The three and nine-month totals assume that similar amounts are available for those time periods, although it is likely that very little food is brought in before July. The energy required for food imports includes all on-farm activities and transportation. For each crop, the transportation analysis was restricted to the largest exporter for each country, by state and province. The distance to Toronto was calculated form the mid-point of that particular state or provinces, as the data were not available at any finer spatial resolution. Both the nine and the three-month analyses assumed that production was invariable throughout the year.
Trucks represent the single most important mode of transport for agricultural produce.
A standard truck size was used to calculate the consumption of fuel required for the trip, and the maximum load of the truck was divided into the total amount of each crop imported in order to determine the number of trips. Plums and prunes rank low on our table, even though the energy inputs are high, due to the relatively small amount that is imported. Other crops such as beans require minimal energy for transport in relation to the energy inputs required for production. The energy used to transport a crop tends to be extremely high for certain crops such as peaches, spinach and peppers, partly due to distance, in relation to the energy required for production. In fact, only peas, beets and raspberries require more energy for production than transportation.