Check out this WWF website if you're interested in finding out how large your personal 'footprint' is: http://rsa. footprint. wwf.org. uk/
Bumping so others can try out this fascinating way of finding your 'footprint' on Planet Earth. Will any others besides nfh1 be brave enough to risk the wrath of the unruly one?
hezwez,
Feb 5, 3:28am
I will! I will! (Puts hand up) And I'm living as if we had 2. 2 planets instead of one. Shall I kill off the pets or scrap the motor vehicle?
dezzie,
Feb 5, 3:37am
I went to my local "farmers market" type store that has been there for a few years now mostly selling local produce, just to get tomatos... . and while I was there I noticed the grapes were in plastic bags so had a proper look, they were from the USA, and the green kiwifruit were from Italy.
uli,
Feb 5, 5:16am
dezzie - that is why our local "growers market" manager - the first in the country too - doesn't want to have anything to do with "farmers markets" - he reckons it is a "con". Most of them are buyers and sellers - or sell "fancy products" instead of "food" - his words ...
He is very strict in what he lets people sell in "his" market here: must be grown within 200km radius of Whangarei - so basically Northland only - must be grown by the people selling. And he buys stuff to check all the time - especially things like avocadoes and olives and melons which customers cannot check out at the stall if they are good or not.
While the stall holders often sigh about his manners - the market has gone from strength to strength - and is the most successful in the country - partly because of his iron fist LOL :)
pixiegirl,
Feb 17, 10:48pm
"Did you know our comercial strawberry growers here in NZ have to buy new plants each year from California. (Monsanto came to my mind straight away - but it wasn't them)A major ice cream company and jam company now import their strawberries from china for ice cream and jam when growers here are basically giving them away at the end of the season. I sent an email to the ice cream company but never got a reply - got a read receipt but no reply to date. Sad isn't it. More sad in the fact that if we buy local grown produce where has the actual "seed" started from - how many food miles did it do before it got here. "
Just posted this in Food lies but also throught it might be of interest here as well.
uli,
Feb 18, 6:40am
pixiegirl - I am sure they do NOT!
... Except if they are bound to a contract selling to some specific companies which need some specific varieties of strawberries - so their "products" are going to work out ... we call those "products" then yoghurt or jam or whatever, but in reality it has nothing to do with "food" - it is just a money making exercise and we might just as well eat a capsule with colouring/flavouring/sugar and preservatives instead LOL :)
However the sooner people wake up to the fact the sooner they will (hopefully) boycott that cr@p and maybe get off their butt and make their own ... . (or make more excuses why they haven't got the time cause they are busy mothers and having a part time job too ... )
duckmoon,
Feb 18, 7:00am
trouble is: living in Wgtn, we are at the end of the island - getting stuff across Cook Strait is expensive - and consumes resources (the whole point of food miles). So we can only head 160km in one direction.
Also, if it is about consuming resources, there are less resources used in growing lamb in NZ and trnsporting it to UK, than there is in raising animals in a barn in the Northern winter.
I would prefer to look at units of consumption to get the product to table, rather than distance travelled.
nfh1,
Feb 18, 8:10am
I think I was penalised because I travel a lot.
That is my excuse anyway.
anne1955,
Feb 18, 8:58am
Sadly due to time I have only read through a few replies to this thread... me packets have there place when they are dirt cheap. . when they are mark downs etc... if they are enclosed in packets that light isn't getting into they last well over a year past there best before dates... they are only 'best before' and required to have these. . think how long you keep a packet of say Gregs spices... like caned things I have worked in the food industry for more than 30 years and there are so many myths out there Like fish married once to a deep sea fisherman... it is caught frozen thawed fillited refrozen brought ashore often and repacked and re frozen often mor than 3 times... it's just the keeping it below certain temps that matters. .cont... .
anne1955,
Aug 18, 1:58am
I get grrh about what we buy imported when we can grow our own like saffron... a small plot of this wonderful thing can be in any garden fact hardly a person well at least none of my foodie friends grow it. . starting with just a few larger corms/bulbs 6 big at 1. 00 each will grow in you flower or vegie garden x's they drop 10 per corm each year... plenty for home use for a year... yet we buy rubbish stuff and wonder why people rave over it. . well if they rave over it it cause they have had the real thing. . there's just one thing. . and it grows even in the deep south... we can do it... haha why buy a lettuce when we can buy all wee need in the produce dept buy the hand full at 1/8 price of a nice fancy lettuce... and as for sun dried tomatoes. . buy semi dried from Bin in or the like of the sunvalley one about 3. 50 per packet then put into a lidded container with 50% good olive oil and 50% good balsmalic vinegar use for dressing as tomes are used... lasts over a year and 1/4 price to make ones self...
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