How Your Food Choices Can Help The Planet
Even if you don’t stay up to date on current affairs, you can’t have missed the focusing in on environmental issues lately. Even as recently as the 90′s, not many people really considered where their nutrition tableware or clothing etc came from. Most just bought what was most convenient at the time. Nowadays however, we cannot afford to live in the same manner, especially if we want to secure a future for the next generation and beyond. A healthy approach can start at home by being considerate about something as simple as your next meal.
Shop Local. We take it for granted these days that we can pop down the local shop and buy some fruits from exotic shores and wines from the other side of the world for example. However, a huge amount of these products are flown thousands of miles from other countries and this causes problems. Not only does the transport release vast amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere, due to burning fuel and having to use a food and wine fridge to keep the produce chilled all the way, but also local food suppliers struggle to compete with low foreign costs. By doing as much of your shopping in local stores as you can and buying local produce, you will secure your communities future and help save the planet at them same time.
Fight Packaging. The amount of packaging that you will find on many supermarket products these days is gratuitous. A single cake might be singly wrapped, inside a little box with a plastic place-holder, which is cloaked in cellophane and transported within a cardboard box, with the other cake boxes. More often than not this packaging is unnecessary, so try and avoid those products that go over the top with it.
Ethical Accessories. More than just the food you buy can influence the planet when you eat. Everything from the cutlery you use to the little wine gifts you purchase for other people can have a knock on effect and so deserve consideration. Ask yourself where this product has come from, is it something that could be made from a more sustainable material, and is this a disposable product when I could be buying a reusable one? Disposable chopsticks for example cause thousands of trees to be cut down every day, when a good reusable pair can last a lifetime.