Welcome to the food deserts of rural America

[Liberal_in_LA]

Welcome to the food deserts of rural America

Driving down a two-lane highway in rural Nebraska last spring, I passed a Native American man riding an old bicycle toward the nearby Omaha Indian Reservation. We were at least seven miles from the nearest town, and he had four grocery bags bulging with food slung over his handlebars as he worked to climb a hill. I'll bet a week's worth of groceries that he wasn't biking for the exercise.

This is what a food desert looks like in rural America.

The term "food desert" has gained a lot of attention in the media in the last several years (much to the chagrin of people who like deserts and don't appreciate the negative connotation). I've also heard "food vacuum" and "area of low food access," but nothing gives the mental picture of what it's like to live in a place with no food like "food desert."

When most people hear "food desert," they think of places like West Oakland, Detroit, or inner-city Chicago. Personally, I think of places like Harrison, a Nebraska town of 279 people. A resident of Harrison called me for help several months ago because the owners of their local grocery store have gotten sick and need to sell or shut down. If they close, it's a 50 mile drive to the next nearest grocery store. I've had conversations with members of Native American nations who talk about driving 110 miles through a mountain pass to get to their nearest town.

The paradox of our unhealthy food system is that many rural towns lack healthy food access, even as the food we eat is grown in rural places. To put it simply, our current food system is failing the very communities that grow our food.

http://www.grist.org/article/2011-01-21-welcome-to-the-food-deserts-of-rural-america

[Name removed]

1. Deleted message

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[NBachers]

2. My lady friend lives at 8th & Foothill in West Oakland, and it's a vibrant store & restaurant area

[Odin2005]

3. Where I grew up we had to drive 50 miles to Fargo to get decent groceries.

We bought in bulk to last a month, and I enjoyed the luxury of going out to east and renting a video game.

[JoeyT]

4. Even when there is somewhere to buy food locally in extremely rural areas,

it's typically so expensive that no one could possibly afford it.

I visited my parents this last weekend and it's around a 35-40 mile drive from their house to the nearest town. There is a gas/grocery/whatever a few miles from their house, but when I stopped for gas the gas was over a dollar a gallon more than in town. A gallon of milk was over $14. A pack of diapers was $50. The only things that had remotely normal prices were the junk food and cokes, which I think has something to do with their supplier. So they're less Mom and Pop type operations and more about gouging people that don't have cars/can't drive in areas that are predominately poor. That could be part of the reason rural America is packing on the pounds. 1 gallon of milk = ~4 gallons of coke price-wise. The pricing in rural stores is like that everywhere I've ever been in this state, but I can't speak for stores in other states.

[Liberal_in_LA]

6. $50 for a pack of diapers!!! omg

[barbiegeek]

5. Someone should set up a seed-share program for them to grow own food

And canning jars & ziploc freezer bags.