There are a lot of reasons to eat local. Your food is fresh, you know where it’s coming from, and you know you’re supporting local growers.

But locally grown food does even more to support our community. Locally grown and produced food is a vital part of both food security and economic security—it provides nourishment for community members who need it, as well as income for small growers.

When we invest in local food, that money stays within the local economy and recirculates, creating and sustaining jobs. In fact, due to something called the “multiplier effect,” every $1 spent on local food generates $1.87 in local economic activity. If Southern Arizonans shifted just $5 of their existing spending toward local food, it would generate an additional $287 million a year in income to local farms and small growers.

We can lead the way to food security and food justice—and it starts with investing in our local food economy.

And there’s more—investing in our local food economy also supports food justice and justice for our local environment. We believe in food grown using fair labor practices and sustainable environmental practices. Local food production in Southern Arizona often involves desert-adapted crop varieties (low water-use crops) and environmentally sustainable methods—which makes it a stable, resilient food source amid global climate and price changes.

Building a healthy, hunger-free community is about more than feeding the hungry today.  We can lead the way to food security and food justice—and it starts with investing in our local food economy.