Food Miles (From Hereford Times)

Food Miles

3:31pm Friday 15th December 2006

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I've got on to food this week in the paper. Once i get going on this subject I might not stop.

I'm continually amazed by the madness of the way our food system works and how it ever got to be so.
Even among the 'carbon conscious' there is little undertanding of the impact we make as food consumers. So here's the statistic that really does it for me - the carbon emissions from the production, processing and distribution of the food of the average family is more or less the same as the emissions from their transport and energy use in the house put together- so for all that activity and effort going in to changing lightbulbs and switching off appliances, which is no doubt of great importance, switching the way we go about our food shopping will have a greater impact.

Whenever i start to feel re-assured that this situation is changing, i get a reminder of how it really is. Last week, for example, the local council responsible for Stansted airport refused planning permission for increased passenger numbers, partly for 'climate change reasons'. However, during the same week I became aware of a proposal to build a new freight terminal at Manchester Airport, specifically for air-freighted fresh produce - so what does that say about whether people are buying local food or not.

Or even shipped produce, when air freighted produce causes 50 times more CO2 emissions than shipping, I'd like to see some reference to food miles, and by what means, when i buy something - then i can make an informed choice. There's a farm shop near Gloucester, at Over, where, last time i went, it had food miles on the labels for all of their fresh produce. Now that's proper consumer information... of course for them its good marketing because a lot of their stuff is grown on the farm next door, on one label it said 'food miles = 200 yards', now thats what i call local!....