Organic Food Security

At OK.O.S, we define organic food security as getting your 6-a-day organic local vegetables and fruits. This requires 5,000 square feet (50’X100′) of irrigated and bio-intensively managed land for ONE PERSON. All the calories needed for a year, from plant sources, can be produced on this small piece of land.

Our definition of food security has a consumer (demand) side of the equation and a farmer (supply) side. Is 60 – 70% vegetable food security a good goal to move towards?

What is your definition of food security?
Do we have the land for this?

There are so many questions. Can lots of small-group discussions find answers? Our company will help to promote and support these conversations. There are some questions at this web site for people to help answer. Our goal is part business and part education – community building.

It is easy to say grow the food you eat. The details of how this is done are much more complicated to work out. How can just talking in small groups of friends, family and co-workers lead to food security?

Talking helps identify needs. Ideas emerge which lead to a shared vision for solutions. Until a number one food action item emerges from all the talking, nothing can be done to grow food security.

A bio-intensive bed as shown above is carefully designed to feed people and the soil life too. The art and the science of doing this needs to be learned by thousands of young urban farmers, for food security in BC to grow.

Beer bluster or just complaining or blaming others will not pull more carrots out of the ground. How do we grow more organic local carrots, cabbage, garlic, strawberries, apples and romaine lettuce to meet strong and growing demand?

How food secure are we in BC? BC food security has collapsed as export focused agri-food has grown over the decades.

Research by Dr. Ostry from Victoria, as published in the 2016 report Agriculture’s Connections to Health (PHSA), shows that 70% of the vegetables eaten in BC come from California. Another 17% come from Mexico.

BC only has 13% vegetable food security. Vegetable and fruit imports to BC of $ 1.2 billion a year are costing us billions in lost economic activity and thousands of farm jobs!

Let’s have small group discussions on food security throughout the bio-region. Talk may be cheap but talk is also easy for busy people to do. Once there are enough results we will publish them on this web site.

Check out our food security questions in the CONSUMERS area of this web site.

Help answer these key questions about food security in the Thompson – Okanagan region and maybe help yourself too.