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Its better because its local is not xenophobic, its better because its from within some made up geographical boundries is. There are tons of objective reasons
by Arkhaine_kupo 7y ago
Its better because its local is not xenophobic, its better because its from within some made up geographical boundries is.
There are tons of objective reasons to promote local products, we have incredible soil and weather, we have a historical tradition of shepherding and sea faring. But none of that is promoted, its the "its from here" with vague connotations.
It is a large corporation that has had a huge trouble expanding outside the local area of influence. Eroski has been a huge supermarket in the basque country for decades and has never hold more than a minimun influence in spain (despite other supermaket chains like Mercadona appearing much later and now dominating the country). Fagor grew steadily to 5,600 employees and then went bankrupt leaving all but 700 unemployed when a company from elsewhere bought the remains. The university has 4 thousand students and most are basque.
They are massive but they are massive because they have a huge influence on a very rich part of spain
- AshamedCaptain 7y agoEvery definition of "localness" is also a "made up geographical boundary" so I fail to see the distinction. It is precisely "it's from here" that my argument applied to. I.e. a supermarket advertising "it's from here" produce is not xenophobic. From my experience, Spain is actually one of the countries in Europe where it is extremely hard to find local produce. Almost everywhere else I can find specific aisle for "it's from here stuff" and again I fail to see why that would be xenophobic. At least I always prefer to buy from there since it's usually more reasonable ecologically-wise.
- JoeAltmaier 7y agoI don't get the ecological argument. Small batch local produce has to be quite a bit less efficient than large-scale production. Transportation has to be a small fraction of the total impact?
- AshamedCaptain 7y agoSomeone linked an article below pointing this is an oversimplification, but yes, importing produce from another continent (e.g. California when Spain has better climate for that) tends to be bad.
- JoeAltmaier 7y agoThat's curious... ocean shipping is so massive and scaled so large, I'd guess its cheaper per item than, for instance, your drive to the grocery store to pick up that item.
- Angostura 7y agoDo you think restrictions on the marque 'Champagne' are xenophobic?
- leftyted 7y ago"Buy local" is not xenophobic. Everyone knows that "buying local" is about supporting local jobs/industry. There's nothing xenophobic about caring more about your neighbors than some people you'll never meet thousands of miles away. If it is to be a meaningful term, xenophobia has to be about fear or hatred. It can't mean "favoring local over non-local".
- spaintech 7y agoSure, but in this region it’s more like buy my local good for you product, sure it’s a little more expensive but.... “OR ELSE”... Many have been driven out of their town or even killed (yes that is what I said) if you go against the status quo in the Basque region. Mondragón would not exist for not for the Basque cause... and most likely (it’s been their financial arm) the Basque cause would not have existed with out Mondragón.