9 Reasons to Grow Your Own Food – Is It Worth The Effort?
Many people love the convenience of simply running to the grocery store to buy . The whatever food they need. Convenience is attractive, but it cannot compare to growing your own food in your own home garden. I too used to love food from the grocery store until I heard about a food recall. A food recall due to Escherichia coli contamination of spinach is a good example. It feels like these recalls are happening more frequently too.
Starting a home garden where you grow your own food is the best solution to many of the health issues that we are dealing with today. We have compiled a descriptive list of 9 reasons to grow your own food.
1. Healthier Eating
You will grow in experience tending to your garden and growing your own food. Thus you will learn to eat in season when nutrients and flavors are available at that time of the year. Fresh vegetables and fruits from the garden have more robust flavors. You will harvest vegetables and fruits that ripen in the home garden. And when you consume them they will be as fresh as you can get. This is in contrast to grocery store fruits and vegetables. Usually, they are harvested before maturity and left to mature on the shelves. They aren’t allowed to fully ripen outside. This interferes with flavor and nutrient content. It is clear that nutritional value of foods reduces over time. You would be surprised just how old your “fresh fruits and vegetables” really are.
2. No Toxic Chemicals
The foods bought from grocery stores are commercially grown. Large-scale farmers usually use chemicals to prevent insect infestations as well as disease. These are pesticides, fungicides and herbicides to control plant pests and diseases. Besides, they use artificial fertilizers to improve soil fertility. On the contrary, you control the growing environment of your home garden. You can easily adopt organic ways of pest and disease control and soil improvement.
Consider the bulletin of The Environmental Working Group dubbed “Dirty Dozen” list. It lists top 12 USDA-tested produce containing highest loads of pesticides every year. The 2017 edition listed tomatoes, spinach, celery, potatoes, and pepper as the culprits. Luckily, these are some of the easiest and most productive vegetables you can grow at home.
3. You Can Make Decent Savings
Money is hard to come by now more than ever. If you can find a way to save some money then it’s that much more important you take advantage. The grocery bill is always larger than most other bills. It can be a serious cause of stress and worry. You can shrink the grocery bill a lot just by growing some of the common vegetables that you are already eating. The money that you will save just by not having to purchase them will add up faster than you realize. We tend to brush off those smaller purchases, but they really account for more than you would think.
All you need is a packet of seeds. You will spend less than a dollar for enough amounts of seeds to give you a bounty season’s harvest. Certain seed varieties such as heirloom tomatoes, non-hybrid can be preserved. Later, use them for the next planting season. Simply select seeds from the best producers. Dry them and store them for next season use.
4. Reduced Risks of Food-Borne and Food-Related Illness
Growing food in your backyard is the surest way to know the source of your food. It’s amazing what people can do to get money. Most large-scale commercial farmers rarely care about your health. All they want is your money. Listening to news about food borne or food-related illnesses is disheartening.
In the US alone, up to 48 million people suffer from food-borne illnesses every year according to FDA. Of these, as many as 130,000 people get hospitalized while about 3000 of them die. You can lessen your chance of being a victim of food poisoning by growing as much of your own food as possible. The most common food born illness outbreaks are caused by Salmonella and Listeria.
