A dissenting view. Crux of the argument:

“In the United States, a 2007 analysis found that transporting food from producers to retailers accounted for only 4 percent of greenhouse emissions related to food. According to a 2000 study, agriculture was responsible for 7.7 percent of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. In that study, food transport accounted for 14 percent of the greenhouse gas emissions associated with agriculture, which means that food transport is responsible for about 1 percent of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions.”

Urban Farming, a nonprofit group that plants crops for the needy on rooftops and other unused spaces in cities, has launched a vertical agriculture project at four locations in and around downtown L.A. The four new urban farms employ the green wall system developed by Green Living Technologies, a series of modular, 2 foot by 2 foot by 4 inch, stainless steel panels divided into growing cells that are mounted to a building facade. The four L.A. edible walls are between 24 and 30 feet across and 6 feet high and have been planted with bell peppers, hot peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers, tomatillos, strawberries, spinach, leeks, and a variety of herbs. Members of the community will maintain the gardens and harvest the food.

No, we’re not talking about picking dandelion leaves from a tree pit that Fido probably peed on, but rather plucking peaches, apples, and other fruit from city trees — fruit that otherwise would be scraped off the sidewalk and shipped to a landfill or at best composted. As reported in Gristmill, a handful of cities are getting organized about harvesting urban fruit and nuts, using interactive mapping tools posted online so anyone can find the nearest pomegranate or avocado ripe for the taking. 

On Saturday mornings beginning August 2, the Portland Fruit Tree Project will be holding Harvest Parties, where city dwellers get together to collect orphan fruits and donate a percentage to local food banks. Last year, the group gathered 3400 pounds of fruit that otherwise would have gone to waste. 

A reader asks:

“How does the carbon footprint of homegrown fruits and vegetables compare with that of imported produce?”

In the past few years the carbon footprint of food has become one of the hottest issues in the western world. A number of luminaries have weighed in on the subject in the U.S. alone, from best-selling novelist Barbara Kingsolver (in Animal, Vegetable, Miracle) to ethnobotanist Gary Nabhan (in Coming Home to Eat). All this discussion has generated its own jargon, including such terms as “food miles” (the distance any item of produce travels from farm to table) and “locavore” (a person who makes a point of eating food grown within 100 miles, give or take).

At first glance comparing, say, a tomato grown 30 feet from your back door with one cultivated half a continent away would seem to be a no-brainer. (more…)