WHAT S IN YOUR GROCERY BAG?

Transcription

1 BCTF/CIDA Global Classroom Initiative 2006 WHAT S IN YOUR GROCERY BAG? by UBC Home Economics Teachers Collaboration Subject(s): Home Economics Food Studies Grade(s): Grades Lesson title: Brief overview: What s in your grocery bag? This lesson extends the information usually included in lessons on shopping and food-buying, to include consideration of the global implications of consumer decisions with regard to the environment, sustainable agriculture and social justice. CIDA development theme(s): Environmental Sustainability Governance: human rights (basic human needs) Private Sector Development BC Ministry of Education prescribed learning outcomes: It is expected that students will: identify factors that affect the food supply (Food Studies 11, Social and Economic Issues) critique global, environmental, and health issues related to the production and consumption of food (Food Studies 12, Social and EconomicIssues) Foods 10 courses must incorporate the following content within the delivery of the prescribed learning outcomes: the global implications of particular food-buying and eating decisions (Supplement to the Home Economics 8 to 10 Integrated resource package (IRP) 1998; Context: relating understanding of foods to personal, cultural, economic and environmental considerations) Time required: one to three classes of one hour each Required materials/equipment: In advance of this lesson, collect a variety of products/packages/wrappers for a variety of food products, and 10 to 12 products that are illustrative of products that address global environmental concerns, and that are available in most supermarkets or specialty food stores (for example: fair trade coffee, fair trade chocolate, fair trade tea, a variety of organic products, products labeled GMO free). Place the products in grocery bags. BCTF/CIDA Global Classroom Initiative

2 Products should vary from bag to bag. Try to have a variety of types (plastic, paper, cloth). The number of bags will be determined by the number of groups (6 to 8 groups of 4). world atlas (minimum one copy per group) world map (one copy per group) chart paper, marking pens, pins Home grown: The case for local food in a global market Quotes from Worldwatch paper #163 (see appendix #1) This is to be cut up and one quote distributed to each group. The 100 mile diet (see appendix #2) One copy for teacher to read to class. overhead projector (optional) Lesson Resources: Home grown: The case for local food in a global market Quotes from Worldwatch paper #163 (see appendix #1). Available at: The 100 mile diet (appendix #2) Websites: Canada s labeling regulations (2003 guide to food labeling and advertising): Dictionary of terms related to labeling and sustainable agriculture: World Watch: Mile Diet: 100milediet.org 100 Mile Diet Map: 100milediet.org/map Fair Trade Products: transfair.ca Shah, A. (2005). Behind consumption and consumerism. Available at: Procedure: 1. Examining Labeling a. Organize students into small co-operative learning groups of approximately four members each. b. Provide each group with a grocery bag containing selected items (see required materials above). c. Invite students to examine the items in their grocery bag, paying close attention to the labeling. Let students know that according to Canada s labeling regulations 2003 Guide to food labeling and advertising The following information must appear on food labels: Common name Net quantity declaration Dealer name and address BCTF/CIDA Global Classroom Initiative

3 List of ingredients Nutrition facts table Durable life date d. Other information is considered optional. Are there any products in your grocery bag that have other information used to inform the consumer that these particular products that support the environment, sustainable agriculture, or social justice (e.g., fair trade coffee, fair trade chocolate, organic products, products labeled GMO free, wild salmon, free-range eggs, etc.). e. Lead a discussion on why consumers might be asking for these products and for products to be labeled in this way (e.g. concern for personal health; concern for working conditions; safe production for both consumer and workers; who profits, who loses; is production of this product sustainable?). For a dictionary of terms related to labeling and sustainable agriculture, see 2. Calculating food miles Introduction: ask the students, When you sit down to eat a meal, how far do you think each of the ingredients on your plate has typically traveled? Let s see if this is the case with this bag of groceries. a. Have students compare their guesses for the typical North American meal which has traveled anywhere from 2,500 to 4,000 kilometers from farm to plate. (Source: Watching What We Eat, available at Worldwatch b. Reconvene students in their small co-operative learning groups. [Note to technical staff: link to BCTF Global Education Web site Methodologies The Global Classroom: Putting Process to Content Co-operative Learning for Smarties] c. Ask each group to select a facilitator, recorder, reporter and one other group role (i.e. clarifier, timekeeper) and briefly review group roles. d. Provide each group with: a grocery bag containing selected items (can be the same bag used for the examining labeling activity) one or more world atlases a world map chart paper, marking pen and pins. BCTF/CIDA Global Classroom Initiative

4 e. Ask students to: determine where the food items were produced/grown and plot these locations their world map. rank the food items in order from those produced closest to those produced the farthest away. using an atlas, calculate the food miles in their grocery bag. record the miles for each item on chart paper, calculate the total and determine the average. f. Ask groups to display their chart papers in a location visible to the entire class. g. Ask group reporters to briefly report out, on behalf of their groups to the class as a whole. h. Lead a class discussion of the consequences of food coming from such distances (e.g. What is the environmental impact of transport? Of refrigeration? Of packaging? Under what conditions is the food is produced? Does producing this food displace other crops in the country producing it so that local people don t eat as well? Are there local foods that could be substituted that would encourage and support local agriculture?). i. Distribute quotes from Worldwatch paper #163: Home grown: The case for local food in a global market to small groups for discussion (one quote per group). (appendix #1) j. Direct groups to complete an issue analysis chart for the quote they have been given. The chart headings are: Identify the issue What is the underlying value? What are the consequences? (e.g., impact on health, environment, safety, economics, human rights, social justice) k. Ask student groups to examine the packaging material of the food products in their grocery bag, and the bag itself, and discuss whether there are options that are more environmentally friendly. 3. One hundred mile challenge a. Introduce students to the One hundred mile challenge by reading The 100 Mile Diet (see appendix #2) to the class. b. Discuss the reasons why people may be trying to satisfy their need for food by finding sources within 100 miles of their home. Highlight some advantages (i.e. fresh, flavourful food; food that hasn t lost nutrients through travel; less pollution due to transportation; supports local agriculture production and farmers) and BCTF/CIDA Global Classroom Initiative

5 disadvantages (i.e. we don t grow coffee, sugar, bananas) c. Assign students one or all of the following activities: develop a meal plan for a breakfast, lunch or dinner that contains only foods from a 100 mile radius of the school (if you need assistance determining the radius go to 100milediet.org/map, a map can be generated for any place in North America on this web site). one of these meals could be made in class. modify and test a recipe that meets the requirements of the 100 mile challenge (think of local substitutions, e.g., for sugar, try honey; for raisins, try dried cranberries, for bananas try grated zucchini or carrots, for rice try barley, etc.) Assessment strategies: calculation of food miles could be collected and marked meal plans for 100 mile diet could be collected and marked modification of a recipe could be collected and marked if students make food products regular lab schemas could be used. Suggestions to extend the lesson: Preserving local foods when they are in season is an essential component of the 100 mile diet. This lesson could be used to introduce a preservation unit that could include canning peaches, pears, tomatoes, etc.; freezing fruits and vegetables; making pickles, jams and jellies; drying fruits and vegetables, making fruit leather; smoking salmon or other fish. Students could be assigned to design a label for a specific product that includes legally required information, optional information, and other information that they think consumers might want. Field trips to local farms, or to a local farmers market (if the market hours are outside school hours it could be a self-guided field trip assignment). Conduct a community audit of food production. Invite a guest speaker from Oxfam, or show the video Hand that feeds the world, or the PowerPoint presentation Trading away the right to food available from Students could be assigned to choose a particular consumer item to research using the title What if Could Talk? The task would be to follow the item from cradle to grave (or from the garden to the compost heap). Statistics Canada has a publication called Agriculture at a glance with a teaching kit that has been developed to go along with it. One chapter of the booklet is called What is in your grocery cart?. It gives a Canadian perspective and may be used as follow up. The web site is There is a unit entitled Think global eat local available from BC Agriculture in the Classroom Foundation, with several activities that complement this lesson. There is also a wealth of other agricultural and food- related resources available at this web site. BCTF/CIDA Global Classroom Initiative

6 Excerpt from Worldwatch paper #163: Home grown: The case for local food in a global market appendix #1 by Brian Halweil, Available at: reliance on long-distance food damages rural economies, as farmers and small food businesses become the most marginal link in the sprawling food chain. This trend also creates numerous opportunities along the way for contamination, while contributing to global warming, because of the huge quantities of fuel used for transportation. Locally grown food served fresh and in season has a definite taste advantage. It's harvested at the peak of ripeness and doesn't have to be fumigated, refrigerated, or packaged for long-distance hauling and long shelf-life. Rebuilding local food economies is the first genuine profit-making opportunity in farm country in years. Of course, a certain amount of food trade is natural and beneficial. But money spent on locally produced foods stays in the community longer, creating jobs, supporting farmers, and preserving local cuisines and crop varieties And developing nations that emphasize greater food self-reliance can retain precious foreign exchange and avoid the instability of international markets. Surveys have shown that a typical meal-some meat, grain, fruits, and vegetablesusing local ingredients entails four to 17 times less petroleum consumption in transport than the same meal bought from the conventional food chain. While most economists believe that long-distance food trade is efficient because communities and nations can buy their food from the lowest-cost provider, studies from North America, Asia, and Africa show farm communities reap little benefit, and often suffer as a result of freer trade in agricultural goods. The economic benefits of food trade are a myth. The big winners are agribusiness monopolies that ship, trade, and process food. The big losers are the world's poor farmers producing for export who often go hungry as they sacrifice the use of their land to feed foreign mouths. BCTF/CIDA Global Classroom Initiative

7 Appendix #2 The 100 mile diet In the Spring of 2005, Alisa Smith and James MacKinnon, two writers from Vancouver, British Columbia, embarked on a simple experiment. They took up the challenge to contest what has been called the SUV diet. The typical North American diet that has traveled anywhere from 2,500 and 4,000 kilometres or 1,500 and 2,500 miles from farm to plate. For one year, they would buy or gather their food and drink from within 100 miles of their apartment in Vancouver. They chose a 100 mile radius because it s an easy way to start thinking local. A 100-mile radius is large enough to reach beyond a big city and small enough to feel truly local. And it rolls off the tongue more easily than the '160-Kilometre Diet.' For one year, James and Alisa got up-close-and-personal with issues ranging from the family-farm crisis to the environmental value of organic pears shipped across the globe. They've reconsidered vegetarianism and sunk their hands into community gardening. They've eaten a lot of potatoes. Lots more information is available on their website, 100milediet.org and a book about their experiment will soon be available: The 100 mile diet: A Year of local eating will be published in the Spring of 2007 by Random House Canada. They have started a movement: 100 mile diet, Eating Local for Global Change. Recently more than 250 people in Powell River, British Columbia signed up for a 50 mile diet. la.sdrive.glob Ed lessons fldr.15 PC:mh/la:tfeu BCTF/CIDA Global Classroom Initiative