Perhaps unintentionally, Kamyar Enshayan, of the University of Northern Iowa's Center for Energy and Environmental Education, has developed a diet plan guaranteed to reduce your caloric intake. Just eat food in which the purchase price returns to the local economy. Hopefully, you won't starve.

"The economy of my dinner plate is completely disconnected from the local economy," Enshayan explained to state legislators Chuck Isenhart, D-Dubuque, and Bill Heckroth, D-Waverly, who hosted a public hearing Friday at Loras College. The hearing focused on how government can help expand the concept of local food beyond Farmers Market booths.

Enshayan presented data about the potential economic impact. He said there are about 50,000 households in Black Hawk County, where people spend about $270 million per year on groceries and another $150 million dining out.

"Just in my county alone, we are spending more than $400 million on food every year, most of which leaves Black Hawk County and leaves Iowa," Enshayan said. "That's not sustainable in an economic sense."

Enshayan decided to capture

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more of those dollars locally. Rudy's Tacos in Waterloo, Iowa, took the challenge. Enshayan helped the restaurant connect with local producers for its ingredients. Some, like cilantro, are hard to find in large quantities, but Rudy's purchased 71 percent of its ingredients locally. That added $167,000 to the local economy that previously went elsewhere.

Those are the kinds of projects that pique Isenhart's interest. He wonders why Iowa, one of the world's great food producers, imports 60 percent or more of its food.

"This is the national agricultural heritage area of America," said Ken Quinn, of the World Food Prize and a Dubuque native. "It ought to be the place that is pioneering all of these kinds of things. People should be coming here to learn about Henry Wallace, Norman Borlaug, Herbert Hoover and George Washington Carver. It ought to be about tourism, but also demonstration."

Isenhart and Heckroth are seeking concrete ideas to take back to the Legislature in January when funding decisions are being made in economic development and job creation, and in particular ideas about how to promote local foods.

"We want to know what the impediments are and to find out how can we remove them," Heckroth said.