Thirty Day Local Food Challenge

Project Title: Thirty Day Local Food Challenge Program Elements: Sustainable Living Lead persons: Theresa Hammond and Peter Kosar Status: Completed Summer 2008 Using the framework of a 30 day challenge, this Green Sanctuary project encourages particpants to eat fruits and vegetables that are produced within a 100 mile circle of Sacramento. This is sometimes referred to as the "100 Mile Diet" and those who follow this diet are called "locavores". Eating local foods helps reduce transportation and other costs, and supports the local and regional economy.

Goals

1. Share information on local food sources.

Handouts created for this purpose include:

• List of farmers markets - descriptions, times, locations.
• 100 mile food map for Sacramento.
• Thirty Day Local Food Challenge Booklet.

Note: All of these handouts were written and published explicitly for this project. They may be freely copied and distributed for non-commercial purposes.

2.   Raise awareness on broader issues relating to eating locally.

We directed participants attention to articles and web sites related to eating locally, food miles, food safety and ethical eating. Instead of printing lots of copies of these materials, we placed one copy of each article in a binder and placed it at the Green Sanctuary table for review before and after Sunday services. We then created a Local Food Challenge Surfing List that people could take with them. It contains a list of all the articles in the binder as well as some good web sites to explore.

Response

Between July 20 and August 24, 2008:

• 60 booklets were handed out.
• 42 people signed the project sign-up sheet.
• Two visitors from other UU congregations asked if they could take our materials and show them to their respective Green Sanctuary committees.
• One person was motivated to do a 100% local 30 day challenge.
• Received a request to send the booklet to Relocalize Sacramento.

Follow On

The Thirty Day Local Food Challenge booklet was updated and a new trifold version was created for use by outside organizations. A presentation about the UUSS Local Food Challenge was given at the September 2008 Relocalize Sacramento meeting. Twenty-five people attended.

Links on this page will be updated as new information becomes available.