Don't shop at supermarkets The biggest single threat to life on earth is global warming,
and the biggest single cause of global warming is vehicle pollution.
The average item af food purchased from a supermarket travels over 1000
miles; by lorry/plane from the producer to the store and then by car
from the store to the consumer. As well as causing severe environmental
darnage, the pollutian caused by supermarket-generated traffic is a
major contributor to rising levels of asthma and other respiratory diseases.
Shopping at supermarkets pollutes the environment and damages human
health.
Don't shop at supermarkets 60 - 70% of all food now passes through four companies; Tesco,
Sainsbury's, Safeway and Asda. This control over the food chain allows
supermarkets to determine tbe price they pay to farmers, with farmers
forced to take that price due to there being no other buyer left in
the market place. This price-setting power, together with the requirement
by supermarkets that farmers either supply them on a large scale or
not at all, is behind the continuing industrialisation of agriculture.
Big Farmers are getting bigger to survive while small farmers are going
bust, leading to prairie farming monoculture (hedgerows are still disappearing
at the rate of 10,000 niles per year) and unemployment (18,000 agricultural
jobs were Iost in 1999). Shopping at supermarkets ia destroying British
agriculture and ruining the countryside.
Don't shop at supermarkets Due to public pressure, the UK now has some of the highest
farm animal welfare standards in the world. This inevitably makes it
more expensive to produce pork, chicken, etc., here than in countries
with lower standards. So the supermarkets, who joined in tbe calls for
a more humane British agriculture but whose first and last concern is
profit, now source large amounts of the meat they sell from abroad,
produced under conditions which would be illegal in this country. In
an attempt to disguise these double standards, the supermarkets hide
the truth from their customers; it is standard practice for products
carrying 'Union Jack' or 'Produce of the UK' stickers to have been processed/packed
here but for the pig/ chicken/ beef/ lamb to have been reared abroad.
Shopping at supermarkets supports factory farming and poor animal welfare.
Don't shop at supermarkets People can only eat so much food, so logic dictates that shopping
at supermarkets puts village shops and high street stores out of business.
Every supermarket that opens results in a net loss of 200-300 jobs,
as a whole network of Iocal shops and their suppliers is destroyed.
Whereas money spent in independent shops tends to stay in the local
economy, supermarkets act as giant vacuum. cleaners; sucking money out
of an area and putting it into the bank accounts of distant shareholders.
Shopping at supermarkets dismantles communities and undermines local
economies.
Don't shop at supermarkets Due to the vast distances that supermarket food travels, the
time it takes to make that journey, and the need for the product to
be stacked on a shelf, dropped into a trolley and fitted with a barcode,
supermarket food is encased in far more packaging than is used by local
production and distribution networks. It was also tbe supermarkets who
dictated that the returnable bottle disappeared; returnables only work
on a regional basis, not the national and international scale of the
supermarket. All of this leaves an ever growing waste mountain, much
of which is multi-material (eg cardboard stuck to foil wrapped in plastic)
and therefore impossible to recycle.
This means it must be buried (to pollute the soil and water) or incinerated
(to pollute the air), the cost of which is met by the taxpayer not the
supermarkets.
Shopping at supermarkets reaults in unnecessary, damaging and costly
packaging waste.
Alternatives: at the Sustainable Food
Chains pages of the Sustain web site: Go
Don't shop at supermarkets Govemment policy on major issues whicb affect all our lives
(road building programmes, development on greenfield sites, health and
safety standards for foods) is dictated not by the public interest but
by the needs of big business. And it doesn't matter who you vote for;
Labour and Conservative MPs have vested interests in supermarkets and
both parties rely on supermarkets for political donations. Shopping
at supermarkets undermines democracy and supports sleaze.
Don't shop at supermarkets In their never ceasing quest to drive down prices paid to suppliers
and so increase profits, supermarkets are increasingly sourcing the
food they sell from the developing world where wages are low, working
conditions poor and pollution laws non existant. This leads to countries
who can barely feed themselves seeing their best agricultural land producing
food for UK supermarkets at rock bottom prices. Shopping at supermarkets
exploits both the people and the land of developing countries.
Don't shop at supermarkets It is often claimed that supermarkets increase choice, yet
the reality is that they only do so when it suits tbeir global view
of the world. It is quite easy, for instance, for a supermarket to put
15 different brands of margarine on the shelves of all its stores. However,
why is it that although there are 2,300 apple varieties and 550 pear
varieties in the National Fruit Collection, you can only choose from
a small handful of each in the supermarket? Because profit maximisation
on a national scale dictates that the super-markets tell farmers to
grow two or three varieties in large enough quantities to supply all
their stores. The result of this is more use of chemicals (less varieties
equals greater threat from pests and diseases) and a subsequent loss
of wildlife and threat to health.
Shopping at supermarkets reduces both biodiversity in the countryside
and choice for the consumer.
Don't shop at supermarkets The continual priority given to shelf life and uniformity of
size/colour/shape over taste has resulted in supermarket food being
a bland imitation of what food can and should taste like. How many top
chefs really shop at supermarkets? Shopping at supermarkets
reduces meals from being an important and enjoyable part of life to
a refuelling exerciae.
Don't shop at supermarkets Despite the corporate might of the supermarket, the greatest
power still lies in the hands of the individual - the power of the purse.
The best way to predict the future is to design it; if millions of individuals
turn their backs on the supermarkets and instead support independent
shops, farm shops and farmers markets the supermarket will cease to
exist.
• Alternatives
Index our growing directory of green services, both local and national
• Friends of the Earth Report: Calling the shots: How supermarkets
get their way in planning decisions
(Links to PDF document)
This document outlines the growing
concern about the strong-arm tactics of the supermarket chains at the
local authority level in driving their store expansion. Allegations
have begun to emerge of supermarkets pressurising councillors; of stores
and warehouses constructed beyond planning permission boundaries; and
of councillors finding it increasingly difficult to voice their concerns
or refuse applications from the supermarkets because of their overweening
power.
• Tescopoly This website is supported by organisations concerned
about the market-distorting power of the major supermarkets.
• Rural
Futures A new countryside initiative by a number of organisations,
between them representing millions of town and country people
throughout Britain, who have come together because there is
a need to bring new thinking to the countryside debate.
• Sustain The alliance for better food and farming advocates
food and agriculture policies and practices that enhance the
health and welfare of people and animals, improve the working
and living environment, promote equity and enrich society and
culture.
Sustain represents around 100 national public interest organisations
working at international, national, regional and local level.
Source:
This article appears on several web sites, including the Rural
Futures site where it is creditted to Richard Boyden; the One
Tree Hill Allotment Society web site with the urging to
circulate it. So we are.
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