What Joanna Blythman won’t eat.
Sunday August 20, 2006
Observer Food Monthly
‘I’ve kept the interpretation of “ethical” broad, as I wanted to put examples in of bad animal welfare, unethical marketing, food miles and products that have caused deforestation,’ says the investigative food journalist Joanna Blythman.
Dole pineapple
In May this year, Dole, the world’s biggest fruit company, was accused by a coalition of Latin American worker’s unions of systematic violations of internationally agreed labour standards in most of the Latin American countries where it operates. This criticism of Dole was backed by 74 trade union and non-governmental organisations in North America and Europe. An investigation into Dole by a number of organisations active in monitoring the fruit industry – ‘Dole: Behind the smokescreen’ – details alleged labour violations in Dole’s Latin American banana, pineapple and flower operations (see www.bananalink.org.uk). The same month, Norwegian television broadcast a damning 50-minute documentary of living and working conditions on farms owned by Dole and its local suppliers. Dole insists that it has a justified reputation for ethical conduct, for respect for the environment and for its high regard for, and fair treatment of, its workers. Dole say that ethical treatment and behaviour is one of the company’s highest priorities. It is a member of the SAI, the NGO that created SA 8000, a social accountability standard (go to www.dole.com). Dole is currently seeking meetings with trade unions in Ecuador and Costa Rica.
Margarine and spreads
Palm oil, a major ingredient in many margarines, is commonly sourced from palm oil plantations in Malaysia and Indonesia. Friends of the Earth warns that the palm-oil trade could cause the extinction of the Asian orang-utan in 12 years, yet not one British supermarket could tell FoE from where its palm oil originates. Margarine is also often emulsified using lecithin derived from soya. To make way for soya cultivation, the Amazonian rainforest in Brazil has disappeared at the rate of five football pitches per minute over the past 10 years.
Nestlé
Nestlé products have been the subject of a consumer boycott since 1977, and almost 30 years later, the boycott campaign continues. The International Baby Food Action Network which represents a network of over 200 citizens groups in over 100 countries claims that Nestlé uses promotional tactics and misleading information when marketing its breast-milk substitutes to mothers and health workers and so undermines breastfeeding. Nestlé strongly denies this. Its infant formula policy in developing countries is set out clearly on the company’s website (go to www.nestle.com/Our_responsibility/Infant_Formula/Charter). The company states that it complies with ‘both the letter and the spirit of WHO’s international code of marketing breast-milk substitutes’. Nestlé recently presented a more ethical face to the world when it launched Partner’s Blend, a Fairtrade coffee. Cynics said that this represents 0.02 per cent of Nestlé’s total coffee purchase.
Tesco South African apples
Last March, the charity ActionAid, in partnership with the Women on Farms Project, commissioned a study detailing the dismal living and working conditions of South African fruit pickers supplying Tesco. A follow-up in January found that, while health and safety had improved, otherwise not much had changed. Last month, Gertruida Baartman, who picks fruit in South Africa for Tesco, arrived in person at the company’s AGM to challenge the supermarket giant to improve pay and conditions. ‘I know Tesco has been told before about the problems workers experience on farms, and they have said it’s not true. But I am standing before you to tell you I don’t get paid enough to feed my children and work with my bare hands in fields full of pesticides. I don’t want Tesco to leave South Africa and I don’t want people in the UK to boycott the supermarket. I just want the company to be fairer,’ she said. Tesco says: ‘We still have no concrete evidence that these allegations are true but are talking to all the relevant groups raising these issues.’
Fiji water
Bottled water shipped all the way from Fiji? You must be joking. Despite being denounced when it first appeared in 2004 for its profligate production of fossil-fuel-guzzling, climate-warming food and drink miles, Fiji water is still going down a storm with the neurotic moneyed classes concerned with diminishing their toxic load. A ‘stuff the planet, it’s my personal wellbeing that matters’ product.
Pink lady apples
A hybrid of Golden Delicious and Lady Williams, the UK’s fastest-growing apple variety is colonising our shelves. But it sets a sinister precedent – the first trademarked or patented apple. So although it has been created using material from the natural world’s genetic ‘commonwealth’, the hybrid is now the property of a profit-driven company. Anyone wanting to plant Pink Lady has to pay for the privilege of growing it. Critics say this is ‘bio-piracy’, the privatisation of our planet’s biodiversity.
Farmed tiger prawns
Tiger prawn farming pollutes the soil and water and destroys mangrove forests. A study suggests that a staggering 38 per cent of global mangrove loss may be attributable to prawn farming. A recent report by an Ecuadorian environmental organisation into ‘organic’ prawn farming in that country found that the concept of ‘green’ prawn farming was a contradiction in terms.
Broiler chicken
Bred to produce plump breasts in record time, broiler birds have the shortest, nastiest life of any intensively farmed animal. Packed into windowless sheds containing as many as 30,000 birds, they take only 42 days to reach their end weight. The price is animal suffering disorders, breast blisters and hock burns from sitting on soiled bedding.
Joanna Blythman is the author of Bad Food Britain published by Fourth Estate, £7.99
