Food and Water

Apr 6, 2011

Why food and water? I have spent the last several years focused on water conservation in the home. My showers are a quick three minutes. I hold the family record, unless you count my daughter Isabella’s attempt to best me with a two minute shower that ended with bubbles of shampoo still on her head. Short showers and other home water conservation measures are important but will not be enough to derail our current path of water scarcity for two-thirds of the world population by 2025.

The average American uses 150 gallons of water each day to bathe, wash dishes, wash clothes, and water the lawn…you get the point. We each use an additional 1300 gallons of water each day for what is called industrial use. This total captures all the water used in the clothes we wear, stuff we pack into our closets and shelves but mostly it is what we eat. Seventy percent of all fresh water that cycles around our globe is used for food production.

So begins my journey to understand the relationship of food and water at my kitchen table. Thus far my research has taken me to a chicken farm, a bakery, apple orchard, wheat farm and strawberry farm.

The list of farms and food production facilities that I will visit in the coming weeks and months gets longer as my curiosity intensifies. My hope is that my research will inform others in their food choices.

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  1. geeta says:

    the timer is still stuck to the shower wall. we think of you each time we turn off that faucet a little earlier than we might have.

    have you seen the movie “tapped”?
    blew my mind! you will love it…well as much as you can love bad news, but the topic is right up your alley!

    also great piece on npr about the very question that is sending you to the fields, few days ago. soup factory in PA that uses more water then the whole city it is in, pulls it right out of the river for free, like it’ll be there forever.

    great blog!

  2. Dani says:

    Conservation begins in the home and you are setting a great example. You are also inspiring me to put a timer by my shower 🙂

  3. Amada Irma says:

    Thank you for holding up the mirror and having the guts to do the work that it takes to change the world! What an inspiration!