Food Preparation and Nutrition GCSE Food Provenance practicalaction.org/gcse-food-preparation-nutrition

Food provenance 'Food provenance' means where your food originates from, therefore where is it caught, grown, or reared. So how do we know where the food we buy originates from?

Food origins In the UK, the law states that food labels are required to include the place of the origin, so that people know where their food is caught, grown or reared. If the food does not have any packaging, then sometimes you have to look harder to discover where its from. Some companies are finding ways to label foods with their country of origin without packaging. Why do you think companies are doing this?

UK facts and figures So, where do you think that most of the food eaten in the UK originates from? The latest figures from the UK government in 2015, show that 52% of the food consumed was supplied by UK farmers and producers. Following that other EU countries supplied 29%, with Africa, Asia and South America all at 4%. The UK also grows and rears lots of foods that are exported to other countries, including fruits, vegetables, meat, fish and oils.

Food miles Many people have concerns about how much food we import to the UK particularly when the UK is exporting foods. Why do you think: The UK imports food? People might have concerns about the UK importing food? One concern is the pollution and therefore impact on the environment caused by transporting food long distances. The distance food travels is known as food miles. How many food miles do you think these beans from Kenya and apple from America have been transported to the UK? Use the Food mile calculator here http://www.foodmiles.com/ to find out how far the foods have travelled. It also calculates the amount of carbon ‘pollution’ produced by the different types of transport. This helps you to work out the carbon footprint and environmental impact of importing foods.

Traceability Some food manufacturers include a wide ranger of information beyond the origin of the product. This helps people to know more about the: ‘traceability’ of the food if it goes to another country for processing and packaging quality assurances about how and where the food has been caught, grown and reared. Here are a few: what do you think they tell consumers? Activity: Look at a range of food labels at school, home or in a shop. On your worksheet make a record of the food, its place of origin, its food miles to transport it to the UK, and any other information about its traceability/quality assurance.

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