With the rise of supermarkets and online shopping, we’ve never been more disconnected from the people who make, grow and distribute our food, including the methods used to get it to us and the impact our collective choices have on the planet.
Have you ever picked up a box of crackers and wondered what factory produced them? What about your spinach? Ever thought about who the farmers are and how much they’re paid?
All our food comes from somewhere, having been grown or produced by someone. Labelling helps connect us with their origins; however, we rarely take the time to consider the actual lifecycle of our food. We just pop it in our trolleys and move on.
This disconnect is convenient for supermarkets that want to turn a profit. Tokenism is rife when it comes to food standards, with bare-minimum regulations that have more to do with marketing than our welfare or health. Have you ever looked up regulators? Or do you see a red tractor and immediately trust the source?
Another issue is variety. We no longer have to wait for the seasons to change to eat the food we love. Globalisation means we’re able to eat what we want when we want, which reduces our appreciation of the food we consume. Why get excited about strawberry picking when you can eat a strawberry every day of the year?
Our lack of connection or awareness of the source to plate lifecycle means less accountability for corporations who benefit from apathy.