How far has your food travelled?

We have just eaten green beans and courgettes with our lunch, from growbags outside our kitchen door. So 10 yards worth of travel.

Two supermarkets here in NE Scotland have been selling tomatoes from Poland. They were cheap, at 75p for a pack of six. I wont buy them because I think the miles travelled is ridiculous when they can be grown closer to home. Aalso what kind of conditions are workers in Poland experiencing if tomatoes can be grown, picked, packed, transported across Europe and then sold for 75p at a profit?

We bought eggs ( 1/2 mile chicken to our table) , tomato’s from about 3 miles away, potatoes about 20 miles and pork and beef raised two fields away ! Oh and strawberries from 5 miles away . I swear they all taste better than stuff shipped in from overseas - especially the strawberries.

Most of my food has been grown or raised very near. I prefer food grown locally to food from chain grocers.

All our vegetables only have to travel up the garden path to the back door at the moment.

M&S fabulous double pk of huge cherries.
Snack heaven...from Kent, about 60 miles.

I have never understood why we import things which we grow ourselves. Green beans from Africa? They grow so easily in this country, it just doesn't make sense. Potatoes are different. The best all-rounders are Cyprus potatoes (in my opinion).

Slow food is a good organisation. I try to follow its principles, especially for meat. But I am trying to eat locally and seasonally if possible

Last one...?

Not so long since, I read on a packet, 'Made in New Zealand from ingredients sourced in Thailand. Packed in Australia.'

So they sent to Thailand for something, made the dish here and then sent the whole thing to Australia to be packaged, only to be sent back here to a New Zealand supermarket, for sale. Well-travelled food indeed. Ludicrous.

As I’m on my olidays in Spain at the moment everything we eat is local and pretty much organic, the reason I know this is that it goes off if we don’t eat it within a couple of days! If it keeps forever in your fridge, trust me it’s been sprayed so that it can travel! I also always eat what’s in season and don’t expect asparagus for instance in November.

Strawberries - about 5 yards, but they are nearly finished now. Otherwise about 20 miles.
Tomatoes, ours are not ready yet but I think the bought ones came from Kent.
Potatoes from Pembrokeshire.

However, I do remember many years ago being shocked that Cornish cauliflowers grown a few miles from us had travelled up to Covent Garden and back again.
Then, of course, we had the French cauliflowers which took over the market via the Roscoff ferry.
Now I notice that most of our cauliflowers are from Cornwall again.

Food may seem to have been produced locally but could have travelled quite some distance before arriving back in your local shop. Unless you shop at a local farm shop or grow your own, you may never know.

I always used to like black berrying from the hedgerows. Making jam and wine etc. Now that I am unable to do this I miss it. Last September when they were in local hedgerows was pleased to see some blackberries on sale in a leading supermarket. However I did not buy them when I saw “produce of Peru” on the label. This same store were selling asparagus from Chile when it was in season here and grown in the nearby fields. Tomatoes from Holland when in season in U.K.

We've got so used to buying fruit and veg on demand, rather than seasonally - who wants to eat brussel sprouts in the summer?
Really hard at times to find anything grown in this country and I have had problems with potatoes, from more than one supermarket , grown in Romania that were absolutely rotten in the middle.
Easy to say "buy from a local farm shop" but if you don't drive, forget it! In my experience, being on actual farms means they are well off the beaten track!
One good thing is that the butchers in my village sells their meat (especially pork) that has been bred and slaughtered on their own farm about 8 miles away

Pantglas1
I'm not picking holes in your spelling but had to laugh out loud after reading 'olidays'. ?

I won’t buy any vegetables unless they are grown in UK. If people won’t buy veg from overseas, then the supermarkets will be forced to buy local. The decision is in our hands.

What puzzles me is why none of these concerns were expressed during the Brexit referendum. It's not just our food that will be generally traveling much further....and at a time when governments are declaring a climate emergency...!!

Must say it annoys me that except for shiitake, Asda never has UK grown mushrooms - all from Poland or Ireland. I buy mine elsewhere.

I do buy home-grown as far as possible - was pleased the other day to find lovely fat black English cherries - 750g for a fiver in M&S - and UK grown sugar snap peas in Asda.

Exceptions are obv. citrus and bananas, not that I buy bananas very often - and celery, which I do use a lot all year, so it often comes from Spain in winter.

Dh is addicted to strawberries on his muesli every morning, but he knows he'll get a rocket from me if he buys non British ones out of season - the season is now so much longer anyway.
Out of season he will often make do with stewed apple - made from the masses of windfalls in dd's garden. She hardly ever has time to do anything with them.

I never buy any non U.K. meat or bacon, though that's as much to do with animal welfare concerns as anything else..

RosieLeah
You ask why imports when available /grown in our OWN country.?Don't think that needs spelling out.

I buy local where I can and try always to buy British. I spend a lot of time reading labels this time to the annoyance of other shoppers.

Help,, I have survived two weeks with my dominant arm in plaster after breaking my wrist. Going crazy as cannot crochet or sew and still got another three weeks in plaster. So frustrating not being able to do even simple things.

GabriellaG54. Tee hee - often do this in Spain as the h is mostly silent! Spelling normally good but predictive text often catches me out - that one was deliberate!

Well I'm waiting in for a delayed Ocado delivery so will check the food miles of my order if and when it arrives!

I think the time has definitely come to consider only buying food produced nearby.

If we are considering the environment, that is.

If we are considering people in poor, or poorer countries, perhaps we should be buying the food they produce, if we don't what will they live off?

A tought one, isn't it. I certainly don't know the solution.