PROGRAMS :: Buy Fresh, Buy Local

Regional Campaigns
What is the Buy Fresh Buy Local campaign?
Why Buy Locally Grown?
Search the online Local Food Guide

CAFF, in partnership with the National Food Routes Network Buy Local Learning Community, has developed the Buy Fresh Buy Local campaign campaign as a pilot program to strengthen regional markets for family farms. It started on the Central Coast in October 2002. Look for the label n other CAFF regions as the campaign expands.

Regional Buy Local campaigns can address many of the problems faced by local family owned farms. CAFF is working with schools, farmers markets, retailers, CSAs and restaurants to encourage them to participate in the campaigns.

Buy Local campaigns

• increase visibility of local products in markets and the media.
• open new local markets for family farmers.
• educate consumers about the benefits of buying local.

Participants include schools, farmers markets, retailers, CSAs and restaurants.

How it works:

1. Farmers sign up to participate, which means they will be identified on the shelf at the market or are able to use the label and other materials on their own.
2. Retailers sign up to participate ­ labeling local farms products in their stores.
3. Community members sign up to participate ­ helping CAFF get the word out about local farms and farming.
4. CAFF spreads the word, connecting farmers with markets and folks with local food.

When you buy local food, you vote with your food dollar. This ensures that the family farms in your community will continue to thrive ad that future generations will have access to nourishing, flavorful, abundant local food.

Look for the label, taste the difference!

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Consumers worldwide are rediscovering the benefits of buying locally grown food. It is fresher, tastier, and more nutritious. It is also good for the local economy--buying directly from family farmers helps them stay in business.

Five reasons to Buy Local

1. Local produce tastes better and it’s better for you.
   A recent study showed that fresh produce loses nutrients quickly. In a weeklong (or more) delay from harvest to dinner table, sugars turn to starches, plant cells shrink, and produce loses its vitality. Even in California, produce may have traveled surprisingly far to get to your grocery store. Food grown in your own community was probably picked within the past day or two. It is crisp, sweet and loaded with flavor.


2. Local food supports local farm families.
   Fewer than one million Americans now claim farming as their primary occupation (less than 1%). Farming is a vanishing lifestyle. And no wonder: the farmer today gets less than 10 cents of the retail food dollar. Local farmers who sell directly to consumers cut out the many middlemen and get full retail price for their food - which means farm families can afford to stay on the farm, doing the work they love.


3. Local food protects genetic diversity.
   In the modern industrial agriculture system, produce varieties are chosen for their ability to ripen simultaneously and withstand harvesting equipment. Shippers demand produce with a tough skin that can survive packing, transport, and a long shelf life in the store. Only a handful of hybrid varieties of each fruit and vegetable meet those rigorous demands, so there is little genetic diversity in the plants grown. In contrast, local farmers that sell direct to you or direct to your local restaurants and grocery stores grow a huge number of varieties selected because they have the best flavors, provide a long harvest season, and come in an array of eyecatching colors. Many varieties are heirlooms, passed down from generation to generation because they taste good. These old varieties contain genetic material from hundreds or even thousands of years of human selection. They may someday provide the genes needed to adapt to a changing climate.


4. Local food preserves open space, and supports a clean environment.
   As the value of direct-marketed fruits and vegetables increases, selling farmland for development becomes less likely. A well-managed family farm is a place where the resources of fertile soil and clean water are valued. Good stewards of the land grow cover crops that prevent erosion and replace nutrients used by their crops. Cover crops also capture emissions and help combat global warming. In addition, the patchwork of fields, hedgerows, ponds and buildings is the perfect environment for many beloved species of wildlife. That landscape will survive only as long as farms are financially viable. When you buy locally grown food, you are doing something proactive about preserving the agricultural landscape.


5. Local food is about the future.
   By supporting local farmers today, you can help ensure that there will be farms in your community tomorrow, and that future generations will have access to nourishing, flavorful and abundant food.
   Look for the Central Coast Buy Fresh, Buy Local label and taste the difference!

Download the "five reasons to buy local" flyer (pdf: 188k)

Taste the difference, Buy Fresh Buy Local!

"Why is buying local important?" More at FoodRoutes.org

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