Sustainable Food Laboratory

In The Economist of December 9th an “Ethical Food” article challenges the green shopping orthodoxies of organic and fair trade consumers. I’m not surprised that The Economist pokes fun at some of the claims made by green marketers. I am surprised that the author’s only suggestion for higher leverage toward sustainability is public policies. National and international policies are important, but not sufficient.

Fortunately, behind the scenes, there’s progress emerging in mainstream supply chains—SYSCO requires reduced pesticides for all the frozen fruits and vegetables they purchase, Starbucks applies social and environmental standards on the majority of their coffee purchases, Unilever applies standards on tea procurement, Costco and other major buyers employ strong social codes of conduct for processors in their supply chains.

Some of these products are sold under niche labels like organic or fair trade. Many are not.

Instead of framing food fights as organic or fair trade versus conventional, we should frame the challenge as making sure that ALL food and agriculture lives up to its responsibility to sustain a high quality life for all.

As is implied in The Economist article, let’s ask those who label or market food to collect data on impact. What’s actually happening as a result of the farming, trucking, processing and retailing of the food? Is the soil and water getting better or worse? Are the farmers and workers prospering or sliding into poverty? Is the energy footprint of each player getting better?

We need to ask the same questions of policy proponents, whether of trade or development policies. What’s the evidence about the impacts of different deregulation or poverty alleviation schemes?

Let’s accept The Economist’s challenge to step up to these challenges, but let’s use the largest levers of all—mainstream market forces and a public well informed about the impacts of their choices.

You can add your comments here. What are the biggest leverage points for positive change? What’s the evidence for leverage?