Call for end to ‘carbon hypocrisy’ in food miles debate

THE UK-based Food Ethics Council has proposed detailed guidelines on how supermarkets should respond to the increasingly high profile “flying food” issue in Britain and elsewhere. The debate could have far-reaching effects on farmers, fishing operations and the freight industry in South Africa and elsewhere on the continent. Environmental groups have focused on airfreight’s impact on food’s carbon footprint, and have called for a reduction in flying food to fill supermarket shelves. Airfreight is claimed to account for 0.3% of UK greenhouse gases. However, development organisations say that response could harm communities in poor countries which depend on horticultural exports. “The debate on airfreight has matured. We’re setting out steps for retailers to follow that will make the situation better for the environment, for development and for consumers,” says Tom MacMillan, executive director of the Food Ethics Council. The council argues that retailers will see civil society groups and consumers judge their performance against increasingly clear and challenging benchmarks. In a recently released report, the council calls for an end to “carbon hypocrisy”, where air freighted produce is replaced with more greenhouse gas-intensive substitutes, even if they have travelled fewer “food miles”. It says the focus should be on “the aspects of air freight that are most widely agreed to be a problem, particularly by improved planning in order to increase flight efficiency and limit ‘emergency’ topup, where airfreight is used to fill unexpected gaps on the shelf”. The report highlights the need for retailers to address wider environmental issues besides climate change, such as water scarcity, waste and biodiversity. It urges retailers to develop measurable indicators of poverty reduction in communities that supply their products, and calls on them to bear the costs of external accreditation – such as the Fairtrade mark – for high labour standards in their own and suppliers’ operations. It also suggests that retailers will need to work actively with their customers to challenge potentially unsustainable expectations that most fresh products will be constantly available throughout the year.