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‘We hope this initiative will help Nutri-Score to rethink’: Olive oil makers launch awards in response to ‘penalising’ FOP labelling By Oliver Morrison Europe’s olive oil industry is railing against the ‘unfair’ Nutri-Score algorithm and has launched the first international awards to assess the health benefits and flavour of olive oils in the hope the food labelling scheme will review its assessment criteria.
Nutri-Score classifies food and beverages according to their nutritional profile using a scale of five colours and letters (A is green to represent the best nutritional quality while E is dark orange to show it’s the lowest).
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Commodities
European governments and legislators urged to help cocoa farmers as prices continue to fall in West Africa By Anthony Myers Fairtrade urges EU to implement regulation to recognise the right to living income in cocoa sector in any forthcoming human rights due diligence regulation, as European Cocoa Association calls for an ‘enabling environment’ across the industry.
The drop in price comes after the governments of Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana, which produce two-thirds of the world’s cocoa, implemented a Living Income Differential (LID) of $400 per tonne on all cocoa purchased from farmers from October 2020. Fairtrade said the LID is intended as a step toward a living income for cocoa farmers, recognising that low global cocoa prices have historically trapped farmers in poverty.
Europe’s ‘difficult target’ of 25% organic by 2030: Is the Organic Action Plan doing enough? The European Commission has detailed how it plans to achieve a target of 25% agricultural land under organic farming. Should it be doing more?
Under the Green Deal’s Farm to Fork strategy, the European Commission has committed to a target of at least 25% agricultural land under organic farming by 2030.
Coming from a current starting point of just 8.5%, the Commission has its work cut out for it.
“We don’t dispute that it’s a difficult target,” said Diego Canga Fano, Principal Adviser at DG Agri, who revealed a ‘big challenge’ lies in the varying starting points of the EU 27.
The seafood industry has hit back at a controversial film about the impact of commercial fishing.
‘Seaspiracy’, made with the backing of Hollywood star and environmental activist Leonardo DiCaprio, has been trending on the streaming service since its release on March 24.
The film puts into question the idea of sustainable fishing, claiming the likes of Dolphin Safe and Marine Stewardship Council labels may not provide adequate assurances for consumers.
It further claims seafood is tainted with slave labour and human rights abuses and is causing irrevocable harm to ocean life. Among its claims are that Bluefin tuna have become critically endangered because of overfishing; farmed salmon are raised in lice-plagued waters and the fish are “swimming in circles in their own filth”; and that the oceans will be empty of fish in 27 years, and become a barren ocean wasteland – leading to our own extinction.
Unilever talks food waste: ‘Our mission is to inspire consumers to be more resourceful with food’ Unilever has some ambitious goals on food waste. The multinational wants to halve waste from its direct operations by 2025 and is working with suppliers and customers to reduce waste across the food chain. It also hopes to tackle one of the trickiest issues, food that is wasted in the home. We spoke to Christina Bauer-Plank, Global Brand Vice President of Hellmann’s, to find out how.
One third of all the food produced globally goes to waste. If food waste were a country, it would be the world’s third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases, behind only China and the USA. Twenty-five percent of the world’s fresh water supply is used to grow food that is never eaten.