As our lives have become ever more complex so too has our food chain. Where once people ate food grown fairly close to them now it is being shipped literally from around the world. From grapes in Chile to water from Fiji much energy is expended in filling our fridges. These products arrive in containers at ports where they are then loaded onto tractor-trailer trucks for long haul delivery. This is an unsustainable model. The stress on the planet and its fragile ecology is severe. Changes in climate and energy point to the necessity for rethinking our local economies. There is a huge growth in and popularity of farmers markets and CSAs, community supported agriculture. More and more people are thinking and acting locally when it comes to food and life in a post carbon world.

Julian Darley is the founder of Post Carbon Institute headquartered in Sebastopol, California. He is the author of High Noon for Natural Gas and the co-author of Relocalize Now!