Survey finds American consumers prefer locally grown food.

Americans feel better about buying food produced in the United States than overseas and believe food grown locally is healthier than food shipped from across the country, a new survey shows. The Associated Press reports that the poll, released last week by the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture at Iowa State University, found that 85% of Americans have confidence in the safety of their local and regional food systems. But only 12% expressed confidence in the safety of food from anywhere else in the world.

In the survey, 500 Americans were questioned about their attitudes about the U.S. food supply and food safety. It was conducted online during July and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4 percentage points. According to the survey, 70% of respondents believe that foods produced locally--rather than foods that have traveled across the country--are healthier, even though there is little evidence to back that up.