Toronto's Greenie Food Program Scaled Down

(Toronto, Ontario) The city of Toronto has scaled back on plans to provide locally-grown, green-friendly food to city-run daycares, shelters and long-term care facilities. Problems with the plans have been encountered and the scope of the program will now be limited to only 37 child care centers.

Buying more local food is a major part of the city's climate-change policy, adopted unanimously in 2007, on the grounds that greenhouse-gas emissions are reduced if food is shipped shorter distances.

But Councillor Gord Perks said the city has learned it's not easy for institutional purchasers to determine where food is grown.

"We want to create a system where you actually know how the food got there," he said, arguing now for a phased-in program. [...]

Staff will be asked to report back on the pilot project and how the idea can be expanded before the 2010 budget process.

"I think the principle is a good one," said Councillor Gloria Lindsay Luby, who chairs the government management committee. "I think we should encourage our farmers to keep farming."

She had concerns about the earlier report, which called for "local" and "sustainable" food, terms that are hard to define.

In summary, the greenie food program is plagued because nobody can easily identify where food is grown and nobody has defined "local" nor "sustainable." However, despite not competently analyzing the fundamentals of the proposed program, the Toronto City Council decided to allocate at least $100,000 of the city's food budget to the greenie food program. Hurrying to fall behind. Helluva way to run a city.

To be fair, though, the council appears to want "farmers to keep farming."