Some food activists are creating systems that could bring local produce closer to home. The tool of choice: the Internet. Rona Roberts reports on her blog Savoring Kentucky that new tools for informing consumers where their food comes from appear to be cropping up across the nation. She cites Wired magazine, where Alexis Madrigal outlines the latest: FarmsReach, a system that would create an online food marketplace to directly connect farms with restaurants. "In other words, middlemen beware: Food could undergo a transition like the one that swept through classified ads, air travel and dozens of other industries," Madrigal writes. Other locally based programs are in the works to connect small farms, consumers and retailers.
Advocates say such systems could give consumers more information about the original sources of their food and help them eat healthier, reducing problems with food safety and obesity. "The current system does a remarkably good job of concealing how food is grown and by whom ... [and] farmers have a hard time showing the value they add and being recognized for innovative practices," Madrigal writes.
Roberts points out the biggest hurdle to projects like FarmsReach is lower Internet use in rural areas. She says a farmer "will not go several times a day and struggle with poor or slow connections to post breaking news about how many eggs, black raspberries, and fryer-sized rabbits he has for sale. He does not have time for bad infrastructure." The Obama administration is putting billions into bringing high-speed broadband to rural areas, but Roberts says for now, "Slow Technology is not a bright hope to set alongside Slow Food."
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