A surprisingly simple home answer to America’s grocery and health care problems

Walk into any grocery store in America right now and you’ll see the same thing across the board. People stare at the prices as if they are learning another language.

A box of cereal for $8. A bag of chips costs $6. Eggs and ground beef sound like comfort. A few grocery bags easily top $150. Washington politicians argue against inflation, supply chains and corporate profits. But there is one obvious solution that no one is talking about anymore.

What if Americans had a responsibility to grow their own food again?

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That is not a strong idea. It’s actually how this country has worked for most of its history.

Today, many middle school and high school students graduate without knowing basic food skills, including how to plant tomatoes, grow lettuce, compost soil or understand how long it takes food to grow.

We teach calculus, Shakespeare and trigonometry. All important lessons, but they won’t lower grocery prices. But somehow we’ve decided that reading and writing about food and life – meaning the ability to grow and understand food – is simply being ignored.

In an era of rising grocery prices that won’t reverse regardless of who is in the White House, that is America’s biggest mistake.

One tomato plant can produce 20 to 30 kilograms of tomatoes in one season. Don’t like tomatoes? It’s too bad. A backyard garden can produce hundreds of dollars worth of vegetables each year, including tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, lettuce, herbs and squash. There are systems today that can be used in homes and townhouses that don’t have land to grow lettuce, herbs, and more.

Multiply that by millions of American households, and suddenly you start to reduce the pressure on the grocery system itself. But the real benefit goes far beyond cheap tomatoes.

Teaching children how to grow food teaches them something that our current education system strives to deliver by explaining the real world economy. When a student plants seeds, tends the soil, waters the crops and waits a few weeks before harvesting, they learn lessons that no textbook can replicate.

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They learn to live off the land.

They learn effort equals reward.

They learn that food is valuable because it takes time and work to produce.

They also learn something else that is becoming more prevalent in today’s America. This is where the food really comes from.

Ask a group of kids where carrots come from, and you’ll hear answers like “Publix” or “the grocery store.”

That termination of agriculture would have baffled earlier generations of Americans.

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During World War II, Americans created what were known as Victory Gardens. More than 20 million households have planted gardens in backyards, vacant lots and public spaces. At one time, those gardens produced about 40 percent of the vegetables consumed in the United States. Let that sink in for a while.

About half of the country’s vegetables came from everyday citizens growing their own food.

It wasn’t just patriotism. It was real.

Today we are highly dependent on complex supply chains that reach across continents. Fertilizer prices, transportation costs, labor shortages and global conflicts are increasing at the grocery store.

But the tomato plant in your backyard doesn’t care about global shipping lanes.

That’s why every middle and high school in America should include a simple but powerful program: food literacy and school gardens.

It does not require acres of farmland. Many schools already have unused green space. Raised beds, small gardens and seasonal planting programs can teach students:

• How soil works • How seeds grow • Seasonal food cycles • Composting and sustainability • Water conservation • Basic food storage

The harvest can even go back to school cafeterias or local food banks.

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And here is where the idea becomes even more powerful.

Americans just couldn’t save money. They would have better health than being addicted to processed food.

Fresh garden-grown vegetables are often more nutritious than produce that travels thousands of miles through a national distribution chain. When families have easy access to fresh tomatoes, lettuce, cucumbers and herbs, they naturally eat more whole foods and fewer highly processed foods.

And that’s important because America’s health care problem is increasingly tied to food.

According to the CDC, nearly 6 out of 10 Americans live with at least one chronic disease such as heart disease, diabetes or obesity. Many of these conditions are strongly influenced by diet and lifestyle.

Health care costs tied to chronic diseases now run into the billions of dollars a year.

Think of this connective tissue. When more Americans eat fresh food and less processed food, long-term medical costs go down.

Gardening also encourages one of the world’s most needed exercises. Digging soil, planting beds, watering plants and tending to the garden get people out and moving instead of staying indoors. Heck, I made a ton as a kid picking up leaves and now all people want to do is beat them.

In other words, growing food improves both sides of the family budget:

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Low grocery bills. Low medical costs. That’s a powerful one-two punch solution for American families. The biggest benefit may be the least measurable thing.

It restores a sense of independence.

Americans are used to solving problems with big government programs, more grants or more regulations. Sometimes the solution is simple.

Give people information and tools.

A generation that knows how to grow food is a generation that is less vulnerable to price shocks, commodity disruptions and inflation. You may not be able to plant everything you eat. But even producing a portion of your food creates obesity.

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And maybe, just maybe it teaches the next generation something profound about self-confidence, responsibility and the importance of hard work.

Because the cheapest vegetables you will ever buy…are the ones you grow yourself.

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