A few years ago, while chatting with a wine industry friend, I was accused of being "BC brainwashed".

I was initially taken aback by the accusation – was it really so bad that I was a devout supporter of what was locally abundant? 

I took the comments to heart, and began asking peers whether this was an "epidemic" – did I really have "valley palate"?

The more people I spoke to – the more I realized it was nothing to be ashamed of.

In fact, when we consider what the French, Italians, or Germans drink – it's not wine sourced from other markets. They are staunch supporters of – you guessed it – what is available locally. 

I spoke with Chris Turyk, marketing director of Unsworth Winery on Vancouver Island, about why Canadians need to focus on supporting local more than ever.

He shared "It is absolutely paramount that we focus and support all of our local businesses, especially agriculture, food production (wine/alcohol inclusive), and make conscious buying decisions to keep our dollar within our local economy. 

Look what is happening in the US with wine import tariffs. Even with very strong domestic production and consumption of American wine within the US up to 10,000 Americans could be out of work within the wine industry if these tariffs go through as planned. These are importers, distributors, agents, retail workers that focus on imported wines. That doesn’t even take into account the impact of economies of the EU wine-producing countries.

When you ship your dollar overseas especially your food dollar, you are trusting your food source to another country’s political will and economy. This is inherently unstable. For every food dollar spent on local products $0.65-$, 0.85 of that dollar stays in the local economy. It goes into your taxes, your government programs and your community. In the '70s, BC produced about 90% of its own food. That number is less than 20% now. The security of our own food has been shipped outside the boundaries of our province so it is essentially not in our hands anymore. That imbalance of power is not sustainable and the trend needs to be drastically reversed."

Without local investment, farmers and winemakers lose the opportunity to grow and improve. No buy-in from locals will also perpetuate the stigma of BC (and Canadian) wine. 

Supporting local is so much more than a trendy choice to make – it's a personal responsibility we all need to take if our local economy has any hope of thriving.