Wednesday, February 13, 2008

England - Changing Consumers

When one thinks of great European food countries, France and Italy are probably at the top of the list. One usually does not think of England, but England has definitely been changing it's food scene recently. And with that change, consumers are demanding better food from the supermarkets. This article from CNN talks about how British government is asking for "eco-labels" measuring the environmental impact - basically labeling food that's grown locally, which emits less greenhouse gases. Funny, since my travels in Italy felt like all food sold was grown locally - which really just tastes better. In addition, Jamie Oliver is sparking a debate of the terrible conditions of the caged chickens with stunts like showing how caged chickens are killed on TV (electrocuted). Now that seems a little extreme to me for TV programming - maybe London has a writer's strike as well. However, hopefully this food culture of more local and organic foods in the supermarkets finds it's way to the states...

Btw - a post will be done on a national Tyson/Perdue chicken vs a local organic chicken to really see side by side how much better local organic chickens tastes...

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

As depressing at it sounds, I at times feel the public could care less about the way we shop and eat.
If you take a moment and think of how supermarkets work, you can only come up with more questions and why things are done the way they are.

It's great nations like England are looking for quality products and taking stance protecting the average citizen.

Let's hope our USDA and FDA take note and work a little bit harder... for our sake anyways.