Government advice: 'Food miles are good'

Source: thisismoney.co.uk 

The Government will today dismiss fears over 'food miles' and urge supermarkets to stock more produce flown in from Africa.

Ministers are to offer taxpayers' money to retailers such as Tesco, Sainsbury's and Waitrose to help them find new African suppliers, in a move that has been described as the worst kind of 'strawberries at Christmas nonsense'.

Environmentalists want consumers to give up their taste for exotic vegetables in the middle of winter and buy more seasonal British produce. But in a speech in London today overseas development minister Gareth Thomas will tell Britain's biggest food companies that about one million African farmers and their families depend on exports to Britain.

He said: 'We have never agreed with those who say we should punish African farmers because they don't like the emissions. If you take green beans, studies have shown there are fewer emissions from growing green beans in Africa than producing them in the European Union. The way to reduce carbon emissions is to get a post-Kyoto global deal, not penalise Africans who then can't get their goods to market.'

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