The alleged tragedy of cheap food

How can anybody seriously spout this stuff? Food produced in other Australian States is apparently seen as very wicked in South Australia. No wonder there is so little sanity about globalization when even a national market for products is attacked. What about food from another town in the same State: Is that suspect too? Or maybe even food grown in the next suburb is bad! Maybe we should just all grow our own and go back to living in caves. The Greenies would approve!

"South Australians are sacrificing quality and food safety for cheap interstate and overseas food, contributing to a $412 million fall in the value of our food production in the past year, an Advertiser investigation has found. As low-priced produce floods on to South Australian supermarket shelves, an increasing amount of home-grown food is going to waste. Compared with last year, there now are 10,000 fewer positions in the food industry, the 2004/05 Food South Australia Scorecard report reveals.....

"The highest fall has been in food manufacturing, with primary production wholesaling and retailing also showing declines." The cheap food is devastating markets for local produce including eggs, fruit and vegetables. The problem is threatening the economic future of these sectors and is jeopardising the success of the state's $9.16 billion food industry....

The amount of food coming into the state also has raised fears about future food security, with the state's food self-sufficiency dropping from 90 per cent to 85 per cent since 2000. The value of food coming from outside the state has increased by 60 per cent to $1.4 billion in the past five years...."

More here

Comments? Email John Ray

No comments:

Post a Comment

All comments containing Chinese characters will not be published as I do not understand them