Where does our food come from?

Most people in the Shoalhaven buy their food from local supermarkets, butchers, fruit and vegetable markets. We wondered where these retailers actually source their food from.

Some places specialise in local produce but on the whole, a lot of our food comes from other places and is transported into the area. Maybe not the most sustainable way to provide us with our food when we are able to produce so much locally.

Transporting food increases its carbon footprint and is a huge contributor to the greenhouse gas emissions of agricultural industries. We need to consider sustainability in the equation.

We wondered just how many people grow their own fruit and vegetables locally and realised that finding out the answer to that would take a lot more time than what we had. We also thought that more local retailers could make a greater effort to sell local produce. A bit like the way we sell our produce from our school farm to help with the running costs.

Stuart and Olivia are asking the major food retailers in the Shoalhaven "Where do you source your produce from?"

The Nowra Fresh Fish and Meat Market get their fish from Ulladulla (local area) and the Sydney Fish Market. Their beef comes from Cowra and Milton.

The North Nowra Butcher's meat comes from Cowra.

The Worrigee Street fruit market stocks some imported fruit and vegetables but most of the produce comes from all around Australia.

The East Nowra Fruit Market prides itself in selling as much locally grown produce as they can.

The Greenwell Point Butcher sources meat from Milton (local area) and when asked why his reply was "because they are local"

Coles supermarket told us that their beef came from a warehouse in Sydney (doesn't really tell us where it was produced) and their fruit and vegetables are from all over the country.

IGA supermarkets get their beef from the Cowra abatoirs and their fruit and vegetables from produce towns and country grocers.


This large meat and fish market open recently in Nowra and we asked where they get their produce from.