Food labels to show 'carbon footprint' under Government plans

Supermarket food will be clearly labelled to show its carbon footprint as well as country of origin and animal welfare standards as part of efforts to transform the British diet.

By Louise Gray, Environment CorrespondentPublished: 3:08PM GMT 05 Jan 2010

Tesco already display carbon reduction labels as part of their packaging on certain products
Hilary Benn, the Environment Secretary, said in future people will have to eat less “carbon intensive” foods like red meat or excessively packaged products to make sure Britain meets targets to cut greenhouse gases.
To help consumers do this, new “green” food labels will show how much carbon was produced in the manufacture and transportation of food.

Tesco, Pepsi and other leading brands are already displaying a “carbon reduction label” on certain products showing the amount of carbon dioxide produced in grams in growing the food, packaging and transportation.
As part of a new food strategy for the next 20 years, the Government calls on other brands to consider measuring the carbon footprint of goods as well as being more honest about where meat was bred and the standards of welfare.
But environmental groups said the Government needed to bring in legislation rather than a voluntary labelling scheme to really transform food and farming.
Speaking at the Oxford Farming Conference, Mr Benn said choosing low carbon goods will help people fight climate change.
“Over the years ahead we are likely to see more information about how things are produced and what the carbon impact is,” he said.
“We are still learning as a world how to do it, but given that one of the things we have to do is get our emissions down here as in other countries the choices consumers make can have a big impact.”
A Government-supported body, the Carbon Trust, is currently working with the food industry, including big brands like Boots and Innocent, to help manufacturers work out and display the carbon footprint of different items.
Following the Irish pork scandal, Mr Benn also called on all retailers to sign up to the Pigmeat Labelling Code of Practice, due to be published next month, that will show where meat was born, reared and manufactured.
But Tracy Worcester, the former actress and food campaigner, said the guidelines will do little to improve animal welfare unless it is compulsory.
“It needs to be mandatory because no producer is going to put people off buying their food,” she said.
Helen Rimmer, of Friends of the Earth, also said carbon labelling will do little to fight climate change unless more low carbon products become available.
She said the Government should be supporting sustainable methods of farming such as organic, while cutting subsidies to factory farms.
"Hilary Benn rightly recognizes the need to fix the way we farm, but yet again it has failed to choose the path to fair and planet-friendly food,” she said.
Research released at the Oxford Farming Conference showed that farmers broadly support development of genetically modified crops and John Beddington, the Government’s chief scientific adviser, will call for more research into the technology at the event.
However an alternative event the “real farming conference” argued that more environmentally-friendly methods can be used to boost food production.