Market Research

A REPORT into the state of the UK farming industry last week blasted it as 'unsustainable' and called for change.

One of the recommendations of the Policy Commission on the Future of Farming and Food - a recommendation welcomed by many local farmers - was that people be encouraged to buy more local produce.

But if supermarkets are willing and able to stock imported strawberries and asparagus in midwinter - and at competitive prices to boot - what's wrong with that?

Plenty, according to campaign group Sustain, the alliance for better food and farming. In a recent report given greater weight by the policy commission recommendations, Sustain reveals that many everyday foods are travelling thousands of miles, often transported by air, before reaching our local supermarkets.

Even those produced in Britain can travel hundreds of miles before reaching our plates, the report reveals, taken by lorry to central distribution points before being freighted to individual supermarkets. Food, it says, now accounts for between a third and 40 per cent of all UK road freight.

That combination of air and road miles travelled before food reaches our plate is hugely damaging and wasteful in terms of the amount of fuel burned, Sustain says.

To ram the point home, the report Eating Oil: Food Supply In A Changing Climate, compares two typical Sunday dinners, one made using ingredients from a supermarket, the other from a farmers' market.

A plate of chicken, with runner beans, carrots, mange tout, sprouts and potatoes could have begun its journey in countries including Thailand and Zambia, with the ingredients covering a total of 24,364 miles before reaching your plate.

In contrast a similar meal, substituting British cabbage and parsnips for the beans and mange tout, would only travel about 376 miles when bought from a farmers' market.

Imported organic produce is no better. A single shopping basket of 26 imported organic products, including onions from New Zealand, organic beef from Australia, avocados from Mexico and baby carrots from South Africa, could have travelled a combined total of 150,000 miles and released as much CO2 into the atmosphere as an average four bedroom household does through cooking meals over eight months. Something to chew on in these days of global warming.

The disadvantages of imported food don't stop there, according to Sustain. Even in excellent storage conditions, long distance transport reduces the nutritional potency of food, it says.

Nutrients including Vitamin A, C and E, as well as riboflavin, all essential for a healthy diet, are particularly vulnerable.

And as Britain saw with the outbreak of foot and mouth disease, which cost an estimated £9 billion and led to the slaughter of some four million animals, transporting animals and food, even within Britain, increases the risk of spreading disease.

Professor Jonathan Whitelegg, of the Stockholm Environment Institute at the University of York, who wrote the foreword to the report, says: "There is something very wrong with a global system that supplies New Zealand onions to supermarkets in the UK - and supplies them more cheaply than local sources."

Report author Andy Jones adds: "Food distribution is a major contributor to climate change and other forms of pollution. The environment and society cannot continue to bear the costs."

So how can you do your bit to reduce global warming simply by what you eat? By buying local produce, of course.

That's easier than it has been for a long time. Farmers' markets guarantee that food is produced locally - usually within a radius of 30 miles - and comes direct from the producer.

Stallholders must have grown, reared, caught, brewed, pickled, baked, smoked or processed the product themselves.

In York, there are two regular farmers' markets - a monthly one in York city centre, and a fortnightly one at the York Livestock centre at Murton.

Malton, Scarborough, Harrogate, Knaresborough, Leeds, Ripon and Richmond also hold regular farmers' markets for local produce.

If you cannot travel to buy the food, the Soil Association runs a box scheme, with fresh produce costing £5-£15 delivered to your door or a central drop-off location.

The boxes contain fresh produce, usually from local farms, which varies according to the season, including meat, wine and dairy products.

Details are available on its website, www.soilassociation.org or from 0117 929 0661.

Alternatively buy directly from farmers, farm shops or mail order retailers, with details listed by the Farm Retail Association on their website www.farmshopping.com or by phoning 023 8036 2150.

You see. It's not as difficult as you might think to ensure the onions in your spag bol haven't travelled half way round the world before ending up in your stomach.

<bullet/> Contact numbers to check dates of your next farmers' market (supplied by the National Farmers Union): York city centre, Paul Barrett, 01904 551355; York livestock centre, 01904 489731; Malton, Chris Woodfine, 01751 473780; Scarborough, Heather Archer/ Helen Scott, 01723 866600; Harrogate, Knaresborough and Ripon, Bernard White, 01423 556027; Leeds, 0113 214 5170; Richmond, Alistair Davy, 01748 884414.

Updated: 10:31 Thursday, February 07, 2002