Local food offered on local website

It’s never been easier to find North Okanagan grown organic spelt, fresh from the garden asparagus, hormone free beef or other local food.

A new website has been launched to provide locations, availability and maps to find local producers and their goods.

“From the producers of the food to the processers of the food to local distribution to promoting it to customers,” says Mary Stockdale of http://www.foodaction.ca.

Stockdale heads up the Food Action Society of the North Okanagan, a group dedicated to protecting local food sources in the community.

Foodaction.ca was officially launched at the Vernon Farmer’s Market on the holiday Monday.

More than 80 North Okanagan food-related businesses have signed on.

UBC Okanagan graduate students developed the website over the last three years with a federal grant. They ventured to find out if google maps could bring about social change and get more people involved in their local environment, according to spokesperson Jon Corbett.

“You can see what’s happening across the world,” says Corbett. “More and more people are looking to alternative solutions of where they buy their food. I think by supporting local food we’re supporting local farmers, we’re supporting the local economy.”

“We’re really lucky here because we have such a diversity of amazing local food,” says Stockdale. “From the produce, the vegetables and fruit, to the cheeses to the breads and local wheat, beer and wine, we really have everything.”

The Food Action Society of the North Okanagan hopes the on-line resource will appeal to young people who are buying into the eat-local movement.

“It’s a real generational change to start to get the young people to think about things that take a little bit more time or cost just a little bit more money but that in the long run either taste better or will be beneficial to their body in the long run,” says Jessica Eaman, a society member.

You can search specific products or check out a map where to find the local product you’re looking for. Producers are listed on the site for free.