Archive for the ‘carbon labeling’ Category
Walmart Announces Goal to Eliminate 20 Million Metric Tons of Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Global Supply Chain
Walmart today announced a goal to eliminate 20 million metric tons of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from its global supply chain by the end of 2015. This represents one and a half times the company’s estimated global carbon footprint growth over the next five years and is the equivalent of taking more than 3.8 million cars off the road for a year.
“Energy efficiency and carbon reduction are central issues in the world today,” said Mike Duke, Walmart president and CEO. “We’ve been working to make a difference in these areas, both in our own footprint and our supply chain. We know that we have an opportunity to do more and the capacity to do more.”
Carbon Craziness
France may be the first country to impose mandatory carbon footprint labeling requirements for all consumer products. A bill will be considered in early 2010 to make reporting of the carbon footprint mandatory in France by 2011. The USDA FAS, in its report “Proposed Carbon Footprint Labeling Could Step on Trade,” looks at the trade implications of the issue.
Though it stands to impact processed food more than fresh, this move strikes me as about the most anti-consumer law that could be devised. With as much as 5% of the product cost expected to result from the reporting exercise, the law would produce nothing more than a “gee-whiz” number that most people would ignore anyway. Plus, as the USDA FAS report points out, there are numerous questions about both how the numbers that would be reported and the potential trade impact of the law.
Is buying local always better? It’s complicated
If most of your food doesn’t come with microwaveable directions, you may have noticed a trend called the local food movement. Yes, it’s everywhere.
It hasn’t hurt that books like The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan or Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal, Vegetable, Miracle have reached millions of readers as they tout the healthy, albeit difficult, struggle to take time to taste the heirloom, organic, homegrown tomato.
via mnn.com
Does Carbon Labeling Confuse Consumers?
Tesco, a British supermarket chain, began festooning cartons of milk this month with information on the carbon dioxide emissions associated with the production, processing, distribution and use of each pint.
Tesco said putting the labels on milk pints – an iconic symbol of British life – helped to raise awareness about climate change and about the impact of store-bought goods.
via nytimes.com
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