Rising cost of food subject of next Missoula City Club forum on 9/15

Americans recently have been experiencing sticker shock at the grocery store.

What’s behind the rising cost of food? What factors affect locally grown food, and what affects the price of food transported across the country? Where will our food come from in the future? What are the roles of fuel costs and pressures for other uses for food crops, such as ethanol? What can people do to control the costs to their own households?

City Club Missoula’s http://www.cityclubmissoula.org September 15 forum will look at these issues with a panel of experts including Josh Slotnick, co-owner of Clark Fork Organics in Missoula and an instructor in the University of Montana’s Program in Ecological Agriculture and Society (PEAS); Joel Clairmont, deputy director of the Montana Department of Agriculture and owner and operator of a family farm that raises hay, grain and beef cattle; Crissie McMullen of Grow Montana, a coalition of agencies and organizations promoting a more central role for community-based agriculture in Montana; and Verne House, an agricultural economist who has taught at the University of Wyoming, Clemson University and Texas A & M University and served as extension economist at Montana State University for 17 years.

Full Story: http://missoulian.com/articles/2008/09/09/bnews/br32.txt