The Book
ADVANCE PRAISE FOR LOCAVORE
“Ravenous for energy, vulnerable to climate change, and chronically unstable, today’s globalized system of industrial agriculture is heading towards crisis. But Sarah Elton shows us another path. In this personal, passionate, yet deeply informed and carefully balanced book, we learn how Canadians in every walk of life are finding new ways to produce the food we eat – ways that are humane, fair, technologically savvy, and environmentally smart, and that bring farmers and consumers closer together. Locavore is full of stories of hope, and it will inspire Canadians who care about their food.” Thomas Homer-Dixon, author of The Upside of Down: Catastrophe, Creativity and the Renewal of Civilization
“Lively, compelling and warm-hearted journalism with a generous helping of rigorous research, Locavore dishes up an insightful look at Canada’s food system: how it once worked, why it fails us now and, most importantly, what we can do to create a sustainable, delicious future.”
Margaret Webb, author of Apples to Oysters: A Food Lover’s Tour of Canadian Farms
Description of Locavore:
Strawberries in January, fresh tomatoes year-round and New Zealand lamb at all times — these well-travelled foods have a carbon footprint the size of an SUV. But there is a burgeoning local food movement taking place in Canadian cities, farms and shops that is changing both the way we eat and the way we think about food.
Locavore describes how foodies,100-milers, urbanites, farmers, gardeners and chefs across Canada are creating a new local food order that is sustainable and can feed us all. Combining front-line reporting, shrewd analysis and passionate food writing to delight the gastronome, Locavore shows how the pieces of a post-industrial food system are being assembled into something infinitely better.
We meet city-dwellers who grow crops in their backyards and office workers who have traded their keyboards for pitchforks. We learn how a group of New Brunswick farmers saved the family farm, why artisanal cheese in Quebec is so popular and how a century-old farm survives in urban British Columbia, bordered by the ocean on one side and by a new housing development on the other. We follow food culture activists as they work to preserve the genetic material of heritage plants to return once-endangered flavours to our tables. In recounting the stories of its diverse cast of characters, Locavore lays out a blueprint for a local food revolution.
Locavore is available online and in bookstores across Canada