About New York Bounty

New York City loves its local farmers, and it shows in countless ways.  It shows in the city’s flourishing farmers markets and in the hordes of New Yorkers participating in community supported agriculture or CSA, an arrangement that links farmers directly to urban dwellers.  Today, 31 farms ― all within 250 miles of the city ― grow food directly for more than 100 CSA communities throughout the city. 

Some New Yorkers, in a throwback to the 1960s show “Green Acres,” are even giving up city life to take up farming.  They’re buying or leasing property in upstate New York and other rural locations to start farm enterprises or become CSA farmers themselves. 

More than ever before New Yorkers are thinking about their food, how it’s produced, and where it comes from.  What’s more, they’re insisting on buying only local food, saying that it’s healthier, tastier and better for the environment.  The new thinking represents a significant shift in how New Yorkers eat and their relationship with food.

What they buy and where they buy it is no longer a mindless activity.  Many consumers today wrestle with decisions concerning their food choices as they would presidential candidates.  Should they support local farmers, even when they’re not organic or are more expensive than farmers on the West Coast? Should they buy organic spinach grown locally or the cheaper spinach — also organic — from California?  What about that New York apple?  Should they buy it, even if it’s not organic? 

This blog looks at all the dilemmas consumers face as they struggle to make good decisions in terms of their health, the environment and their wallets.  It also looks at the urban agriculture scene in New York, poking into the city’s biggest food-producing gardens. Plus, it covers all topics directly and peripherally related to food, from composting to hunger and food pantries.

Though there is much support for local food, food is very much a global matter, with rising food prices and food shortages around the world.  This blog tries to look at the bigger picture, examining broader topics like agribusiness — the monolith often blamed for many of our food troubles ― and global agriculture and trade. For the most part, though, this blog tries to keep it local.