You should probably plant a garden

Food…
 
You are probably thinking about it more than ever these days.  With the pandemic sweeping across the globe we have all seen the impact it has had on the food system.  From restaurants shutting down to empty grocery store shelves this pandemic has shaken the food system to its core.  We have been given a glimpse into the inner workings of a system that usually delivers what we want when we want it without any hiccups.
 
But just because it appears to be this indestructible behemoth of a system that is simply not true.  The food system as we understand it is built of two separate supply chains.  One chain that feeds into the grocery store system which caters to the home cooking crowd and one chain that feeds into the commercial food space.  Commercial food for the purpose of this article includes restaurants, schools, prisons, event centers, and other large venues where lots of food is made.
 
What the pandemic has done is thrown a wrench into the finely tuned food production and delivery system that is modern food.  We have what is called a just in time delivery system.  In most stores across the country there is roughly a three day supply of food on hand in the stores.  This three day supply is based on the average food purchases that occur at that store.
 
I will give you one guess about what happens when say a novel disease makes its world debut and people start to freak out.
 
Suddenly that average consumption rate is useless, and stuff begins to fly off the shelves faster than it can be replenished.  The emptiness then triggers more panic buying because omg there might not be enough food.  Well that is both right and wrong.  We are not going to run out of food in the short term there is plenty to go around.  The immediate problem is that it isn’t going around as fast or as efficiently as before.  That combined with the surge in demand has led to the current crunch in food supplies in some locations.  The potential problem that worries me is the impact that this will have on future food supplies.  Right now, we are living off the good times of years past but sooner than we think we will need to replenish that supply.
 
In the normal course of things, spring is the time of year when crops are being planted, livestock is being born and we are laying the groundwork for next year's food.  But this pandemic is wreaking havoc on certain parts that system, most notably the vegetable and fruit farms/orchards.  These farming systems are still heavily reliant on manual human labor to plant and harvest the food.  You can’t pick an apple or harvest lettuce with a machine.  This pool of human labor is jeopardy because in many parts of the world these farmworkers are among the most vulnerable to getting this illness.  They live and work in close conditions, in many cases have poor sanitation and they must travel to follow the various harvest seasons.  You combine this with border closures that stop these workers from even getting to their worksites and you have a long term problem in the making.     
 
This problem is simple without the workers ever arriving, things do not get planted.  If they do get planted but enough workers get too sick to work or even die, then the produce won’t be harvested in time or at all.  This means the real impact on the food system is potentially sometime in the future when there really will be a food shortage of at least certain types of food.
 
So what does this mean for the everyday person like you….
 
Well it means you should seriously consider trying to grow some food of your own.  Every little bit helps and whatever you can do to stabilize your own food supply puts less strain on a system that will continue to be under a lot of strain for a while yet. 
 
Stay tuned for a series of posts going over several options for how to maximize your available growing space and what to grow in those spaces that will give you the most bang for your dollar.

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