The Last Word on Local
FOODLOVER INVESTIGATES THE IMPORTANCE OF WEST COUNTRY PRODUCERS TO THE LOCAL ECONOMY
What does the term ‘local food community’ mean to you and why is yours special to you?
My local food community has to be all the fantastic farmers, producers, chefs and retailers throughout Cornwall. It can sometimes feel like we’re at the end of the world down in this far corner of the South West but it also adds to Cornwall’s distinctiveness and sense of community. Although at one level it’s my job, I’ve ‘lived’ Cornish food and drink for over a decade now (we have our own hens, pigs, bees and veg patch too!) and emphatically believe in the quality of the produce and the people behind it.
What inspires you to support your local producer? My background is in market analytics, therefore I love data, but I can’t bear fluffiness! So it’s the knowledge that it’s really making a difference to the local economy that inspires me to support local producers, plus knowing that there’s still loads of room for the local marketplace to develop further.
What are your thoughts on convenience offered by local producers? Things have changed a lot over the past fifteen
Ruth Huxley
Director of hub organisation Cornwall Food & Drink and organiser of Cornwall Food & Drink Festival
they can command a premium for their produce simply because it’s local. Consumers will no longer wear that; they need to see justification for it, and that’s where marketing becomes important.
How will a growth in support for local producers benefit the local economy? This is really important because I think people might support their local producers more if they understood better what impact it could have. For example, on average every person living in the UK spends about £38 per week on food and drink (both household shopping and eating out). In Cornwall alone, if every person spent 1% of this, i.e. just 38p a week, on local produce in a local outlet rather than a large supermarket, it would generate nearly £10 million of local trade in a year.
“Things have changed a lot over the past fifteen years... I think it’s important that ‘local’ is no longer synonymous with foods that are unimaginative and take ages to prepare”
years or so and I think it’s important that ‘local’ is no longer synonymous with foods that are unimaginative and take ages to prepare. For example, in Cornwall we now have patés, pies, charcuterie, salads, artisan breads, cheeses and a whole host of fabulous accompaniments and drinks that didn’t exist ten years ago. My idea of the perfect local ‘convenience’ lunch can now be sorted easily in just a few minutes. It’s also heart-warming to see new initiatives popping up all the time that make local shopping more convenient, such as the fantastic online initiative
www.cornishfoodmarket.co.uk where people can do their whole
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household shopping using a local supplier. I’d love to see more of this kind of innovative thinking in local food retailing.
Is buying local becoming more affordable? It’s all about perception and people’s understanding of value rather than price. Many local products are much higher quality than their mass produced counterparts and people should therefore expect to pay more for them. Sadly the supermarkets have encouraged shoppers to think only about price and that cheap is good. However, a real irritation of mine is an expectation from a local producer that
How can FOODLOVERS get involved with their food communities? By going to festivals such as ours – Cornwall Food & Drink Festival, 28 – 30 Sept, Truro – where they can discover their local food treasures and get a good idea which chefs are the true exponents of local ingredients. But the
important thing is to then make local food shopping a regular habit and not just for high days, holidays (and festivals)!
Do you feel it’s important that the next generation learn about traceability and food culture? Why? We are what we eat, so how can we really understand how to look after ourselves if we don’t understand food, where it comes from and the effect it has on our bodies? It’s horrendous that so much effort has been put into raising educational standards via the National Curriculum but there are children who still don’t know that milk comes from cows, which is as basic as it gets really, isn’t it? F
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