Capacity and Competition
Currently, the 100-Mile Foodshed does not grow enough food to meet Greater Philadelphia’s consumer demand. Part 1: Agricultural Resources
conservatively estimated that the Philadelphia region has a deficit of 2,764,217 acres of farmland needed to meet food demand. Part 2: Food Distributionalso demonstrated that most food from the 100-Mile Foodshed is destined for the 100-Mile Foodshed, although not necessarily for Greater Philadelphia, and predicts that “inbound” movements from the nation and world will continue to grow faster than food movements within Greater Philadelphia. Comparing the
agricultural resources findings with expenditure data, there is a sizable difference between total sales of agricultural products in the 100-Mile Foodshed ($6,732,916,000) and total food expenditures in the Greater Philadelphia MSA ($16,438,100,000), suggesting, again, that Greater Philadelphia’s food demand exceeds the 100-Mile Foodshed’s
supply, and food is needed from around the country and world.
Finally, the food that is grown in the 100-Mile Foodshed is not necessarily going to Greater Philadelphia because of its relatively weak aggregate food dollars. Consumers in Greater Philadelphia spend the same percentage of their income (12%) on food as consumers in the metropolitan areas of New York, Boston,
Washington, DC, and Baltimore. However, metropolitan Philadelphia’s lower median household income equates to an average household food expenditure of $5,600, which is approximately $2,000 less than New York and Washington, DC, and $1,000 less than Boston and Baltimore. Aggregated, the Philadelphia MSA spent $16 billion on food in 2007, compared to $61 billion spent by New Yorkers. DC residents spent $16 billion, despite a smaller population. This means that Greater Philadelphia is a relatively less affluent market. For producers, proximity to these other
markets is an advantage because they can get a higher price for their product. For consumers, it means competition for regional products and the threat of higher prices. This also demonstrates that Greater Philadelphia’s ports, with their specialization in break bulk cargo and perishable foods, provide access to more affordable food for a lower-income metropolitan area.
Beyond consumers, some of the 100- Mile Foodshed’s top food employers also rely on imported inputs.
Manufactured and processed foods are the top type of commodity moving through Greater Philadelphia in terms of both weight and value,
demonstrating the economic
importance of the processing sector, as well as the prevalence of processed foods in the American diet.
Looking more closely at the
manufacturing data provided in Part
3: The Food Economy, Philadelphia
has a high location quotient (or more- than-average employment) in the
manufacturing of dry pasta, chocolate and confectionary products from cacao beans, and creamery butter. Besides butter, the inputs needed for the other top manufacturing sectors do not or cannot grow in the 100-Mile Foodshed at a scale sufficient to supply wholesale manufacturers. The metropolitan area has specialized in food processing, among other types of manufacturing, but this is dependent on the resource- intensive global food system.
Given these findings, one can surmise that Greater Philadelphia’s population consumes most of what is grown in or near the metropolitan area, does not have enough land to meet the demand, and is increasingly dependent on food sources farther away. Further
research, such as the USDA Eastern Seaboard Study, will investigate the East Coast’s needs and land capacity for food production.
The global food system, which has developed over the last 200 years due
to technological efficiencies, has yielded many economic benefits, reduced hunger in many places, and enabled labor specialization. This food system has opened trade borders with countries around the world, creating wealth. The global food system is also very efficient at transporting goods and services to consumer markets.
However, the centralized, corporate, global food system that feeds billions of people worldwide also produces a range of economic costs, negative
environmental impacts, and possible crises, including: the rise of large industrial monoculture farms that reduce biodiversity and require increased chemical fertilizers and pesticides; environmental degradation and contamination due to the increased use of fertilizers and pesticides; and widespread consolidation of food producers due to the mechanisms of financial markets, which make the average consumer more vulnerable to food safety issues and price increases, while providing fewer choices.
FINDINGS
USDA Eastern Seaboard Food Security Study
The USDA Agricultural Research Service, partnering with land-grant universities, is undertaking a comprehensive food security analysis of local production capacity and regional consumer demand along the dense East Coast. Production capacity will be determined by analyzing land availability and soil suitability and by identifying biophysical, infrastructure, energy, and policy constraints. The study will also evaluate system viability in order to determine a sustainable balance between local production and imports to meet the demand of population increases, while considering potential risks from market fluctuations, natural disasters, and climate change.
More simplistically, Americans have benefited from the large economies of scale that the global food system offers. With the start of the industrial
revolution and the emergence of mechanized harvesting, America’s population drastically shifted from rural to urban, as fewer people were needed to work in agriculture. In 1910, about one- third (32%) of the working population was considered a “farmer” or “farm laborer.” In 2000, less than 1% of the working population worked on a farm. The implications of this consolidation and expansion are outlined below.
Despite all of these advances and the creation of a worldwide free market for all goods, including food, the global food system has plenty of inefficiencies, treats many workers unjustly, and degrades the landscape and natural resources in some areas.
However, a relocalized food system can also have all of these externalities. Reducing the distance a food item travels
may not reduce that food item’s
environmental, social, and economic costs. Long-distance travel is not necessarily inefficient, especially if large volumes of food are transported far distances on fuel- efficient modes, such as water travel.
Time and freshness are other factors to consider, particularly for highly perishable goods like fruits and vegetables. Within the United States, nearly all food is transported in high volumes over long distances by trucks, which are less fuel efficient than ships but can reduce spoilage and waste by
meeting time constraints more consistently than water or rail travel. Conversely, recent medical research supports the assertion that fresh fruits and vegetables left to ripen on the vine longer have more nutritional value and taste better, and that food harvested and allowed to ripen during transport loses nutritional value. However, some medical research asserts that frozen vegetables and fruits retain more nutritional value than fresh vegetables, as food items are usually frozen within 24 hours or less after harvest.93
Farming as an occupation is also threatened by competition from other professions and an aging farming community. In order to increase the number of farmers that we have in the 100-Mile Foodshed and the amount of food that they produce for nearby populations, knowledge about food and agriculture needs to be passed down to a new generation of farmers, some of whom may not be from farming families
(seeNew Farmer Training).
FINDINGS
93Pollan, Michael.In Defense of Food. New York: Penguin, 2008.
Ripening blackberries at a farm in New Jersey