Globalisation is not only a matter of clothing and mobile phones. Long-distance worldwide shipping of food commodities has also increased tremendously over the last few decades. Lassaletta et al. (2014) estimate that one-third of all proteins (a proxy for the nutritive potential of foodstuffs) produced globally are redistributed through international trade. Thus a recent study in France shows that the total volume of long distance commercial exchanges of food commodities, mostly originating from far away, account for over twice the national agricultural production (Le Noé et al., submitted).

However, the positive value of a globalised food supply is being actively questioned. In industrialised countries, a citizens’ movement has arisen, sometimes supported by local public authorities, seeking to promote a local food supply. This movement aims to reclaim control of nutrition, re-create social links often destroyed by the extent of mass distribution, and develop the local economy.

Developing countries are also attempting to strengthen their local food supply and recover part of their food sovereignty lost by decades of open market policies. At both the community and national scales, the objective of localising the food supply has become an important social and political focus.

However, shipping cereals, soybeans or other foodstuffs in containers across the oceans is very inexpensive. Many studies have shown that this does not in itself have a large environmental imprint compared to the impact of agricultural practices themselves. Converting chemical agriculture to organic practices, which eliminates pesticide pollution and gives rise to lower nitrogen losses to the environment, would have much greater impact on the environment than reducing “food miles” (Weber and Matthews, 2008).

Economists have therefore proposed the comparative benefits of producing each type of food on the most suitable land and relying on international trade to redistribute them. These are among the sceptics claiming that targeting food self-sufficiency and sovereignty compromises the environmental optimum that an open global market economy might offer.

For example, Desrochers and Shimizu (in Yes We Have No Bananas 2008) claimed that feeding a rapidly growing world population in a sustainable manner requires long-distance trade to ensure that food is produced most efficiently in the most suitable locations. Ballingal and Winchester (2008) go further by stating that local preference in food choices in developed countries would lead to “starving the poor” by depriving Southern countries of important commercial incomes. The important question we will address in this article, therefore, is whether localising the food supply is beneficial or detrimental to food security and to the environment.