Brenda Skidmore's Health Tips

There are several different ways that are used to define how rural America is falling further and further behind when compared to the rest of the country. The main one is by conducting surveys, and you thought they were merely an invasion of your privacy. These surveys tell us that our rural population has more disadvantages, in that there are greater numbers of families with children without medical health care coverage, and less per capita spending on public schools. Rural communities, also, continue to lag behind the nation's metropolitan areas in receiving life-changing technological advances. For many rural families access to high-speed internet services are but a dream.

Yet these are conditions that the mainstream media, charitable organizations, and hopeful future political leaders continue to dismiss and side-step.

Rural America is a lot more than just land space, it's a way of life for those who choose to live there. One-fifth of the population, or 60 million people strong, represent rural America's rich diversity of people, heritage, and possibilities. It is a well known fact, throughout the history of this great nation, that when our rural communities are thriving, the rest of our population living in the cities and suburbs are living better too. Everyone benefits from stronger markets, in more abundant resources, when rural community economics are healthy. When rural communities are faltering, it drains the nation's (as a whole) prosperity and limits the collective productivity of everyone.

A trend, in not needing the small family farm, has been growing steadily, and intensely, over the last four decades. Corporate farming may have resulted in being able to feed a growing population world-wide rather cheaply, but not any longer. Along with the massive amounts of food being grown, it was also thought to be a major advantage to mass process these foods which has merely compromised everyone's productivity, sustainability, and health.

We are facing an incredible challenge now, as the increasing price for fuel has forced many people to re-think how we feed and nurture ourselves, and the impact it may have on a very fragile environment.

Another primary election season has ended. It, basically, stem-rolled right on through the small towns and communities that make up rural America. Yet, in all of the debating about the war, economics, and high fuel prices was there any mentioning of the crisis that is facing rural America? What prospects do the future political hopefuls have to offer, in getting rural communities back on their feet again?

The farm bill is the only solution our political leaders can seem to come up with when it comes to discussing strengthening rural agriculture. Does anyone think we may have to solve this crisis ourselves? The farm bill is, at best, a long worn out piece of legislation. It was designed for a different era. A certain group of like-minded individuals, who had grand ideas about what they wanted rural America to become, not what it was truly meant to be, became the focus of a high profit generating agenda.

Our current trend, which is far different than it was forty years ago, and before that, is that fewer than 2 percent of the rural population depends on agriculture to sustain them. This makes agriculture far more dependent on the rural population to sustain it for an improved rural economy, rather than the rural population's dependency on agriculture to sustain them. This trend has become so 'out of balance' and is one of many reason's why America's prosperity has become compromised. You can learn more by visiting RuralCompact.org, an organization dedicated to re-establishing the important balance of power in rural America.

As another growing season gets underway for harvesting fresh fruits and vegetables, think about your local alternatives, as opposed to the well-traveled produce that ends up at your local big chain super markets. A study was done, recently, that shows how far produce has traveled to be conveniently located on your local super market shelves.

There are several disadvantages with this globalization of our food chain, and they are:

1. The massive amounts of fuel that are needed to transport these foods, plus the carbon footprint it leaves on the environment.
2. The massive amounts of water that is used to irrigate warm weather crops grown in the arid southwest.
3. The less stringent controls over the use of pesticides and herbacides used on food crops grown inside the U.S. and outside our borders.
4. The difference in quality and freshness compared to locally grown plant foods.

By shopping your nearest farmers market you are helping to solve some of rural America's economic problems. Not to mention, also, that you will find locally grown is often a superior value, tastes better, and is much healthier for you to eat.

We may have a bit of a problem this year in the mid-west, however, as flooding has compromised the planting of corporate bound profits as well as smaller bound profits. Still, I believe there will be a lot of locally grown plant foods available. Please give your small, local producer your support whenever you can. They work awfully hard to bring you the best products they have to offer.