3rd June 2008
Food and Climate Change
In this section of our website we're hoping to provide you with some food for thought, facts and figures and inspiration to become active. There are lots of different ideas about what we need to do to stop catastrophic climate change. Here we present some of them in the hope to stimulate a productive debate about how a sustainable future might look.
Local Food Growing
The food chain contributes to 18% of total UK greenhouse gas emissions and a third of human's contribution to climate change. Vast amounts of fossil fuels are used in the growing, processing, packaging & transportation of the food we eat. With oil prices rapidly increasing in reposnse to dwindling reserves, the cost of transporting food is becoming higher and higher - making local food more and more important. The world's easily accessible oil supplies are forecast to run out in the next few years. To prepare for this & to reduce the impact of climate change we need to start acting now. Buying & producing local, organic, unpackaged food is a great way of reducing the energy used in the food we eat.
''Organic, sustainable agriculture that localize food systems has the potential to mitigate nearly thirty percent of global greenhouse gas emissions and save one-sixth of global energy use.'' Dr. Mae-Wan Ho and Lim Li Ching(1)
Food Miles
The globalised commodity trade has resulted in the concentration of the food supply chain in the hands of a few transnational corporations. This greatly increases the carbon footprint and energy intensity of our food consumption. A UK government report on food miles estimated the direct social, environmental, and economic costs of food transport at over £9 billion each year, which is 34 percent of the £26.2 billion food and drinks market in the UK.(1)
How far has your food travelled to be on your dinner plate?
Here's some examples:
A typical basket of 20 fresh foods from a supermarket has travelled over one million miles.
Apples - 76 per cent of apples consumed in the UK are imported even in the height of the British growing season. Apples from USA travel over 10 thousand miles.
Carrots - Carrots from South Africa travel almost 6000 miles - for every calorie
provided by a carrot, the equivalent of 68 calories are used to fly them from South Africa.
Apart from foods like bananas, tea and coffee, most imported goods could be produced in the UK or Europe.
Growing or buying local, seasonal food massively reduces the food miles & therefore carbon footprint of a particular product.
Agriculture & Energy Use
The total energy used in agriculture accounts for about 2.7 percent of UK national energy use , and about 1.8 percent of national greenhouse gas emissions based on figures for 2002.(1)
Most of the energy input (76.2 percent) is indirect, and comes from the energy spent to manufacture and transport fertilizers, pesticides, farm machinery, animal feed and drugs.(1)
The remaining 23.8 percent is used directly on the farm for driving tractors and combine harvesters, crop drying, heating and lighting glasshouses, heating and ventilating factory farms for pigs and chickens. (1)
Nitrogen fertiliser is the single most energy intensive input, accounting for 53.7 percent of the total energy use. Thus, phasing out nitrogen fertilizer will save 1.5 percent of national energy use and one percent of national ghg emissions, not counting the nitrous oxide from Nitrogen fertilizers applied to the fields.(1)
Organic Agriculture
Converting our agricultural systems to organic methods would make a significant contribution to reducing the UK's carbon emissions. The Soil Association found that organic farming in the UK is overall about 26 percent more efficient in energy use per tonne of produce than conventional farming, excluding tomatoes grown in heated greenhouses.(1)
The 2002 report of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO)states that 'organic agriculture enables ecosystems to better adjust to the effects of climate change and has major potential for reducing agricultural greenhouse gas emissions' (1).
The FAO report found that, “Organic agriculture performs better than conventional agriculture on a per hectare scale, both with respect to direct energy consumption (fuel and oil) and indirect consumption (synthetic fertilizers and pesticides)”, with high efficiency of energy use. (1)
Greenhouse gas emissions were calculated to be 48-66 percent lower per hectare in organic farming systems in Europe [24], and were attributed to no input of chemical N fertilizers, less use of high energy consuming feedstuffs, low input of P, K mineral fertilizers, and elimination of pesticides, as characteristic of organic agriculture.(1)
Growing Your Own
Allotments-
Most cities, towns & parishes have allotment sites that can be rented by local residents to grow their own food. Prices range from £9-£80 a year with some sites having waiting lists of several years with others desperate for more gardeners to take on plots. Some allotments are owned by the local council, some are rented by allotment associations, others are private. In theory every parish should offer allotments if there is a demand for them but in practice they can be hard to get hold of; especially in rural areas.
Short History of allotments in the UK
It's possible to trace the origins of allotments back over 200 hundred years - they derive from the enclosure legislation of the 18th and 19th centuries - and the word 'allotment' originates from land being allotted to an individual under an enclosure award (Enclosures were use by richer land-owners to stop the poor grazing their animals on common land).
The most important of the Enclosure Acts was the General Inclosure Act 1845 which required that provision should be made for the landless poor in the form of 'field gardens' limited to a quarter of an acre. At this time, allotments were largely confined to rural areas.
The modern notion of an allotment came into being during the Nineteenth Century. A lot of people from the country went to work and live in towns; there was a lot of poverty, and what the Victorians called "degeneracy" amongst the working classes.
In the Victorian scheme of things, allotments provided an alternative to drink and other unworthy pursuits for the poor. The spread of urban allotments was intensified by the growth of high-density housing, often without gardens.
The First World War prompted a huge growth in the number of allotments - from 600,000 to 1,500,000. After the War, many of the temporary allotment sites were returned to their original use.
WWII again increased the role for allotments as a major provider of food; there was a blockade from the U-boats, and many farm-workers went to the war. Allotments became a common feature in towns and cities, Dig for Victory posters were everywhere, and food production from allotments rose to 1,300,000 tonnes per year from around 1,400,000 plots - that's nearly a tonne per plot !
The end of the War again saw a diminished role for allotments and, as time passed, other pressures on the use of land have reduced the total (there are now only about 250,000). Although the biggest decline was immediately after WWII, it is still continuing today; the number of allotments has halved since 1969.(2)
Since 1996 the rate of decline appears to have decreased with an upsurge of interest in growing organic, local & GM free food. Last year for the first time more vegetable seeds were sold than flower seeds in the UK.
For help getting an allotment/growing your own see the links at the end.
Community Gardens- There has been a move towards community gardens in recent years which give people the opportunity to get involved with growing food without the responsibility of taking on a whole plot themselves. There are over 60 city farms and 1000 community gardens in the UK. They are community-managed projects ranging from tiny wildlife gardens to fruit and vegetable plots on housing estates, from community polytunnels to large city farms.
They exist mainly in urban areas and are created in response to a lack of access to green space, combined with a desire to encourage strong community relationships and an awareness of gardening and farming.
Community-Assisted Agriculture-(CSA) This is about reconnecting people with the farm on which their food is grown. There are lots of different ways that CSA can work. Normally, local people will invest in their local farm in some way in return for a share of the harvest. CSA is a partnership between farmers and consumers where the responsibilities and rewards of farming are shared. Fundamental to CSA is an understanding of mutual support between farmers and those who consume their produce. As CSA farms are directly accountable to their consumer members they strive to provide fresh, high-quality food, typically using organic or biodynamic farming methods.
CSA members often commit in advance, in cash or kind (working on the farm), to buying their food directly from the CSA farm.
How a CSA farm might be organised
A CSA can work in many different ways. For example, CSA farms may supply their members with vegetables distributed weekly through a box scheme, from a pick up point or collected from the farm. Once it has been agreed what the farm can produce and what members would like to receive, the farmer develops a crop plan and a budget for the season. This incorporates all the production costs and fair wages for the farmers. The members approve the budget, and calculate the cost of an annual share by dividing the total budget between them.
Buying Local Food
There are many ways to buy local, organic food if you don't have the time or inclination to grow your own.
Box schemes – a producer or distributor delivers a box or bag of produce direct to customers, or to community distribution points
Farmers' markets – local producers who live within a certain distance of the market location sell their products direct to shoppers in a traditional market
Farm shops and farm gate sales – producers selling direct from their farm: from converted barns to honesty boxes at the farm gate
Producer cooperatives – local farmers group together to share services and market produce
Community supported agriculture – local people group together to support a local farm.
Local shops – play a key role in local food economies
Food cooperatives – local people group together to buy food in bulk from wholesalers or direct from local producers
References:
(1) Mitigating Climate Change through Organic Agriculture and Localized Food Systems -Institute of Science in Society 31/01/08
Links: