Cyclospora and Local Food

By now, you’ve certainly heard about the cyclospora outbreak that has affected over 10,000 people across the country.

The scope and scale of this outbreak is a symptom of our massive, global, centralized food system. Here’s how it happens: crops are grown on vast farms, and then they are washed and packaged in immense processing facilities where they comingle with crops from many other farms. Then they’re shipped from coast to coast. Wherever the point of contamination happens – whether it’s in the field or in the processing facility – the scale of these systems means that an outbreak can affect thousands of people nationwide.

Are local farms immune to food safety concerns? Absolutely not. We may someday see a food safety outbreak tied back to a Massachusetts farm, and that is why farmers take the matter seriously and why we at CISA provide food safety trainings for local farm owners and workers. If and when that does happen, it’s likely to affect many fewer people and to be quickly traceable because of the shorter chain from farm to table.

If you are concerned about cyclospora and wondering if local food is safer, consider what we know about how something like this happens. Food grown on a farm here in Massachusetts and sold directly to you at a farmers’ market, farm stand, or through your CSA has not intersected with the system that perpetuated this cyclospora contamination. This is also true of food grown on a local farm and sold directly to a local grocer, restaurant, or distributor.

This is a great argument for supporting local farmers all the time – not just in response to a crisis. A robust network of thriving, well-supported local farms provides much-needed food when our global food system, which is so efficient but also can be brittle, falters. Thank you for being a supporter of CISA and our local farms, and we hope you enjoy this summer’s local bounty!