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GOOD FOOD?
From The Economist print edition Dec 7th 2006
http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=E1_RPRTPSV (if you have a subscription)
If you think you can make the planet better by clever shopping, think again. You might make it worse
“You don't have to wait for government to move... the really fantastic thing about Fairtrade is that you can go shopping!” So said a representative of the Fairtrade movement in a British newspaper this year. Similarly Marion Nestle, a nutritionist at New York University, argues that “when you choose organics, you are voting for a planet with fewer pesticides, richer soil and cleaner water supplies.”
The idea that shopping is the new politics is certainly seductive. Never mind the ballot box: vote with your supermarket trolley instead. Elections occur relatively rarely, but you probably go shopping several times a month, providing yourself with lots of opportunities to express your opinions. If you are worried about the environment, you might buy organic food; if you want to help poor farmers, you can do your bit by buying Fairtrade products; or you can express a dislike of evil multinational companies and rampant globalisation by buying only local produce. And the best bit is that shopping, unlike voting, is fun; so you can do good and enjoy yourself at the same time.
Sadly, it's not that easy. There are good reasons to doubt the claims made about three of the most popular varieties of “ethical” food: organic food, Fairtrade food and local food. People who want to make the world a better place cannot do so by shifting their shopping habits: transforming the planet requires duller disciplines, like politics.
Buy organic, destroy the rainforest
Organic food, which is grown without man-made pesticides and fertilisers, is generally assumed to be more environmentally friendly than conventional intensive farming, which is heavily reliant on chemical inputs. But it all depends what you mean by “environmentally friendly”. Farming is inherently bad for the environment: since humans took it up around 11,000 years ago, the result has been deforestation on a massive scale. But following the “green revolution” of the 1960s greater use of chemical fertiliser has tripled grain yields with very little increase in the area of land under cultivation. Organic methods, which rely on crop rotation, manure and compost in place of fertiliser, are far less intensive. So producing the world's current agricultural output organically would require several times as much land as is currently cultivated. There wouldn't be much room left for the rainforest.
Fairtrade food is designed to raise poor farmers' incomes. It is sold at a higher price than ordinary food, with a subsidy passed back to the farmer. But prices of agricultural commodities are low because of overproduction. By propping up the price, the Fairtrade system encourages farmers to produce more of these commodities rather than diversifying into other crops and so depresses prices-thus achieving, for most farmers, exactly the opposite of what the initiative is intended to do. And since only a small fraction of the mark-up on Fairtrade foods actually goes to the farmer-most goes to the retailer-the system gives rich consumers an inflated impression of their largesse and makes alleviating poverty seem too easy.
Surely the case for local food, produced as close as possible to the consumer in order to minimise “food miles” and, by extension, carbon emissions, is clear? Surprisingly, it is not. A study of Britain's food system found that nearly half of food-vehicle miles (ie, miles travelled by vehicles carrying food) were driven by cars going to and from the shops. Most people live closer to a supermarket than a farmer's market, so more local food could mean more food-vehicle miles. Moving food around in big, carefully packed lorries, as supermarkets do, may in fact be the most efficient way to transport the stuff.
What's more, once the energy used in production as well as transport is taken into account, local food may turn out to be even less green. Producing lamb in New Zealand and shipping it to Britain uses less energy than producing British lamb, because farming in New Zealand is less energy-intensive. And the local-food movement's aims, of course, contradict those of the Fairtrade movement, by discouraging rich-country consumers from buying poor-country produce. But since the local-food movement looks suspiciously like old-fashioned protectionism masquerading as concern for the environment, helping poor countries is presumably not the point.
Appetite for change
The aims of much of the ethical-food movement-to protect the environment, to encourage development and to redress the distortions in global trade-are admirable. The problems lie in the means, not the ends. No amount of Fairtrade coffee will eliminate poverty, and all the organic asparagus in the world will not save the planet. Some of the stuff sold under an ethical label may even leave the world in a worse state and its poor farmers poorer than they otherwise would be.
So what should the ethically minded consumer do? Things that are less fun than shopping, alas. Real change will require action by governments, in the form of a global carbon tax; reform of the world trade system; and the abolition of agricultural tariffs and subsidies, notably Europe's monstrous common agricultural policy, which coddles rich farmers and prices those in the poor world out of the European market. Proper free trade would be by far the best way to help poor farmers. Taxing carbon would price the cost of emissions into the price of goods, and retailers would then have an incentive to source locally if it saved energy. But these changes will come about only through difficult, international, political deals that the world's governments have so far failed to do.
The best thing about the spread of the ethical-food movement is that it offers grounds for hope. It sends a signal that there is an enormous appetite for change and widespread frustration that governments are not doing enough to preserve the environment, reform world trade or encourage development. Which suggests that, if politicians put these options on the political menu, people might support them. The idea of changing the world by voting with your trolley may be beguiling. But if consumers really want to make a difference, it is at the ballot box that they need to vote.
From The Economist print edition Dec 7th 2006
http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=E1_RPRTPSV (if you have a subscription)
If you think you can make the planet better by clever shopping, think again. You might make it worse
“You don't have to wait for government to move... the really fantastic thing about Fairtrade is that you can go shopping!” So said a representative of the Fairtrade movement in a British newspaper this year. Similarly Marion Nestle, a nutritionist at New York University, argues that “when you choose organics, you are voting for a planet with fewer pesticides, richer soil and cleaner water supplies.”
The idea that shopping is the new politics is certainly seductive. Never mind the ballot box: vote with your supermarket trolley instead. Elections occur relatively rarely, but you probably go shopping several times a month, providing yourself with lots of opportunities to express your opinions. If you are worried about the environment, you might buy organic food; if you want to help poor farmers, you can do your bit by buying Fairtrade products; or you can express a dislike of evil multinational companies and rampant globalisation by buying only local produce. And the best bit is that shopping, unlike voting, is fun; so you can do good and enjoy yourself at the same time.
Sadly, it's not that easy. There are good reasons to doubt the claims made about three of the most popular varieties of “ethical” food: organic food, Fairtrade food and local food. People who want to make the world a better place cannot do so by shifting their shopping habits: transforming the planet requires duller disciplines, like politics.
Buy organic, destroy the rainforest
Organic food, which is grown without man-made pesticides and fertilisers, is generally assumed to be more environmentally friendly than conventional intensive farming, which is heavily reliant on chemical inputs. But it all depends what you mean by “environmentally friendly”. Farming is inherently bad for the environment: since humans took it up around 11,000 years ago, the result has been deforestation on a massive scale. But following the “green revolution” of the 1960s greater use of chemical fertiliser has tripled grain yields with very little increase in the area of land under cultivation. Organic methods, which rely on crop rotation, manure and compost in place of fertiliser, are far less intensive. So producing the world's current agricultural output organically would require several times as much land as is currently cultivated. There wouldn't be much room left for the rainforest.
Fairtrade food is designed to raise poor farmers' incomes. It is sold at a higher price than ordinary food, with a subsidy passed back to the farmer. But prices of agricultural commodities are low because of overproduction. By propping up the price, the Fairtrade system encourages farmers to produce more of these commodities rather than diversifying into other crops and so depresses prices-thus achieving, for most farmers, exactly the opposite of what the initiative is intended to do. And since only a small fraction of the mark-up on Fairtrade foods actually goes to the farmer-most goes to the retailer-the system gives rich consumers an inflated impression of their largesse and makes alleviating poverty seem too easy.
Surely the case for local food, produced as close as possible to the consumer in order to minimise “food miles” and, by extension, carbon emissions, is clear? Surprisingly, it is not. A study of Britain's food system found that nearly half of food-vehicle miles (ie, miles travelled by vehicles carrying food) were driven by cars going to and from the shops. Most people live closer to a supermarket than a farmer's market, so more local food could mean more food-vehicle miles. Moving food around in big, carefully packed lorries, as supermarkets do, may in fact be the most efficient way to transport the stuff.
What's more, once the energy used in production as well as transport is taken into account, local food may turn out to be even less green. Producing lamb in New Zealand and shipping it to Britain uses less energy than producing British lamb, because farming in New Zealand is less energy-intensive. And the local-food movement's aims, of course, contradict those of the Fairtrade movement, by discouraging rich-country consumers from buying poor-country produce. But since the local-food movement looks suspiciously like old-fashioned protectionism masquerading as concern for the environment, helping poor countries is presumably not the point.
Appetite for change
The aims of much of the ethical-food movement-to protect the environment, to encourage development and to redress the distortions in global trade-are admirable. The problems lie in the means, not the ends. No amount of Fairtrade coffee will eliminate poverty, and all the organic asparagus in the world will not save the planet. Some of the stuff sold under an ethical label may even leave the world in a worse state and its poor farmers poorer than they otherwise would be.
So what should the ethically minded consumer do? Things that are less fun than shopping, alas. Real change will require action by governments, in the form of a global carbon tax; reform of the world trade system; and the abolition of agricultural tariffs and subsidies, notably Europe's monstrous common agricultural policy, which coddles rich farmers and prices those in the poor world out of the European market. Proper free trade would be by far the best way to help poor farmers. Taxing carbon would price the cost of emissions into the price of goods, and retailers would then have an incentive to source locally if it saved energy. But these changes will come about only through difficult, international, political deals that the world's governments have so far failed to do.
The best thing about the spread of the ethical-food movement is that it offers grounds for hope. It sends a signal that there is an enormous appetite for change and widespread frustration that governments are not doing enough to preserve the environment, reform world trade or encourage development. Which suggests that, if politicians put these options on the political menu, people might support them. The idea of changing the world by voting with your trolley may be beguiling. But if consumers really want to make a difference, it is at the ballot box that they need to vote.
In reply to TRNovice:
interesting article with some valid points.
one "ethical shopping" policy not covered
is buying energy efficent products - surely
this is blameless?
interesting article with some valid points.
one "ethical shopping" policy not covered
is buying energy efficent products - surely
this is blameless?
In reply to TRNovice: i have to say there is alot of bollox in this. I buy alot of organic food, several hundred tonnes in fact, and the yields on the organic farms are just the same as those on the conventional in the same country, and far less impact in many different ways.
But anyway, just to draw on one point (non professional) NZ lamb more energy efficient than British lamb? The guy who wrote the article has clearly never climbed in Wales...
But anyway, just to draw on one point (non professional) NZ lamb more energy efficient than British lamb? The guy who wrote the article has clearly never climbed in Wales...
In reply to Dr.Strangeglove:
thats alot of info on beetroot
thats alot of info on beetroot
In reply to Shone:
Yes. the next search result was a paper
that showed similar yields across systems.
depends what you are growing and where.
your welsh lamb example is a case in point.
But remeber very little british lamb is finished
on grass alone - most of them get loads of concentrates
Yes. the next search result was a paper
that showed similar yields across systems.
depends what you are growing and where.
your welsh lamb example is a case in point.
But remeber very little british lamb is finished
on grass alone - most of them get loads of concentrates
In reply to TRNovice: Reminds me of the old adage: 'Fighting for peace is like f*cking for virginity'...
In reply to Dr.Strangeglove:
About the only thing I have ever learnt in life is that there is very little that you can do that no one will blame you for
>
> one "ethical shopping" policy not covered
> is buying energy efficent products - surely
> this is blameless?
> one "ethical shopping" policy not covered
> is buying energy efficent products - surely
> this is blameless?
About the only thing I have ever learnt in life is that there is very little that you can do that no one will blame you for
In reply to Shone:
Based on the Economist's coverage of things that I know something about (e.g. Maths in the Science section), I agree that they are not always 100% accurate and sometimes entirely miss the point. This sounds awfully bad until you compare their levels of accuracy and understanding with the majority of journalists (e.g., to quote from my own experience, the Technology press).
> (In reply to TRNovice) i have to say there is alot of bollox in this.
Based on the Economist's coverage of things that I know something about (e.g. Maths in the Science section), I agree that they are not always 100% accurate and sometimes entirely miss the point. This sounds awfully bad until you compare their levels of accuracy and understanding with the majority of journalists (e.g., to quote from my own experience, the Technology press).
In reply to TRNovice: I don't buy organic to save the planet, I buy it to save me.
In reply to Anonymous:
A recent New Scientist (another of those magazines that doesn't know what it is talking about?) said that tests had revealed no measurable difference in the nutritional value of organic and non-organic food.
Chris
A recent New Scientist (another of those magazines that doesn't know what it is talking about?) said that tests had revealed no measurable difference in the nutritional value of organic and non-organic food.
Chris
In reply to TRNovice:
It's an interesting article but I do distrust the economist on principle and experience.
If it's true, they've got a point. I buy a mix of local/supermarket. The local shops are closer but are open shorter hours so harder to get to. The butchers meat is far tastier than tesco's meat though, I did some blind tasting and it showed up.
It's an interesting article but I do distrust the economist on principle and experience.
If it's true, they've got a point. I buy a mix of local/supermarket. The local shops are closer but are open shorter hours so harder to get to. The butchers meat is far tastier than tesco's meat though, I did some blind tasting and it showed up.
In reply to Chris Craggs:
Based on the opinion of scientists I know, I think they view NS the way that economists view The Economist - i.e. as a journal for non-practitioners. It’s not exactly Nature is it?
> (In reply to Anonymous)
>
> A recent New Scientist (another of those magazines that doesn't know what it is talking about?)
>
> A recent New Scientist (another of those magazines that doesn't know what it is talking about?)
Based on the opinion of scientists I know, I think they view NS the way that economists view The Economist - i.e. as a journal for non-practitioners. It’s not exactly Nature is it?
In reply to galpinos:
I'm not suggesting that The Economist has a monopoly on truth - they obviously have their own axes to grind. In my opinion however, it is helpful to consider the other side of questions like this in order to make informed decisions about your own behaviour.
Most NGOs - almost by definition - have an axe to grind as well. Some of their pronouncements of "fact" should be viewed in the same way as statements by politicians, no matter how worthy a cause they might stand for (the NGOs that is, not the politicians).
> (In reply to TRNovice)
>
> It's an interesting article but I do distrust the economist on principle and experience.
>
> It's an interesting article but I do distrust the economist on principle and experience.
I'm not suggesting that The Economist has a monopoly on truth - they obviously have their own axes to grind. In my opinion however, it is helpful to consider the other side of questions like this in order to make informed decisions about your own behaviour.
Most NGOs - almost by definition - have an axe to grind as well. Some of their pronouncements of "fact" should be viewed in the same way as statements by politicians, no matter how worthy a cause they might stand for (the NGOs that is, not the politicians).
In reply to TRNovice: To be fair when he talks about using local shops and that the distance travelled is greater by cars, he obviously is not taking into account the type of miles those are. A car has vastly different emmissions to an aircraft flying your trimmed beans back from Poland or lamb from New Zealand. I believe its something like a seat on one shorthaul flight is the equivalent of driving your car for its entire lifetime - unless I'm missing something here he's not really comparing like with like. And surely the point of Faitrade is not to diversify but to ensure that the farmers see some of the money they deserve. And Organic food? Like somebody else said they do it for themselves rather than to make a point...
In reply to mike kann:
Actually this is something I have wondered about, does anyone know the actual mpgpp (miles per gallon per person) used by a full 737 flying 1000 miles (UK to Spain) and a full 757 UK to San Francisco (say 6000 miles).
If two of us drive to Spain we will use about 14 gallon each - be interesting to compare?
Chris
Actually this is something I have wondered about, does anyone know the actual mpgpp (miles per gallon per person) used by a full 737 flying 1000 miles (UK to Spain) and a full 757 UK to San Francisco (say 6000 miles).
If two of us drive to Spain we will use about 14 gallon each - be interesting to compare?
Chris
In reply to Chris Craggs: Funnily enough from the Economist...
http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=7033931
Doesn't give figures but makes the point reasonably adequately within the first couple of paragraphs...
http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=7033931
Doesn't give figures but makes the point reasonably adequately within the first couple of paragraphs...
In reply to mike kann:
Interesting - not wanting to be accused of being lazy I worked it out for my self, if I drive down (2 in the car) we will use about 14 gallons each. If we fly down (assuming a full plane) we will use 11 gals each. Not sure where the figure of a lifetimes emissions come from!
Chris
Interesting - not wanting to be accused of being lazy I worked it out for my self, if I drive down (2 in the car) we will use about 14 gallons each. If we fly down (assuming a full plane) we will use 11 gals each. Not sure where the figure of a lifetimes emissions come from!
Chris
In reply to Chris Craggs: Thats Gallon for Gallon though - it burns differently. At the bottom they have a chart comparing grammes od CO2/passenger for different modes of transport. Short haul flights of 500km are the worst (by up to 300%), and 1500km long haul flights are better but but still 150% that of cars...
In reply to mike kann:
I think the points they are making are:
that only about 10% of the premium on Fairtrade coffee goes to the grower, the rest to everyone else in the chain, with the store selling it taking one of the biggest cuts
that supermarkets use the Fairtrade label to identify price-insensitive customers (who by definition are willing to pay more than they have to) and then bleed them
that even if the lot of Fairtrade growers is improved (arguable) that of the non-Fairtrade growers is made worse by the price of their goods being suppressed by over-supply in the market; probably a net disbenefit for the developing world
I guess finally I should say that these are the points that they are making, not me.
> And surely the point of Faitrade is not to diversify but to ensure that the farmers see some of the money they deserve.
I think the points they are making are:
I guess finally I should say that these are the points that they are making, not me.
In reply to mike kann:
I think I should say in defence of The Economist that they have been arguing the case for carbon taxes and the polluter paying for years. I think their difference with the green movement is more about means than ends.
> (In reply to Chris Craggs) Funnily enough from the Economist...
>
> http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=7033931
>
> http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=7033931
I think I should say in defence of The Economist that they have been arguing the case for carbon taxes and the polluter paying for years. I think their difference with the green movement is more about means than ends.
In reply to Chris Craggs:
There is also a suggestion that emissions from jets are more deleterious to the environment than an equivalent amount of cars and lorries. I think the point was to do with the height at which they are discharged - no personal knowledge on whether this is true or not. Maybe some one else will knowmore about this.
There is also a suggestion that emissions from jets are more deleterious to the environment than an equivalent amount of cars and lorries. I think the point was to do with the height at which they are discharged - no personal knowledge on whether this is true or not. Maybe some one else will knowmore about this.
In reply to TRNovice: I take your point. I supose the only way around this though is to remove the shop and buy direct - but how do you achieve this with the more exotic items that people now seem to be unable to live without, like coffee.
I must admit that I buy locally and my farm shop is far less distance than a supermarket by about 6 or 7 miles... they sell organic rare breds meat directly off the farm (which tastes frickking sublime) and the increase in cost is about the same as the petrol to get to a supermarket - I reckon I go to a supermarket maybe once a month... Infact there are two farm shops in my village, an old lady who sells eggs from the chickens in her back yard, and another farmshop about minutes down the road. I guess I'm lucky...
I must admit that I buy locally and my farm shop is far less distance than a supermarket by about 6 or 7 miles... they sell organic rare breds meat directly off the farm (which tastes frickking sublime) and the increase in cost is about the same as the petrol to get to a supermarket - I reckon I go to a supermarket maybe once a month... Infact there are two farm shops in my village, an old lady who sells eggs from the chickens in her back yard, and another farmshop about minutes down the road. I guess I'm lucky...
In reply to TRNovice:
2-4 times the warming effect of CO2 alone, according to the IPCC
http://deoxy.org/meme/AviationSmog
> (In reply to Chris Craggs)
>
> There is also a suggestion that emissions from jets are more deleterious to the environment than an equivalent amount of cars and lorries.
>
> There is also a suggestion that emissions from jets are more deleterious to the environment than an equivalent amount of cars and lorries.
2-4 times the warming effect of CO2 alone, according to the IPCC
http://deoxy.org/meme/AviationSmog
In reply to TRNovice:
If by 'premium'you mean the extra 50p and originally the coffee grower was getting say 5p, 10% of that 50p doubles the farmers income
> (In reply to mike kann)
>
> I think the points they are making are:
>
> that only about 10% of the premium on Fairtrade coffee goes to the grower, the rest to everyone else in the chain, with the store selling it taking one of the biggest cuts
>
>
> I think the points they are making are:
>
> that only about 10% of the premium on Fairtrade coffee goes to the grower, the rest to everyone else in the chain, with the store selling it taking one of the biggest cuts
>
If by 'premium'you mean the extra 50p and originally the coffee grower was getting say 5p, 10% of that 50p doubles the farmers income
And travelling further to buy local is utter bs. To buy local you go to a shop in town just the same distance as going to a supermarket, or even buy local things in the supermarket.
And organic food doesn't take up rainforest space if it is local
In reply to TRNovice:
But Fair Trade food is flawed due to over production. Surely if we are over producing (which we are, you only need to look at EU food mountains) then a reduction of yield per acre would not prevent us producing suffient food as claimed in the anti organic polemic but would in fact help us to balance nearer the land usage and yields produced?
Also, the argument against local food, saying that half the food miles are us doing our shopping, totally relies not only on the idea that you live nearer a supermarket than a farmer's market (not true in my case - 7 miles and 1/2 mile respectively) but also that this difference offsets the difference in the food miles between the respective crops. For example, if I lived 2 miles from the market and 1 mile from a supermarket but bought apples that have travelled 50 miles in the market but ones from New Zealand in the supermarket then despite the supermarket being nearer the food will still have covered more mileage in total.
Finally, there is absolutely no mention (as there never is in these articles) of actually growing your own veg and fruit. We have a modest garden but grew all our our raspberries, blackcurrants and redcurrants. We also grew strawberries,cherries, potatoes, tomatoes, carrots, runner beans, courgettes and lettuce. Our brassicas were a bit of a disater but you live and learn.
It also takes very little effort and saves you a lot of money on soft fruit, albeit not a lot on veg as farmed veg is so cheap.
This all from four beds 2.4 m x 1.2m, dug out of our back lawn, so no rain forest loss in sight.
The veggies taste nice and you can walk out of the house to pick them rather than drive miles.
> >
> A strange and somewhat contradictory article. On the one hand organic food is bad because you can't get as much out of the ground per acre, so you will destroy the rain forest (always assuming all crops can be grown on ex rain forest land presumably!)
> A strange and somewhat contradictory article. On the one hand organic food is bad because you can't get as much out of the ground per acre, so you will destroy the rain forest (always assuming all crops can be grown on ex rain forest land presumably!)
But Fair Trade food is flawed due to over production. Surely if we are over producing (which we are, you only need to look at EU food mountains) then a reduction of yield per acre would not prevent us producing suffient food as claimed in the anti organic polemic but would in fact help us to balance nearer the land usage and yields produced?
Also, the argument against local food, saying that half the food miles are us doing our shopping, totally relies not only on the idea that you live nearer a supermarket than a farmer's market (not true in my case - 7 miles and 1/2 mile respectively) but also that this difference offsets the difference in the food miles between the respective crops. For example, if I lived 2 miles from the market and 1 mile from a supermarket but bought apples that have travelled 50 miles in the market but ones from New Zealand in the supermarket then despite the supermarket being nearer the food will still have covered more mileage in total.
Finally, there is absolutely no mention (as there never is in these articles) of actually growing your own veg and fruit. We have a modest garden but grew all our our raspberries, blackcurrants and redcurrants. We also grew strawberries,cherries, potatoes, tomatoes, carrots, runner beans, courgettes and lettuce. Our brassicas were a bit of a disater but you live and learn.
It also takes very little effort and saves you a lot of money on soft fruit, albeit not a lot on veg as farmed veg is so cheap.
This all from four beds 2.4 m x 1.2m, dug out of our back lawn, so no rain forest loss in sight.
The veggies taste nice and you can walk out of the house to pick them rather than drive miles.
In reply to Chris James:
I think the article was aimed (possibly inaccurately) at people who feel self-satisfied that they are "doing their bit", but may not be. I don't think they were targeting people like you who grow their own food.
I think the article was aimed (possibly inaccurately) at people who feel self-satisfied that they are "doing their bit", but may not be. I don't think they were targeting people like you who grow their own food.
In reply to TRNovice:
Fair enough, although I think my criticisms of the article still stand.
In any case, no-one can grow all their own food and certainly not tea / coffee etc so it still applies to me. I'm not bothered about orgainc per se (I'll use chemcials if absolutely necssary on my veg, although I think they are all 'organic' approved so far!) - I just like what tastes nice.
I have no plans to start rearing and slaughtering anicmals either, my neighbours will be glad to hear.
Fair enough, although I think my criticisms of the article still stand.
In any case, no-one can grow all their own food and certainly not tea / coffee etc so it still applies to me. I'm not bothered about orgainc per se (I'll use chemcials if absolutely necssary on my veg, although I think they are all 'organic' approved so far!) - I just like what tastes nice.
I have no plans to start rearing and slaughtering anicmals either, my neighbours will be glad to hear.
In reply to Chris James:
I assume that they were rather over-stating their case to try to puncture some bubbles. Some of the generalisations that they make are not wholly sustainable, but maybe part of what they are trying to do is take the same approach as the NGOs who are equally happy to quote "statistics" to support their cause.
The above article was a leader and there was a more detailed piece later on in the magazine (too long to post here). They based their claims about local food involving more food miles per tonne on a survey done by the UK DEFRA, (the environment and farming ministry), here is an extract:
"The DEFRA report, which analysed the supply of food in Britain, contained several counterintuitive findings. It turns out to be better for the environment to truck in tomatoes from Spain during the winter, for example, than to grow them in heated greenhouses in Britain. And it transpires that half the food-vehicle miles associated with British food are travelled by cars driving to and from the shops. Each trip is short, but there are millions of them every day. Another surprising finding was that a shift towards a local food system, and away from a supermarket-based food system, with its central distribution depots, lean supply chains and big, full trucks, might actually increase the number of food-vehicle miles being travelled locally, because things would move around in a larger number of smaller, less efficiently packed vehicles. "
The full article is at the URL below if you are interested. I think you can read this one without being a subscriber.
http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8380592
I assume that they were rather over-stating their case to try to puncture some bubbles. Some of the generalisations that they make are not wholly sustainable, but maybe part of what they are trying to do is take the same approach as the NGOs who are equally happy to quote "statistics" to support their cause.
The above article was a leader and there was a more detailed piece later on in the magazine (too long to post here). They based their claims about local food involving more food miles per tonne on a survey done by the UK DEFRA, (the environment and farming ministry), here is an extract:
"The DEFRA report, which analysed the supply of food in Britain, contained several counterintuitive findings. It turns out to be better for the environment to truck in tomatoes from Spain during the winter, for example, than to grow them in heated greenhouses in Britain. And it transpires that half the food-vehicle miles associated with British food are travelled by cars driving to and from the shops. Each trip is short, but there are millions of them every day. Another surprising finding was that a shift towards a local food system, and away from a supermarket-based food system, with its central distribution depots, lean supply chains and big, full trucks, might actually increase the number of food-vehicle miles being travelled locally, because things would move around in a larger number of smaller, less efficiently packed vehicles. "
The full article is at the URL below if you are interested. I think you can read this one without being a subscriber.
http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8380592
In reply to TRNovice:
this doesn't surprise me in the least. As someone I know who is a distribution manager for Boots once said to me: we wouldn't organise it that way if it wasn't cheaper - ie used less fuel.
The biggest argument agaisnt fair trade is that it insulates (to an extent) producers from price signals which should encourage them to diversify. Personally that doesn't stop me buying it because FT itself is a form of niche-market innovation, and it is up to national governments - and to a lesser extent NGOs - to encourage diversification. It is never going to good for a country to be reliant on commodity markets whether dominated by TNCs or a FT variant.
> "The DEFRA report, which analysed the supply of food in Britain, contained several counterintuitive findings. It turns out to be better for the environment to truck in tomatoes from Spain during the winter, for example...
this doesn't surprise me in the least. As someone I know who is a distribution manager for Boots once said to me: we wouldn't organise it that way if it wasn't cheaper - ie used less fuel.
The biggest argument agaisnt fair trade is that it insulates (to an extent) producers from price signals which should encourage them to diversify. Personally that doesn't stop me buying it because FT itself is a form of niche-market innovation, and it is up to national governments - and to a lesser extent NGOs - to encourage diversification. It is never going to good for a country to be reliant on commodity markets whether dominated by TNCs or a FT variant.
In reply to Stig:
The counter argument from the NGOs is that developing world producers are too poor to diversify out of, say, coffee beans; but I agree that the incentive of price signals must be blunted by things like Fair Trade. The detailed Economist report (not the leader I posted) also said that Fair Trade has political aims, e.g. it will generally only work with cooperatives of small farmers and not the larger plantations - unfortunately many more people in the developing world work on the bigger farms.
Again I must stress that I have no information on this beyond what I read in the article - it may be right and it may be wrong. However, if true, this approach seems a case of an NGO favouring a certain set of producers over others - which is certainly not reflected on the Fair Trade labels on the bags of coffee I see.
The counter argument from the NGOs is that developing world producers are too poor to diversify out of, say, coffee beans; but I agree that the incentive of price signals must be blunted by things like Fair Trade. The detailed Economist report (not the leader I posted) also said that Fair Trade has political aims, e.g. it will generally only work with cooperatives of small farmers and not the larger plantations - unfortunately many more people in the developing world work on the bigger farms.
Again I must stress that I have no information on this beyond what I read in the article - it may be right and it may be wrong. However, if true, this approach seems a case of an NGO favouring a certain set of producers over others - which is certainly not reflected on the Fair Trade labels on the bags of coffee I see.
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