Informing the Carbon foot print

Government data suggests that food transportation within and around the UK produces 109 million tonnes of CO2 annually which equates to 26 per cent of our greenhouse gas emissions.

Coupled with this, cuisine and tastes have changed over the last 60 years, and with this diversity the need and want for imported food has magnified significantly.? The transportation of food imported to the UK from long distances is a contributing factor to greenhouse gases which is having an adverse effect on climate change.

Wouldn’t it therefore be a good idea if we were able to put some form of traffic light system onto labels indicating the severity of the impact the food within has had on carbon emissions?? This would of course equally apply to the packaging itself.? Manufacturers would then possibly need to reassess the method and modes as to how the food we eat is transported and make this transparent to the consumer.

Labelling is extremely powerful, and gives us as the consumer choices. These choices could have an impact on not only the ingredients, nutrition and calorific calculations of the food we eat but maybe we could go further and have choices on what effect the food we eat has had on the planet.

This truly is food for thought - as it is in the interests of everyone to look after our planet.