Eating Local During Food Shortages – PLUS 4 Easy Recipes!

In the last 18 months we have seen our lives increasingly disrupted from lockdowns and staying in doors to petrol shortages and delivery delays. The recent headlines in the papers indicate we could be in for more months of food product shortages due to delays in transportation issues meaning less variety on our supermarket shelves.

Food shortages also happened last year when the world ground to a halt and toilet paper was being rationed. The restrictions limiting us to one trip out a day and minimal delivery slots for online supermarket shopping pushed us to seek out new independent and local companies to source our weekly food shops from. Now that the supermarkets are suffering again due to stock shortages there is no better time than now to continue to support local when buying our weekly shop. Continue reading to discover the benefits of eating local, food item shortages, local ingredients - and FOUR easy recipes you can make at home.

Benefits of eating local

• Foods grown locally are picked when ripe and so are more likely to contain more nutrients than foods that have travelled for several weeks on a lorry as nutrients depreciate over time. Eating local also encourages you to eat more seasonally which ensures the produce is as fresh as possible.
• It benefits the local economy, supporting local farmers and producers – why buy an apple shipped over from Turkey, China or the US when you can buy one right on your doorstep from a local orchard or even just your neighbours garden? Why buy supermarket honey, usually a mix of honeys from different countries when you can buy local honey in your area that will benefit your health?
•  Shopping local is better for the environment. It reduces fuel emissions; it reduces packaging costs and reduces our carbon footprint.
•  You can trace the product back to source making it easier for you to know about the farming processes used and whether it’s a product you want to eat. For example, if pesticides have been used on crops or the conditions an animal has been kept in before slaughter.

Food item shortages

Although the supermarkets are only likely to slim down their ranges of products rather than totally miss out on certain food items there is a likelihood that meat availability will be affected due to the shortage of workers, packers, and drivers in the industry. Boris Johnson has appointed ex-Tesco boss Sir David Lewis as the government’s supply chain adviser to address the issues but for those that don’t already now is the time to support your local farmers and order your Christmas meat from
them.

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