For breakfast this morning I poached two eggs laid by Trouble, one of Ken Snoke’s chickens. Trouble may be trouble in the hen yard, but she sure knows how to produce picture-perfect green-gray eggs – a color you will not find in PAAS Easter egg dye kits. Trouble’s eggs are so lovely, I experience a twinge of regret every time I crack one open.
Inside is a dark orange yolk redolent with country-fresh flavor. Eating Trouble’s eggs takes me back to summers on my grandmother’s farm, where virtually everything cooked in the kitchen was grown on the premises. Our meals were alive with deliciousness. At five years of age I didn’t appreciate flavorful eggs the way I do now. But then, I thought eggs came from a chicken coop instead of a cardboard carton. “Reality” set in a few years later.
As I enjoyed Trouble’s eggs I scanned an article about Harvard Business School professor Michael Porter, who built a career helping companies create strategic advantage by beating out competitors in a relentless game of win/lose. In a stunning about-face, Porter is now urging businesses to pursue growth strategies that are inclusive rather than divisive. Value creation has morphed into what he calls shared value creation.
The addition of the word shared represents a sea change in Porter’s thinking. It goes like this: In a world of scarcity, wealth cannot continue to be created just for the few. Benefits need to be spread more widely – to small farmers and enterprises, women, young people. Consider what happened on the streets of Cairo and Tripoli, where educated, digitally connected twenty-somethings who have been locked out of the formal economy challenged the prevailing political and economic orthodoxy. Like Porter, they were making a case for localized opportunity and shared value creation. Apparently the distance between Harvard and Africa is only a Facebook message away.
My thoughts wandered to the aftermath of the Fukushima nuclear power plant meltdown, which raised concerns about radiation in food. One email update from a scientist explained the half life of radioactive iodine in fish, dairy products, fruits and vegetables. At the conclusion he advised, “This is definitely a good time to buy local produce. At least you know where it comes from.”
When the guru of American business strategy recommends sharing wealth with the little guy and a scientist tells you that consuming local produce is safer than buying imports, it just might be a trend in the making. Going local and supporting small enterprises could well be emerging as the wave of the future, out of necessity if not enlightenment.
Trouble does seem to be on the rise. We can either be brought down by it, or we can find new ways to transcend it. If you prefer the latter, living more locally is a good way to begin. I hope to see you Saturday mornings at the Jacksonville Farmer’s Market, where I’ll be stocking up on produce grown a stone’s throw away and Trouble’s green-gray eggs. They’re golden.
Gates McKibbin moved to Jacksonville after working and living in the Bay Area for three decades as a consultant to major corporations. This column contains her musings about this remarkable community and her new life
far away from the fast lane.