You know how many calories are in that pack of Salt and Vinegar crisps. You even know how much salt is in your Fisherman’s Pie. Personally, I feel a much better person for knowing how my GDA of iron will be affected by a tin of beans.
We’re in a time of exacting detail when it comes to food. The tiniest bit of information is examined and broadcast. While packaging designers are probably tearing their hair out trying to fit in all the different traffic-light signs and nutrition tables, it’s an wonderful thing for someone who actually has an interest in what’s going into their body.
Personally, I’m a bit of a stickler for detail. I’d rather have a picture of a baked bean molecule on the tin than some curly writing in gold tint. So I’m stoked to hear about government plans to label foods with their carbon footprint, alongside nutrition information and ingredients.
Think about it: what’s the footprint of a baked bean? Well, not a single one, but every one that you’ve ever eaten? Where did the haricot beans spring from in the first place? And the tomatoes, or the spices, or the sugar? And how did they get hold of the metal to make the tin? Is it recycled? Do they drive the beans across international boundaries in tins, or is there some kind of baked bean supertanker that ploughs through the surf, nobly delivering a swamp of sauce-laden legumes to consumers in the UK?
So many questions. These labels that the Government are proposing aren’t going to bother answering every single one (to loud cheers from the packaging design community): they’ll boil down the basics to give a guide to each foodstuff’s relative impact. Telling people the relative merits of their shopping is a great way to drive awareness of carbon: one that they can end up doing on automatic as they cruise the supermarket shelves.
Some forward-thinking brands are already on the case, such as Boots and Innocent, who are working with the Carbon Trust to thrash out the precise definitions and small print. Even the fizzy-drink Leviathan that is Pepsi Co. is on board with the idea, according to reports. Which begs a question: do you release more carbon when you open up a can of pop? Show me the label!
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