Part III of Aquaponics in New England discusses how aquaponics can fuel a significant increase in the region's food production. A PDF of the entire paper (Parts I-III) can be downloaded here, including a full list of sources referenced by footnotes.
Help Scale Up Local Food Production
Help Scale Up Local Food Production
Scaling up refers to significantly increasing food production to a level well above the status quo, dramatically altering the ratio of imported to in-state/region produced food
Why Scale Up?
Aquaponics offers the potential to scale up local food production for Massachusetts and New England. But first, why is scaling up production important to the region? As discussed previously, locally produced food tends to produce less GHGs. It also provides an opportunity for local employment, helps to reinvest money in the state or local community, and preserves open space and rural character of the region, supporting tourism and real estate values. Local food often tastes better, too, because varieties are cultivated for their flavors. In contrast, most commercial varieties are cultivated for their ability to withstand the assault of freezing, packing, and shipping hundreds or thousands of miles.
In addition to growing demand for local food, climate change presents a major economic argument for increasing local food production. Most of the extremely high risk areas for water stress in the Tetra Tech study are in America’s major agricultural areas: the Great Plains and Southwest, including California.13 Globally, climate change will have an overall detrimental effect on agriculture, too.10 This means prices for imported food will...
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