Organic and Air Freighted? Maybe Not For Much Longer...

Organic and Air Freighted? Maybe Not For Much Longer...

The local vs. organic debate is a familiar one to many treehuggers. Is it better for a shopper in London to buy organic green beans from Kenya, or non-organic from Kent? This shopper at least decided long ago that there was little point in avoiding pollution in the production of his food, only to then fly it round the world spewing emissions in the process. Soon we may no longer have an option, if a report in the Guardian is anything to go by. Apparently the Soil Association, the UK’s leading organic certification body, has just launched a year long consultation into whether air freighted food should be banned from carrying the organic label. According to the report, the consultation will consider other options, such as carbon offsets, but with UK supermarkets Tesco and Marks and Spencer recently announcing labeling schemes for airfreighted produce, it may be that the tide is turning against flying beans. Of course, this was never an issue at the farmers market… [Written by: Sami Grover]