Food self-sufficiency

Originally published Feb. 3, 2002

Is complete food self sufficiency possible? (short answer)

This is one of my favorite topics.

It is possible but requires a number of tradeoffs that make it less
than worthwhile. We produce a year-round average of perhaps
60% of our food presently, although it climbs a little each year.
Total food self-sufficiency is not a goal for us. (Complete discussion
follows below).

> In other words growing all your own foods(fruit, vegetables) assuming you had
> a lot of land?

If you have the right kind of soil and climate and enough water you
can grow all the fruit and vegetables you can eat on less than an acre
per person.

If you're going to produce meat and dairy products, you will need
somewhat more land.

> How long of a growing season do you need to do this?

It doesn't matter much. Soil, climate, and water matter more than the
number of frost-free days. I live in Minnesota and can grow any
major fruit or vegetable except things like peaches, citrus, pecans,
and tropical fruit.

You can do this in most parts of the world, certainly in most of
the United States. It becomes difficult in areas with exceptionally
short seasons, such Alaska, the northern part of Canada, and
the northernmost portions of Minnesota, North Dakota, and
Wyoming. It is also difficult in desert regions and rocky areas
where the soil is very poor.

We have to irrigate to grow vegetables. This is true in most
areas. Therefore, you have to have water available, at least
a little. Water is especially important in areas with little rainfall,
such as most of the western United States. We get enough
rainfall here to grow hay and grain crops, and tree fruit,
without irrigation. That doesn't work in, say, Utah.

> Is complete food self sufficiency possible? (long answer)

First of all, you have to give up any processed foods that aren't
practical on a homestead-sized scale. That means no more cold
cereal, Doritos, or chocolate. And you have to give up foods that can only
be produced in limited climactic areas, so no bananas, pineapples,
coffee, or lobster.

Consider these culinary building blocks:

- Meat (incl. poultry, fish, eggs)
- Dairy products (milk, cheese)
- Grains (wheat, rice, oats)
- Fruit
- Green vegetables
- Root vegetables
- Sugars
- Spices Flavorings
- Mineral compounds

We produce our own eggs and beef, which isn't that hard to
do. That's a good share of most people's diet. We don't produce
poultry meat of any kind so that's something we buy.

Producing dairy products year round on a small scale is next
to impossible. The closest way is with goats, which have small
enough production that a family can keep several and try to have
at least one in milk most of the time.

Producing grains on a small scale is fiddly and labor intensive.
Threshing wheat or oats by hand is fun for the first quarter cup or so.
And it doesn't make sense to own even a small combine or threshing
machine for one family's needs. Wheat can be grown in most places
but rice requires a specific habitat. We buy our flour, rice, and cereal.

Apple trees grow anywhere (except in Jan's climate) and will keep
through the winter if you're careful. And there are lots of summer fruits
for variety. In our area, citrus can't be grown, and so that's something
we buy.

Anyone can grow garden vegetables. During the months of July,
August, and September, that is. If you want your own year around
you have to be a canning and freezing fiend or be adept at four-season
growing. I have some lettuce growing in the basement at the moment,
but generally we buy our vegetables in the winter. Before the days of
freezers, people generally did without green vegetables in the late
winter months.

Root vegetables are easy to grow and store (I am speaking broadly
here to include the other nonroot winter vegetables such as squash
and cabbage). So if you want 100% self-sufficiency you had better
like to eat them. They are a lot of work to grow but don't require
that much space.

Sugars. You can't make white sugar at home. The closest things
are honey and maple syrup. Now, since you need sugar to make
jam and many of the fruit dishes, you had better be able to buy this
even if you're 100% self sufficent on everything else.

Spices and flavorings. In this category we have such items as black
pepper, coffee, tea, herbs and spices, chocolate, yeast, and extracts of
almond,
vanilla, lemon, and the like. Few of these items can be produced at home
because of climate. A number of herbs can be grown at home with
some success but most require a specific climate to produce the desired
flavor. So this is another area where you had better be able to buy
stuff.

Mineral compounds. Salt, baking powder, baking soda, hydrated lime,
sulphates, and iodine have roles in food preparation or nutrition. In some
areas the ores to make these are readily available and I suppose you could
make them. Salt from the ocean, or lime kilned from limestone, for example.
But why would you do this when you can buy a years' supply for next to
nothing?

Now, in order to do all this, there are inputs and equipment involved.
To produce beef you must have hay and corn. To produce hay and corn
you must have tillage equipment, seed, and fertilizer. How far up the chain
do you need to go to be satisified that you've reached your 100%?
Growing seed corn, for example, is a specialty of its own, and maintaining
the isolated inbred lines and producing a range of hybrids each year is
enough to fully occupy the attentions of any farmer.

So, you will find, that the more you get involved in producing your own
food, the more you must choose your specialties. The completely self
sufficient homestead that produces all it consumes and consumes all it
produces does not exist and never has. Individuals and groups have
traded for what they need throughout history. The certain indigenous
people cited as an example by others (and Jan's Old Believer Russians)
are only able to do this by depending on an abundance of wild game.
This does not scale and does not work for most people who try it.

And that's why we grow beef, but not pork. Chickens for eggs, but
not meat. Vegetables, but not root crops (Well, maybe a few).
Fruit, but not citrus. Corn, oats, and soybeans, but not wheat, rice,
or barley.

Some of this (the beef, corn, oats, and soybeans) we do as a business,
which helps justify the amount of time and effort we put into it. The other
things we do pretty much for ourselves. It is a lot of work but you learn
a lot about food and eat better than any other lifestyle offers.

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