Tom Levitt, MSN Environment

Ethical Food Checklist

It is a tough ask to be both an ethical and environmentally-friendly shopper. But Liz Barling from the Food Ethics Council has created an easy-to-use checklist to help.

She splits the checklist between how and where we shop and then what we choose to eat.

How and where you shop

Before you even make your weekly shopping list, decisions about how and where you shop have an ethical implication.

1. Environment

Walking is better for the environment than taking the car, so go to local shops and reduce your trips to out-of-town superstores.

Food can be over-packaged, leading to vast amounts of plastic waste. Not to mention those got-to-have bogofs (Buy one get one free) that stack up in your fridge, only to go off and end up in landfill.

2. Health

Walking is better for your health too, so get out of your car - and cut down on your petrol or biofuel consumption at the same time.

3. Social impact

Larger retail outlets often put the squeeze on producers to provide their products at the lowest cost, which can leave them on the breadline. Paying a fair price for produce means a living wage for small-scale producers – but be prepared to pay a bit more at the till!

Most of the buying power in the food industry is concentrated in a handful of big retailers. That means we buy what they want to sell – and producers grow what they want to sell too. Although the supermarket shelves are full of “choice”, in many cases it’s an illusion. Who’s actually in control of our health when we buy food from big retail outlets?

4. Animal welfare

Buying meat can mean animals travelling for miles to large slaughterhouses – unless it specifically says they haven’t - causing unnecessary suffering. Intensively reared animals and birds suffer stress and illness, resulting in large-scale exposure to antibiotics and other chemicals that may have impacts on our own health.

Dish of the day

Unpackaged food, locally bought, as and when you need it.

Off the menu

Over-packaged, bulk-made, multi-buy purchases you don’t really need, bought from out-of-town superstores.

Would you eat a genetically modified banana?

What you eat

Whether you eat lots of fruit and veg or you’re a committed carnivore, everything that ends up on your plate has an impact on the health and welfare of our planet, people and animals.

1. Environment

Food production can have serious implications for the environment. Rearing meat accounts for 8% of the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions.

It’s a thirsty business too – it takes 5,000 litres of water to produce the average amount of meat consumed by a person in the UK every day, compared to 2,000 litres for a vegetarian. Eating less meat and dairy and more vegetables is one way to reduce our impact on the planet.

Fish stocks are perilously low, and farmed fish can destroy the sea bed. Buying Marine Stewardship Council approved fish supports businesses that fish sustainably. So shop locally for fish and ask your fishmonger how and where it was caught.

Intensive farming can destroy biodiversity; monocultures only support a few species of plants and animals, and pesticide use can wipe out what’s left. Organic, small scale food production on farms that grow lots of different things takes best care of the land. Look for the soil association label on products to support our environment.

2. Health

Processed food contains much more salt, sugar, fat and additives than food in its natural state. This can cause hyperactivity in children, obesity, and even food scares like BSE. Look at the labels on your favourite food and ask whether all those extra ingredients are really necessary.

3. Social impact

The food and farming sector is the UK’s biggest employer, and one of its worst. Workers suffer long hours, bad pay and short term contracts. These working conditions mean they have less access to fresh, healthy food for themselves and their families.

Fairly made, fairly traded food offers a decent wage and working conditions to workers and producers in the UK and abroad.

4. Animal welfare

Intensively reared animals lead miserable lives. They are bred to provide optimum levels of milk, meat or eggs in the shortest time possible, often at the expense of their health.

Buying free range and organic meat means that the animals you eat led decent lives. They’re still bred for meat, egg or dairy production, but you can be happy in the knowledge that they were allowed to live well and grow at a natural rate.