Slow Food is Sustainable Food: The Importance of Renewing America's Food Traditions

While it may not be as cutting edge or as innovative as building a high tech farm in a supermarket, getting back to the roots of food culture and tradition in America is just as important to build a sustainable food system. Why? Well there are lots of reasons, not the least of which include environmental sustainability, as well as the preservation of culture and really good food.

Clearly the most important and foundational to preserve and encourage the legacy of our food traditions is simply to maintain (or try to restore) biodiversity. Biodiversity is at the crux of environmental sustainability, and is also very integral to sustainable food. Ironically, although we have more choices than ever in our supermarkets, we've lost a lot of the variety that used to be growing naturally in our own backyards. There are numerous plant and animal varieties that were once eaten all the time that have gone out of favor, have been forgotten, or are now extinct. A big reason for the disappearance of specific and unique plant varieties has to do with the trend towards monculture and the disappearance of sustainable agriculture and small family farms.

It wasn't until after the fact, until after we had lost so much valuable local knowledge and after so many varieties and species had gone by the wayside that we began to realize the impact of weakening out nations biodiversity. Plant and animal biodiversity helps to sustain  healthy ecological systems, which, if in balance, would naturally help to control unwanted pests and weeds. But more tangibly, we've lost  an awful lot of good food because of this lose of biodiversity, and we've lost a real sense of place.

 The local food movement may be just the ticket to save food traditions and plant varieties that are on the brink of becoming a museum piece. As people shift their focus back to their specific region and place, they rediscover the foods that grow speicifcally and sometimes exclusively in that particular area, foods that their predecessors knew well. Recovering food sources goes hand in hand with recovering food traditions: old methods of growing foods, recipes, folklore, festivals, and other ways to honor local, whole food and culture.

The local food movement has kicked up all sorts of energy around heirloom and heritage foods. The Slow Food movement has been particularly influential in putting nearly forgotten foods back on the map. Find out what the traditional foods used to be wherever you live. Grow foods in your garden that are specific to where you are. Celebrate and buy local food that is grown in sync with the local environment and protects local biodiversity. All of these actions can help contribute to a more sustainable food system in our country, one that honors our past and places, and moves away from industrial agriculture.