- Location
- Hammerwich
I was at the London Agritech conference yesterday and one of the speakers was from Foundation Earth and they have developed an environmental rating label.
The aim is to create a more sustainable food system and reward farmers that are most sustainable. The calc includes the whole supply chain to get food to the shelf. So includes up and downstream of the farm itself. Including any processing and transport. This is not just a carbon calc - it includes things like water.
The main problem at the moment, is that the farming part all uses averages to create a footprint. And the farming part is about 1/3 of the overall eco footprint. Thus the accuracy is way off. I believe this is a worldwide average, not even a UK one. So you can imagine how bad red meats fair at the moment when they factor in land use changes in developing parts of the world!
However, they want to make the rating more accurate over time. To do this, they need to know more about what actually happens on farm. Not just carbon, water usage and overall sustainability. The aim being that farms can get their own eco rating, that then contributes to an overall eco rating of the product. The better the eco rating, the more valuable your sales are.
Given how good UK (and irish) farming is compared to that being imported this could offer us a unique advantage and even a premium. This is a worldwide system, not like Red Tractor that is just UK. So would allow direct comparison to imports.
What are your thoughts - the label is coming regardless!
The aim is to create a more sustainable food system and reward farmers that are most sustainable. The calc includes the whole supply chain to get food to the shelf. So includes up and downstream of the farm itself. Including any processing and transport. This is not just a carbon calc - it includes things like water.
The main problem at the moment, is that the farming part all uses averages to create a footprint. And the farming part is about 1/3 of the overall eco footprint. Thus the accuracy is way off. I believe this is a worldwide average, not even a UK one. So you can imagine how bad red meats fair at the moment when they factor in land use changes in developing parts of the world!
However, they want to make the rating more accurate over time. To do this, they need to know more about what actually happens on farm. Not just carbon, water usage and overall sustainability. The aim being that farms can get their own eco rating, that then contributes to an overall eco rating of the product. The better the eco rating, the more valuable your sales are.
Given how good UK (and irish) farming is compared to that being imported this could offer us a unique advantage and even a premium. This is a worldwide system, not like Red Tractor that is just UK. So would allow direct comparison to imports.
What are your thoughts - the label is coming regardless!