When the average North American sits down to eat, each ingredient has typically traveled at least 1,500 miles or more to reach the table. Costs to the environment in shipping and transportation alone are enough to have us looking local for available food sources.

Imported produce has to be picked before ripening to prevent excessive spoilage which results in pretty tasteless pulp.

Here on the island, we have spring, summer and fall seasons for fresh produce and by supporting local farmer's markets more offerings can be made available because of demand.

On the first day of spring, 2005, Alisa Smith and James MacKinnon of Vancouver, chose to confront this unsettling statistic with a simple experiment. For one year, they would buy or gather their food and drink from within 100 miles of their apartment in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Since then, James and Alisa have gotten up-close-and-personal with issues ranging from the family-farm crisis to the environmental value of organic pears shipped across the globe. They've reconsidered vegetarianism and sunk their hands into community gardening. They've eaten a lot of potatoes.

Their 100-Mile Diet struck a deeper chord than anyone could have predicted. Within weeks, reprints of their blog at thetyee.ca had appeared on sites across the internet. Then came the media, from BBC Worldwide to Utne magazine. Dozens of individuals and grassroots groups have since launched their own 100-Mile Diet adventures. The need now is clear: a locus where 100-milers can get the information they need to try their own lifestyle experiments, and to exchange ideas and develop campaigns. That locus —turning an idea into a movement. The 100 Mile Diet as a publication is available at most book stores.

Getting Started with Your Own 100 Mile Program

1. Start small.

"We walked smack into a year of strict 100-Mile eating. That was a big, blind leap into the unknown. You can start with a single meal, a 100-Mile day, a one-week commitment. Most people partner up, or do the 100-Mile Diet as a family or group.' Alisa Smith

2. There are no rules.

Make your 100-Mile Diet experiment a challenge. If you're trying it for a day, consider getting tough: every ingredient in every product has to come from within 100 miles.
Over a longer period, escape clauses are nice. Maybe the occasional restaurant meal or dinner at friends' houses?
And what will you do if you travel? Ask some deeper questions, too. If you eat meat, where does the feed for the animals come from?
If you're vegetarian, would you be prepared to eat animal products if no beans or tofu are raised where you live?

If you just can’t live without coffee, don't let it stop you. Wave your magic wand and declare it ‘local.’

3. Find your farmers' market.

The easiest and most fun step toward eating locally. Make the market a weekly priority for your food shopping. To find yours, search the web, look for listings in local newspapers, or call your area's tourism office.

4. Find your farmers.

Most larger cities and many smaller towns have organic food delivery companies, often with direct connections to local farms. Consider joining a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program, in which you support a specific farm by paying a lump sum at the beginning of each growing season and then sharing in that farm's food products year-round. Most delivery and CSA programs have websites, or try contacting your regional organic certifying body or farmers' association.

5. Start a garden - even a tiny one.

Self-sufficiency feels good, and greens up our cities and towns. Even urban apartments can grow vine beans, tomatoes and herbs in pots on the balcony. A 3x12 plot in a community garden, which is run by a cooperative community group is another alternative. If not, remember this: many began as 'guerrilla gardens' planted on longtime vacant lots.

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1. Taste the difference.
At a farmers’ market, most local produce has been picked inside of 24 hours. It comes to you ripe, fresh, and with its full flavor, unlike supermarket food that may have been picked weeks or months before. Close-to-home foods can also be bred for taste, rather than withstanding the abuse of shipping or industrial harvesting.
2. Know what you’re eating.
Buying food today is complicated. What pesticides were used? Is that corn genetically modified? Was that chicken free range or did it grow up in a box? People who eat locally find it easier to get answers. Many build relationships with farmers whom they trust. And when in doubt, they can drive out to the farms and see for themselves
3. Get in touch with the seasons.
When you eat locally, you eat what’s in season. You’ll remember that cherries are the taste of summer. Even in winter, comfort foods like squash soup and pancakes just make sense–a lot more sense than flavorless cherries from the other side of the world.

4. Discover new flavors.
Ever tried sunchokes? How about purslane, quail eggs, yerba mora, or tayberries? Our local spot prawns are tastier than popular tiger prawns. Count the types of pear on offer at your supermarket. Maybe three? Small farms are keeping alive nearly 300 other varieties–while more than 2,000 more have been lost in our rush to sameness .

5. Save the world.
A study in Iowa found that a regional diet consumed 17 times less oil and gas than a typical diet based on food shipped across the country. The ingredients for a typical British meal, sourced locally, traveled 66 times fewer “food miles.” Or we can just keep burning those fossil fuels and learn to live with global climate change, the fiercest hurricane seasons in history, wars over resources…

6. Support small farms.
We discovered that many people from all walks of life dream of working the land–maybe you do too. In areas with strong local markets, the family farm is reviving. That’s a whole lot better than the jobs at Wal-Mart and fast-food outlets that the globalized economy offers in North American towns.

7. Give back to the local economy.
A British study tracked how much of the money spent at a local food business stayed in the local economy, and how many times it was reinvested. The total value was almost twice the contribution of a dollar spent at a supermarket chain .

8. Be healthy.
Eat more vegetables and fewer processed products and sample a wider variety of foods. Eating more fresh food at its nutritional peak and having meals made from scratch is a healthier approach to diet.