THE KITCHEN PHILOSOPHER
Next time you’re in a supermarket, take a moment to ponder its wonder. Our ancestors would have been staggered to see such well stocked, endless aisles of quality, mostly affordable food. The world’s population is predicted to rise from 7.3 to 9.7 billion by 2050, and with growing numbers of people coming out of poverty, most notably in China and India, there just won’t be enough land in the world to keep us all stocked with many of the foods we now take for granted, especially meat and dairy.
Those are sobering thoughts fitting for Earth Day on 22 April. Back in 1970, when Earth Day was instigated, it was a way for a few hippies and idealists to show support for the idea of environmental protection. Today, no cook can deny the challenges of sustainability.
The strange thing about considering the planet, though, is that it often encourages people to retreat to their corner of it. So many of our problems seem to be rooted in our globalised economy. Thousands of food miles result in tonnes of greenhouse gases, while our desire for a plentiful supply of cheap food leads to rainforests being cleared for farming and indigenous people are deprived of traditional foods such as avocados and quinoa – all to fuel our fashions. ‘Think global’ seems to lead to ‘shop local’.
But while there are often real ecological problems in international supply chains, sustainability doesn’t require a kind of culinary nationalism. If you look at the full production cycle of food, home-grown can be more destructive than imports.