It’s time for Squamish to showcase just how foodie it is.
Residents have until Sept.14 to vote for their favourite culinary hangouts in a province-wide people’s choice awards, dubbed We Heart Local Awards. The BC Agriculture Council and BC Dairy Association initiative aims to highlight popular food and agriculture businesses across B.C.
Over the competition’s three-year history, two Squamish businesses soared to the top of their category. In 2013, Locavore was nominated and won Favourite Local Food Truck and Howe Sound Brewery landed in first place for the Favourite Brewery category two years running.
The title means a lot, said the co-owner of Howe Sound Brewery, Leslie Fenn. Last year, We Heart Local Awards had almost 350 nominees and attracted 40,000 votes in the 15 categories.
The win propelled the brewery into the media spotlight, Fenn said. Staff were interviewed by newspapers and television stations and appeared on a TV show.
“It is really amazing,” she says.
The awards help highlight the vast selection of B.C. agriculture and artesian produce, Fenn said, and supporting such companies fans out into so many different areas of agriculture. Howe Sound Brewery purchases local berries for its beers and uses hops from Hops Connect, a hop trading company in Pemberton.
Fenn said there are positive spill-off effects of buying from B.C. artesian companies including microbreweries.
British Columbians are more aware of where their food is coming from, but that’s not necessarily translating into their buying practices, said Reg Ens, executive director of the B.C. Agriculture Council.
Campaigns like We Heart Local Awards aim to create a buzz around B.C.’s produce selection. Ens hopes early adopters of such shopping practices will help thrust the movement forward.
There are many benefits for purchasers and producers of consuming food grown within B.C., he said.
“B.C. has high standards in food safety, regarding the environment and labour,” Ens said.
Buying B.C. produce helps diversify the province’s economy and adds jobs to the market pool. There is less of a carbon footprint for food trucked in from around B.C. than produce shipped and flown in from around the world, he added.
“The multiplier effects on this are a lot higher,” Ens said, noting B.C. farmers tend to invest back into their province.
You can vote or nominate a business in the third-annual awards at www.weheartlocalawards.ca.
Nominations are open until Wednesday, Sept. 6. Voting will be open from Sept. 7 to Sept. 14.
