Food: our facts

Paris – One can split hairs about whether organic is better than seasonal, fair trade or locally produced. But what counts in the end are the facts. Partly thanks to Greens present at the Heerlen meeting in Paris in December, 150 thousand Paris children get organic school lunches every day, 350 French community groups buy their food from local farms and 80 thousand London construction workers will have a healthy diet when building the venues of the 2012 Olympic Games.

Our special guest is Jenny Jones, a London Green believing that sustainable policy can make a huge contribution in greening the consumption in cities. Elected in the Greater London Assembly and chair of London Food, a partnership of food experts and organisations set up by the Mayor of London, she is about to prove it for one of the largest metropolitan areas in the world. London Food aims at nothing less than a strategy that improves the health of the inhabitants of England’s capital and makes their food sustainable over the next 10 years. ‘We are convinced that if you get people’s food right’, says Jones, ‘other things will be put right too.’

The strategy, published last summer, is quite ambitious. It talks about health and reducing CO2-emissions, about changing the catering policy of schools, hospitals and other public institutions, about reducing waste and the accessibility of low incomes to quality food. In order to help to establish a new food climate, Jenny Jones said, London Food will encourage British farmers to increase their capacity so the percentage of foreign import, now 80 percent, will decrease.

Takeaways
It also will encourage seasonal food. In order to guarantee consumers a diverse diet, farmers will be taught how to form small consortia that bring different products together and how to get better access to the markets. London Food awards contracts on the best value, not the lowest price, taking the whole life cost of products into account, including delivery, and social and environmental arrangements. And it encourages people to cook for themselves, because ever more people live alone and tend to turn to greasy takeaways.

One of London Food’s more spectacular levers is the Olympic Games of 2012. ‘We made the city government persuade the Olympics Delivery Agency (ODA), responsible for the catering of some eight thousand construction workers during the building of the site, to pass from the usual fat and cholesterol-rich diet to a sustainable menu which is locally produced, seasonal and, if possible, organic. And successfully so, which is a big breakthrough because decisions were taken on a high level. But green moles in the system have been helpful in galvanising them.’

A tool the Greens would like to add, Jenny Jones says, is urban planning. ‘London has always had a Green Belt, the a rural area around the city thanks to which people still know how their food grows. Since 1960 it is officially protected. And although the pressure is up, greens will keep protecting the area. But the population has increased to 7,5 million inhabitants and another million are expected in the coming years, so new communities have to be developed. ‘Food should not be an afterthought for those. Planners should include green spaces from the beginning, as well as spaces for markets, and for farming.’

Organic wheat
Jacques Boutault, mayor of the 7th arrondissement of Paris since 2001, has been quite successful in making the 1.500 daily school lunches served to children in his area sustainable and, where possible, organic. At first, he said, this seemed impossible because of the higher costs. ‘So we started with bread from organic wheat as a first step. Gradually, other ingredients were changed and at the moment half of them is organic.

For the moment that is all we can politically achieve. Then the budget for those meals is voted by the Paris city council, which can’t give one district more funding than others. And because the socialists are not too inclined to make food into an issue. But we have tried to convince the parents, telling them that it is for the well being of the country and the children’s health. We asked: should we sometimes do less on quantity and more on quality? 70% were in favour.’

Farm baskets
Sjoerd Wartena believes individuals can do a lot to improve their environment and their menu, helping the regional farmers at the same time. Having left Amsterdam 33 years ago to start a farm in southeast France, he is involved in AMAP, a movement of associations supporting a farmers’ agriculture – as opposed to agribusiness. The AMAP system, he explains, is based on contracts between a local farm and groups of some 50 households each who buy ‘baskets’ of farm products and pay in advance, thus guaranteeing the farmers an income during a certain period of time.

Some 350, he says, have been created all over France. In addition, Wartena has started a community land trust – known as soil association in England – aiming at sustainable agriculture. The trust buys the land and enables the local community to buy the shares and take care of the agricultural production.
But organic and regional production are not enough, Wartena argues. ‘The entire system should be made sustainable, from local policies right to the Common Agricultural Policy of the European Union.’

5 million cows
Jacques Maret (agriculture specialist from Les Verts) expressed his ideas on this issue. The French words pays, paysan, paysage – country, farmer, landscape, he says, have the same roots. Once they were in line, taking soil, climate and biodiversity limitations  into account. ‘That system is broken now, largely because of the European subsidy rules. Farmers who used to work with real money, are forced to follow world market prices, whereas only 10 percent of the total production is actually traded that way.’ The best example of the absurdity of the mechanism is New Zealand, he says. ‘It has 5 million cows for 2 million people – who would each have to drink about 40 litres per day to consume it all. So they export most of it. And thus only 2 million people decide how much the world should pay for its milk.’

Maret advocates real pricing that includes social and environmental costs, a limit on the amount of subsidy awarded per producer and a halt to money that is put in the wrong places. Fortunately there are signs, he claims, that the EU-policy will change in the right way. But the local level, he adds, there also is a lot to improve. ‘Governments show a general lack of interest for farming. Their main problem is housing, not food, so they refuse to include nearby agricultural activities in their plans. They often sacrifice green belts around cities out of fear for speculations.’ 

DEBATE
The term locally produced causes quite some debate. ‘Local production is not possible everywhere’, argues Bas Eickhout (GroenLinks). ‘A metropolis for example always will have to get part of its food from considerable distances, simply because of its size. Moreover, locally grown food is not necessarily environmentally friendly.’ ‘London is so huge that it is difficult to grow everything very close’, Jenny Jones replies. ‘So London Food defines local in a variable way. But we do use sustainable forms of transport.’

‘By local we mean area’s a lot bigger than just the green belts around towns and cities’, Sjoerd Wartena adds. ‘But for us, the limited distance is important, more important than whether the food is organically grown.’ ‘I would not put local and organic in a hierarchy’, says Jolanda Terpstra (GroenLinks). ‘Production should always be as energy effective as possible. And sometimes it can be more effective to produce tomatoes in Southern Spain than around the corner.’ ‘That depends on the season’, is Maret’s reply. ‘We just should not eat tomatoes all year long!’ To which Jos van Dijk (GroenLinks) answers: ‘How much do you want to go back in time?’

Sustainability
And how should sustainability be defined? Jean-Louis Maurer recommends to ‘switch to vegetarianism, because it reduces the need for soil.’ André Cicolella (health commission, Les Verts) suggests ‘to put more emphasis on health. French children are getting fatter each year because of their diet, and the level of pesticide residues in their blood increases.’ ‘Organic food does not always cover all aspects of sustainability’, says Victoria Selwyn (Les Verts). ‘Jacques Boutault, are the social and transport of your school meals dealt with in a sustainable way?’  Boutault: ‘Our bread wheat comes from the region. The other ingredients still are a problem. In summer we get a lot of seasonal products but in winter a lot less. If you take local in a narrow way.’
 
Price
But what about the price: why indeed should sustainable food s be more expensive? ‘Is it because non-organic food is produced on a large-scale?’ suggests Inti Suarez (GroenLinks).  ‘Mass production of organic food indeed is a problem’,  Sjoerd Wartena admits. But Jenny Jones refuses to go along that road. ‘When food is cheap, you can bet someone is paying the price. It is unrealistic to expect cheap food. If Greens were in charge, conventional farming would be very expensive because it takes the environment costs into account.

And organic food would be relatively cheap.’ ‘Food just has become too cheap’, Jacques Boutault agrees. ‘By the end of World War II, people spent 60 percent of their income on food. Today it is only 15 percent.’ ‘Organic food does not have to be expensive’, Michael Leibman says, ‘when you cut on the quantity. Unfortunately there is a lot of pressure on people to eat way too much.’

Action
So much for theory and talk. ‘Without action, programs and ideas are insufficient’, Sjoerd Wartena concludes before returning to his farm. ‘What we need are real projects suggested by civil society.’

Panel: Jenny Jones (Green Party of England and Wales, member Greater London Assembly and director of London Food), Sjoerd Wartena (Les Verts, organic farmer & land movement AMAP), Jacques Boutault (France, Les Verts, mayor 2nd arrondissement Paris). Conveyor: Greet Goverde (GroenLinks & Platform for Agriculture Change)
Moderator: Michael Stimson (England)

 

Read more:

London Food 
AMAPs 
Community land trusts

Events:

15 February, London: SUPPLY, STANDARDS & STRATEGY – International conference examining how to make public sector food & its supply system more sustainable.

6 April 2007, Paris: HEALTH SYSTEMS CRISIS IN EUROPE – A CHALLENGE FOR POLITICAL ECOLOGY. Conseil Régional d’Ile de France, 35 Boulevard des Invalides, salle Paul Delouvrier