Oil and Food: A Rising Security Challenge

by Danielle Murray

From farm to plate, the modern food system relies heavily on cheap oil. Threats to our oil supply are also threats to our food supply. As food undergoes more processing and travels farther, the food system consumes ever more energy each year.

The biggest political action individuals take each day is deciding what to buy and eat. Preferentially buying local foods that are in season can cut transport and farm energy use and can improve food safety and security. Buying fewer processed, heavily packaged, and frozen foods can cut energy use and marketing costs. Eating lower on the food chain can reduce pressure on land, water, and energy supplies.

Fossil fuel reliance may prove to be the Achilles heel of the modern food system. Oil supply fluctuations and disruptions could send food prices soaring overnight. Decoupling the food system from the oil industry is key to improving food security.

The U.S. food system uses over 10 quadrillion Btu (10,551 quadrillion Joules) of energy each year, as much as France’s total annual energy consumption. Growing food accounts for only one fifth of this. The other four fifths is used to move, process, package, sell, and store food after it leaves the farm. Some 28 percent of energy used in agriculture goes to fertilizer manufacturing, 7 percent goes to irrigation, and 34 percent is consumed as diesel and gasoline by farm vehicles used to plant, till, and harvest crops. The rest goes to pesticide production, grain drying, and facility operations.

The past half-century has witnessed a tripling in world grain production – from 631 million tons in 1950 to 2,029 million tons in 2004. While 80 percent of the increase is due to population growth raising demand, the remainder can be attributed to more people eating higher up the food chain, increasing per capita grain consumption by 24 percent. New grain demand has been met primarily by raising land productivity through higher-yielding crop varieties in conjunction with more oil-intensive mechanization, irrigation, and fertilizer use, rather than by expanding cropland.

Food today travels farther than ever, with fruits and vegetables in western industrial countries often logging 2,500-4,000 kilometers from farm to store. Trucking accounts for the majority of food transport, though it is nearly 10 times more energy-intensive than moving goods by rail or barge.

Processed foods now make up three-fourths of total world food sales. One pound of frozen fruits or vegetables requires 825 kilocalories of energy for processing and 559 kilocalories for packaging, plus energy for refrigeration during transport, at the store, and in homes. Processing breakfast cereals requires 7,125 kilocalories per pound-easily five times as much energy as is contained in the cereal itself.

Processed foods are often individually wrapped, bagged and boxed, or similarly overpackaged. This flashy packaging requires large amounts of energy and raw materials to produce, yet almost all of it ends up in our landfills.

Food retail operations, such as supermarkets and restaurants, require massive amounts of energy for refrigeration and food preparation. The replacement of neighborhood shops by “super” stores means consumers must drive farther to buy their food and rely more heavily on refrigeration to store food between shopping trips. Due to their preference for large contracts and homogenous supply, most grocery chains are reluctant to buy from local or small farms. Instead, food is shipped from distant large-scale farms and distributors-adding again to transport, packaging, and refrigeration energy needs.

Rather than propping up fossil-fuel-intensive, long-distance food systems through oil, irrigation, and transport subsidies, governments could promote sustainable agriculture, locally grown foods, and energy-efficient transportation. Incentives to use environmentally friendly farming methods such as conservation tillage, organic fertilizer application, and integrated pest management could reduce farm energy use significantly. Rebate programs for energy-efficient appliances and machinery for homes, retail establishments, processors, and farms would cut energy use throughout the food system. Legislation to minimize unnecessary packaging and promote recycling would decrease energy use and waste going to landfills.

Direct farmer-to-consumer marketing, such as farmers’ markets, bypasses centralized distribution systems, cutting out unnecessary food travel and reducing packaging needs while improving local food security. Farmers’ markets are expanding across the United States, growing from 1,755 markets in 1993 to 3,100 in 2002, but still represent only 0.3 percent of food sales.

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Excerpted from Earth Policy Institute’s Eco-Economy Update, a SustainableBusiness.com Content Partner.