Where does the District’s ‘local’ food come from?

Megan Engle | November 29, 2023

Every weekend, the streets come alive with thousands of people and literal tons of farm-fresh food. With 36 farmers markets across Washington, local agriculture seems to be thriving in the nation’s capital. However, most of this food comes from hundreds of miles away, and the government is trying to change that.

Less than one percent of the food eaten in Washington is grown in the District, according to the D.C. Office of Urban Farming (OUF). Increasing Washington's food production has been one of the office’s top priorities for years.

Consumers tend to think local food is higher quality than general supermarket goods and more affordable than organic produce, according to a 2023 National Institute of Health study. The same study also found that people feel regional food systems are more environmentally and socially sustainable. As of 2021, 42 percent of consumers said they prefer buying locally grown food, a Statista Consumer Research survey reports.

Currently, Washington has 45.8 acres of land in cultivation. The OUF aims to increase that by 20 acres over the next decade. To achieve that goal, the District recently began offering urban farmers grants, a 90% property tax abatement, and the opportunity to lease government land.

While these policies may reduce the cost of agricultural land, land availability remains a serious problem.

Most of the vacant land in Washington is divided into small lots spread throughout urban areas and would be difficult to develop.

Megan Engle | Source: D.C. Office of Planning | ArcGIS

Most of the vacant lots in Washington are less than one acre, in dense urban areas, and difficult to develop, according to the D.C. Office of Planning. Although some of these lots could support community gardens, they generally cannot support commercial farms. 

The average American farm is 445 acres, or ten times larger than all the District’s cultivated land combined, according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service.

Farmers say that smaller operations benefit communities, but they cannot fully support them. 

“If you wanna tackle food security…, you can't really just grow microgreens. We’d all starve” said Brittany Gallahan, production manager at Little Wild Things Farm. “Think about how much space you need to grow tomatoes profitably. Like, you need a lot of space.”

With usable land scarce, commercial real estate is expensive in the District.

“There’s a limited amount of dirt and when it’s difficult to develop, prices are driven up,” said Colin Flannery, a real estate financial analyst with Hunter Investments.

Agricultural land in Washington is currently almost five times more expensive than in Pennsylvania and almost ten times more expensive than in West Virginia, according to the USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service. As such, it is just not possible for many farmers to grow in Washington.

This real estate market represents a serious challenge for local leaders as they try to increase cultivated land in the District by almost 50 percent.

“The commercial real estate market is in a weird and very volatile place,” said Flannery. “We may not see a lot of change on this front for a bit.”

In 2023, D.C.’s farmers markets featured 268 vendors, Freshfarm reports. About one-third of the vendors were farmers who sold produce, dairy, or meat products from their own farm.

Despite these challenges, D.C.’s local food scene remains vibrant thanks to farmers rooted in surrounding states.

Washington’s farmers markets currently feature 76 growers, according to Freshfarm, the nonprofit that organizes these markets. These farmers bring their produce in every week from Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia. All of them are based within 250 miles of the capital.

“You go to Dupont Farmers Market, [and] most of those farmers are not in D.C.,” said Gallahan. “They have found it to be more profitable for them to just drive 200 miles into the city than to try to operate here.” 

These farmers markets and their vendors are the capital’s main source of local food, even though they do not align with the District’s local agricultural goals.

Since the USDA defines local produce as food grown within 400 miles of its distribution point, all D.C.’s farmers market produce meets the national requirements to be classified as ‘local.’ Processed foods, for comparison, travel 1,500 miles on average before reaching your plate, according to the USDA. 

As work continues to increase food production in and around the District, the community’s appetite for local food remains strong. In 2023, 1.03 million people collectively spent $14.2 million at D.C.’s farmers markets, according to Freshfarm.