Moral Question(s) - Ethical Food Shopping

A._Badger

Edwardia wrote: »

Agree but wholesome affordable food for all with high welfare standards IS more expensive to produce.

Yes, it is. But it is nowhere near as expensive to produce as so-called 'organic' produce.

I have no argument with people who prefer to buy British. I do myself. I go even further: I try to buy from my neighbours (I live in a very rural location, so that isn't hard - unless I want a lemon or a pineapple).

I also agree with you about the unmitigated evil that is the EU farm subsidy system.

Edwardia wrote: »

Don't agree with the sanctimonious middle class comment. I'm the daughter of middle class parents, married to a man from a working class background and my husband and his family are just as keen to eat decent food as my family -his mother wouldn't dream of serving up a ready meal.

Wholesome does not mean 'organic'. 'Ready meals' are not necessarily unwholesome.

The 'organic' movement is a lifestyle choice and a statement. It doesn't have very much to do with nutrition, economics or feeding the world. It is selling a message to M&S and Waitrose customers - helping them assuage their innate sense of guilt for being 'privileged'.

stephen77

useless_git_requires_wife wrote: »

Modern organic farming is a sound model and in some cases produces more product (and value) per hectare than comparable non-organic farms. It's not a perfect system, but it is sustainable and sensible.

1.

Then why is it not cheaper if product and value are increased?

mcallister1

This is an interesting debate. I watched a film called Fast Food Nation about the food situation in the USA, where things are even more industrialised than here. It is a horrible story of big business taking something which should be simple and supply sufficient food, and then using it to create a market leader for their products... Gm seed for example. The big cattle pens they have there are also horrific.
Have I changed the way I shop though? I do what I can, when I can afford to, and draw some absolute lines, which may or may not be rational, eg Fairtrade bananas and free range eggs. I consider buying yellow stickers or short dated food to also be a contribution (conveniently as I love a bargain!) as otherwise some would go to landfill.
There are so many factors it has become very confusing. I do think we should try to think more about whether we need to eat so much meat and go for better welfare standards, but less often. Having said that, as others have pointed out, if you are struggling for money, working long hours and under stress, everything conspired to send you the way the manufacturer wants you to go.

valk_scot

There is always the arguement that by not buying foodstuffs like green beans from Senegal or Kenya, poorer nations would be deprived of the chance to grow cash crops for export and their economies would suffer. Poorer nations need such cash crops to be able to buy in foreign imports like medicine and technology.


Having said that I really dislike buying imported foodstuffs when there's a British produced equivelent availible. However like all of us budget is tight so I will buy them when there's a bargain, say in the Whoopsies section. Like most folk my ethical standards suffer a bit of a wobble when it comes to saving a substantial amount of money! In general though I prefer to buy as much as possible from my local very good greengrocer and butcher, who both source as much as they can from local farmers.

I'm fortunate though in that I do live in one of the market garden counties where they produce a lot of quality foodstuffs anyway. If I really wanted to I could source a very good diet from my own county suppliers only. It would, however, be very seasonal and limited in many ways. (Tea and coffee don't grow up here!)


I don't think it's an either/or situation tbh. I do think that if we all tried say to buy 10-20% more of our foodstuffs from local or british producers the farming economy would benefit greatly, to the point where there would start to be more economy of scale and foodstuff prices would start to be more competitive with foreign imports. Worth thinking about perhaps, with your own buying?

Edwardia

A._Badger wrote: »

The 'organic' movement is a lifestyle choice and a statement. It doesn't have very much to do with nutrition, economics or feeding the world. It is selling a message to M&S and Waitrose customers - helping them assuage their innate sense of guilt for being 'privileged'.

Have to disagree again. The Soil Association for example, was founded in 1946. Granted, organic is mainstream now, but that's true of the whole go Green, save the planet message. Even fifteen years ago it was seen to be cranky.

I get Internet deliveries from Waitrose because I don't drive and free delivery saves me the bus fare and the quality is excellent. I rarely shop in Marks and Spencer as there isn't one in my town Shopping in them doesn't make me privileged and I don't feel at all guilty, that's tosh sorry.

You're making classist comments and stereotyping people.

If I want to shop in Lidl, Waitrose, Marks and Spencer, Fortnums, Poundland, ASDA, Sainsbury's, Morrisons, Holland and Barrett, 99p Stores, Wilkinson, Co-op - I can and will. My OH works hard and our money is as good as anyone else's.

We bargain hunt so every pound goes further. We want the best food we can afford. We've been poor, eating soya mince every night and it's depressing. So no guilt here at all.

useless_git_requires_wife

A._Badger wrote: »

Let me guess. You don't have any relevant scientific background in agriculture, do you?

The 'very basics of soil management' are well known and understood - quite as much by farmers who take advantage of science as those who prefer to believe in muck and magic.

I've plenty relevant experience to the subject and not just in Britain. Modern organic farming utilises science whilst observing principles of sustainability. There are good and bad organic farms just as there are good and bad non-organic farms, but organic farming's principles are sounder and, in my view, have a bright future. Time will tell but I can't subscribe to the black and white view of things that you seem to have, that one type of farming is the only possible future and the other is quackery of some sort.

useless_git_requires_wife

stephen77 wrote: »

Then why is it not cheaper if product and value are increased?

I said in some cases, not the majority.

That may change over time.

useless_git_requires_wife

There's a good UN study by the Food and Agriculture Organisation that compares organic and non-organic farming, sadly I cant link to it but here's a sample:


Positive environmental impacts of organic agriculture

Increased soil fertility: biodynamic farms had better soil quality: greater in organic matter, content and microbial activity, more earthworms, better soil structure, lower bulk density, easier penetrability, and thicker topsoil (Reganold et al., 1993);
agricultural productivity doubled with soil fertility techniques: compost application and introduction of leguminous plants into the crop
sequence (Dobbs and Smolik, 1996; Drinkwater, 1998; Edwards, 2007);
More energy efficiency: growing organic rice was four times more energy efficient than the conventional method (Mendoza, 2002);
organic agriculture reduces energy requirements for production systems by 25 to 50 percent compared to conventional chemical-based agriculture (Niggli
et al., 2009);
Carbon sequestration: German organic farms annually sequester 402 kg Carbon/ha, while conventional farms had losses of 202 kg (Clark et al., 1999; Küstermann et al., 2008; Niggli et al., 2009);
Less water pollution: in conventional farms, 60 percent more nitrate are leached into groundwater over a 5-year period (Drinkwater, 1998);
More water capture: enhanced organic soil structure reduces risk of floods (Lotter et al., 2003);
Increased soil fauna: organic soil fauna increases by 148 percent (Dumaresq and Greene, 2001);
Enhanced biodiversity: organic farms’ biodiversity increases resilience to climate change and weather unpredictability (Niggli et al., 2008);
Reduced erosion: organic agriculture reduces erosion caused by wind and water as well as by overgrazing at a rate of 10 million hectare annually (Pimentel et al., 1995).


Positive health impacts of organic food

Several studies indicate that 10-60 percent more healthy fatty acids (like CLA’s) and omega-3 fatty acids occur in organic dairy (e.g. Butler et al., 2008);
In crops, vitamin C ranges 5-90 percent more and secondary metabolites 10-50 percent more in organic. Also, less residues of pesticides and antibiotics are present (Huber and van de Vijver, 2009);
Organic food contains higher minerals and dry matter and 10-50 percent higher phytonutrients (Heaton, 2002);
Decreased cell proliferation of cancer cells was observed on extracts of organic strawberries (Olsson, 2006);
The Parsifal study showed 30 percent less eczema and allergy complaints and less bodyweight among 14 000 children fed with organic and biodynamic food in five EU countries (Alfven, 2005);
In animals, organic feed leads to increased fertility (Staiger, 1988) and increased immune parameters(Finamore, 2004).


If yield comparisons would take into account the quality of the target crop - e.g. dry matter content in fresh organic produce has been shown to be higher (Woese et al., 1997) - this could compensate for lower total yields in organic agriculture in developed countries. When comparing relative yield and
composition of vegetables during 12 years, Lampkin (1990) showed that although conventional yielded 24 percent more, organic had 28 percent higher dry matter in its produce. Subsidies are one way of helping organic farmers in continuing environmentally-friendly farming Practices. However, price supports may actually take the form of compensation for rewarding farmers for the ecosystem and societal services (e.g. landscape) they are doing for the common good. Both external costs and benefits can be quantified in economic terms (e.g. pollution abatement costs) and thus, could be taken into account in comparative studies. This would mean a redirection of economic
thinking, but it would enhance the realization of the true cost of farming practices and hopefully, trigger the re-formulation of policies so that they no longer support polluting activities but those that provide the correction of negative externalities to the highest extent possible.

A._Badger

Edwardia wrote: »

Have to disagree again. The Soil Association for example, was founded in 1946. Granted, organic is mainstream now, but that's true of the whole go Green, save the planet message. Even fifteen years ago it was seen to be cranky.

I know when the Soil Association was founded. I also know rather more than I want to about the whole 'Green' mythos - including its exceptionally distasteful antecedents in Germany (worth looking into if you've ever wondered where ideas and movements come from).

Personally, I still consider it cranky - even if it has become the BBC's substitute for religion.

Bad ideas can take 100 years to come to fruition. 'Green' mania being a good example and,indeed, 100 years is about how long this one took to make the transition from the nut house to the nut counter.

Edwardia wrote: »

I get Internet deliveries from Waitrose because I don't drive and free delivery saves me the bus fare and the quality is excellent. I rarely shop in Marks and Spencer as there isn't one in my town Shopping in them doesn't make me privileged and I don't feel at all guilty, that's tosh sorry.

You're making classist comments and stereotyping people.

No more so than the editors of lifestyle magazines, Sunday broadsheet and the BBC's Foodie commissioning editors when they target their nonsense.

Still, it's always amusing to have touched the raw nerve of a Waitrose customer. 'Classist' indeed!

A._Badger

useless_git_requires_wife wrote: »

There's a good UN study that compares organic and non-organic farming, sadly I cant link to it but here's a sample:

Well Googled!

It is the proponents of the 'Organic' (a misnomer if ever there was one) movement who are the ones trying to pressurise scientific farming out of existence, not vice versa: witness the hysterical campaign against GM.