Wayne Roberts' article in this issue of Alternatives is titled "Eat this Recession" and in it he describes an inventive plan for pulling ourselves up by our own economic bootstraps.

He says that if three million Canadians shifted $100 from buying imported food to buying local food, the economic impetus of all that local money sloshing around our economy would inevitably create the jobs we are so lacking.

There are some wiggles -- like the 10% credit he's asking the government to kick in to cover the extra cost of local food.

I visited Roberts hoping to find some weaknesses in his scheme. I came away instead having received a lesson in the true cost of imported foods, the potential for home and roof-top gardening, why winters in Canada not necessarily be written off for agriculture.