Healthy communities have strong local food systems.

Good Habits works to establish and strengthen local food systems based around small family farms. These food systems prioritize transparency, with direct connections between producers and consumers. Without subsidies, mark ups, or middlemen, these systems reflect the actual cost of growing real food. 

Healthy local food systems should be radically inclusive. They should advocate for healthy food access for all within their foodshed. They should care for neighbors in need, and work to eliminate food waste through redistribution and composting. Strong local food systems are desperately needed because the corporate American food system is broken.

The American Food System is Broken…

Unhealthy for people

Unhealthy eating is a leading cause of death in the United States. Our food system is good at producing an abundance of cheap, shelf-stable food, but this food is not good for people.  

Unhealthy for our planet

Controlled by large corporations which favor fast and cheap production methods, much US farmland is abused. The results include soil loss, polluted streams, and produce lacking in nutrients. 

Lackluster fruits and vegetables

Typical production methods rely on large farms and long shipping routes. This requires many crops to be be harvested before they’re ripe, and sold long after they’ve been picked. Both practices diminish the flavor and nutritional value of vegetables and fruit. Long shipping routes also influence crop selection. Crops are hybridized to have especially long shelf lives and thick skins, rather than for full flavor and high vitamin content. The result is dull vegetables, lacking in nutrients.

Privileges for corporations

From crop insurance policies to food safety regulations, our food system is designed to work well for large corporate producers, at the expense of small family farms. 

Facilitating addiction to sugar, salt, and fat

 Though the US recommends eating plenty of vegetables and fruit, US tax dollars are used to subsidize the production of corn, soybeans, wheat, rice, sorghum, dairy and livestock,  JAMA International Medicine. Subsidies suppress the price of highly processed foods.

Favors profits over people

 Though America is one of the most advanced countries in the world, many of our communities have no place to purchase vegetables and fruit.