rural area and shop directly from farmer neighbors or you live in the city and have local foods shipped to your door, building relationships and supporting small farms makes our food more secure.
If you’re local to Southern, Ohio you can check here to see when we’ll be at the Chillicothe Farmers Market or be open at the farm.
We also ship meats across Ohio and most of the Midwest every Tuesday and will be adding farm store hours to the calendar soon!
If you’re not already part of our farm community, our email list is the best place to start to connect with your farmers and the source of your food! Watch your inbox for, recipes, first dibs on restocks, and to follow along with our farming journey.