Think Globally, Act Locally

Big Food may now be powerful enough to get fast food into our public schools, sway congress to get them to decree that tomato sauce is a serving of vegetables to keep factory-made pizza in the School Lunch Program, create irresistible flavor combinations to keep us buying their products, and treat living creatures as a commodity; but the food industry did not get to where it is today all by itself. As consumers, we are voting with our pocketbooks in favor of such practices with each food purchase that we make at the supermarket.

Food today, if we do not consider the health care and environmental costs, is much cheaper, relative to our total income, than it was a generation ago. It is because such heavily subsidized food can be produced so efficiently, on such a massive scale, that so many of us can now live crammed into cities without giving a thought to producing our own food, or even to where that food is coming from. We rightly assume that virtually any food item that we desire will be available, under several different brands, at fairly constant prices. They may be dangerously unsustainable, but since the current agricultural practices keep the supermarkets full, and most of us content (and full), I suspect that they will be with us for quite some time.

A Sustainable Lifestyle

Our family chooses to do our part by casting our votes for whole foods that have been conscientiously grown-preferably by local growers. We seldom partake in the processed convenience foods, and we grow, or harvest, much of our own food. Our family has, for the past 25 years or so, lived on acreage that has allowed us to garden at will, but the reality is that for most folks having a garden, and the time to tend one, is not a realistic option. In fact, even though we live on 25 acres, we started to think that there had to be a way to both enjoy growing some of our own food and enjoy our summer spending time on the lake at the same time.

Our family's attitude toward diet and food production has been shaped, in large part, by time spent living in Central Africa. My wife Peg and I each spent 2 years living in the Central African Republic (CAR) as Peace Corps volunteers in the early 1980s. Peg was in the Rural Health Program, and I was in the Freshwater Aquaculture Program; teaching farmers how to construct ponds and raise Tilapia to sell in local markets.

While these experiences are the subject for a different kind of book, I will touch on our adventures (actually a lot of touching) throughout the series of print books and e-books, as I delve into the various topics. Besides our desire to return to the wonderful Whole Foods diet that we grew so fond of in the CAR, the Appropriate Technology approach to problem solving, which was a big part of life in Africa, has helped us to hatch some interesting ideas for innovative products that assist us in achieving our goal of becoming less dependent on supermarket foods- and have some fun doing it.

Simplicity and Functionality

With our designs you get our commitment to simple construction methods using mostly locally available materials; with low cost, attractiveness, simplicity and functionality being equally important design criteria. And while each of these products can stand alone just fine, there is synergism in having them all.

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