FOOD, glorious food, hot sausage and mustard, cold jelly and custard…” with apologies to Oliver, Lionel Bart (and ultimately Charles Dickens), but what a wonderful show that was, lots of memorable songs, helping to bring Dickens into the 20th century. Actually, we’ve just missed World Food Day, although most of us would assume that every day is food day.
Anyway, we bought a pork roast at a local upmarket store recently and when we arrived home we noticed that it was declared to be ‘Kinder to sows’. I was intrigued and followed up. It seems that the store has struck a deal with its suppliers to change their pig farming practices to those that are, well, kinder to sows.
Intensive pig farming apparently requires pregnant sows to be kept in sow stalls or gestation crates that allow virtually no movement except standing up or lying down and this goes on for 16 weeks until the sow has had her litter.
The negotiated deal is that the sow is now only put into the gestation crate for the week before the litter is due and then she is moved to a bigger enclosure where she can move around and feed her piglets at leisure. The store is working on other such deals with farmers, but it all sounds very worthwhile to me. Oh, and the roast pork was delicious.
By contrast, we bought a pre-prepared, vacuum packed peri-peri chicken at another store the other day. The list of ingredients was as long as your arm, containing at least 33 items, many of which had been irradiated, modified and/or contained preservatives (one day I shall discover exactly what are ‘sulphites’).
YOU MIGHT ALSO BE INTERESTED IN: The best ‘green’ guide to all-natural gardening
I must point out that I am a compulsive reader of the small print on food packaging, quite simply because I like to know what we’re eating. Anyway, the point is that the cooked chicken tasted of nothing in particular, certainly not of peri-peri, but do be aware of that small print.
And now, a land reform success story comes from drought-stricken north eastern Brazil, where a group of women in a so-called agro-village have established a thriving fruit and veggie business.
Agro-villages are part of the Brazilian government’s land reform programme, where landless would-be farmers are granted land, either state land or private land bought by the state, on which to develop their own farming ventures.
In this particular case, a group of women has formed their own co-operative and are producing fruit and vegetables for sale in a nearby town. The crops are organic and watered by an irrigation system based on wells. The agro-village also includes land for livestock farming and for a community hall, school and clinic.*
Finally, the latest on the food wastage situation in Britain is that as much as 40 percent of all bagged salads, that would be pre-prepared and packaged salad, is thrown away. That amounts to 37 000 tons of fresh salad a year ending up in the rubbish dumps.** Isn’t that awful?
*Third World Resurgence, magazine of the Malaysia-based Third World Network.
**The Week: the Best of the British and Foreign Media.
HAVE YOUR SAY
Like the South Coast Herald’s Facebook page, follow us on Twitter and Instagram
For news straight to your phone, add us on BBM 58F3D7A7 or WhatsApp 082 421 6033
