insideSUSSEX Magazine Issue 17 - July 2016 | Page 49

FOOD+DRINK
change your habits, change the world cont.

than grain fed – a lot of grain feeds are associated
with added drugs and hormones to speed up
the growth of the cow. Eat less and buy better:
environmental harm occurs during the production
of meat, and not the consumption, so to reduce
this harm we need to affect the decision to
produce.

Eat and shop local
Between production, packaging and
transportation to the enormous supermarkets
from which many of us buy our weekly shop, a
lot of our food travels an awful long way. I’m
ashamed to admit that, barring the ‘perfectly
imperfect’ strawberries that found their way to
my fridge via Kent (and, incidentally, may well be
shaped more like potatoes, but taste divine), for
the process of research I’ve just checked my
own fridge and found tomatoes from Holland,
grapes from Chile, and blueberries from Morocco.
Eating local is not only a way to cut down on
food miles and pesky emissions caused during
transit, but is also a way to support your own
community economically as opposed to further
lining the pockets of the large companies who
make billions annually from our constant need
for convenience. Buying food locally promotes
solidarity with smaller scale food producers and
is an opportunity to eat more natural foods – or

‘whole’ foods as non-tampered with, less-travelled
foods have always been known.
Whole foods are higher in nutrient levels because
they don’t undergo all of the packaging, artificial
lighting and changes in temperature that fruit and
vegetables which have travelled across the world
(or even from one end of the country to the other)
will have. Which isn’t to say that non-local produce
isn’t nutritious, but is to say that its levels of
nutrients and specifically vitamins A, B, C and E
will be significantly lower than fruit and vegetables
bought from local markets where the produce
sold hasn’t had to travel far and so has had more
time to ripen on its branches, vines and bushes.
Shopping locally, your food will not only be
healthier for you, but it will taste better too as
anyone who’s ever been to a ‘pick your own’ and
eaten fruit fresh from the plant will contest.
Eating local also means that your diet will naturally
follow the seasons as you’ll buy whatever the
farmers have in abundance. It’s too easy to go
to the supermarket and pick up the same produce
from the same spot along the same aisle, which
sounds boring because it is boring! The rise in
popularity of home-delivered veg boxes, filled
with colourful, and, crucially, seasonal food
however, shows that more people are choosing
to eat what the world is producing when the
world is naturally producing it, which is great
news for our nutritional needs and makes for a
much more varied and interesting dinner plate.

49

Find out where your food comes from
Every seller of food should be both knowledgeable
about and accountable for the supply chain along
which the food they’re selling travels. Sadly, the
appalling sweatshop conditions for which
numerous high street clothing stores are criticised
exist in the food industry too, and the way in
which many workers in the fishing sector are
treated is tantamount to slavery. Forced away
from their families due to financial need, they are
stranded at sea in unsafe, rust-bucket boats with
inadequate sanitation and forced to work
excruciatingly long hours for very little pay.