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Food

The UK Is Importing More than Half of Its Food and It's Ruining the Environment

A new study suggests that importing so much food is having a huge impact on cropland and greenhouse gas emissions in smaller, less affluent countries.
Photo via Flickr user Ralph Daily

Globalization can create some strange trends.

Take the UK, for example. Though British food isn't exactly the most beloved cuisine in the world, the United Kingdom is a food-exporting powerhouse. They even sell tea to China, cheese to France, and chocolate to Switzerland.

Overall, the UK exported $29 billion worth of food to over 150 countries in 2014—not bad for an island unjustly known for bad food.

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READ: British Food Is Taking Over the World

Yet, for all of these exports, more than half of the UK's food supply comes from outside its borders, a reality which is afflicting not just the environment, but its poorer trading partners.

A new study published by Royal Society Interface suggests that this reliance on external cattle feed and food means that 70 and 64 percent of the country's associated cropland and greenhouse gas impacts, respectively, are also located abroad.

The study, titled "Global cropland and greenhouse gas impacts of UK food supply are increasingly located overseas," goes on to warn readers of the dangers of simply outsourcing the production of food to poorer countries under the guise of reaching climate goals.

"Producing sufficient, healthy food for a growing world population amid a changing climate is a major challenge for the 21st century," the authors write. "However, agricultural trade has implications for national food security and could displace environmental impacts from developed to developing countries."

In other words, in addition to exporting its most coveted products around the world, the UK is also exporting its carbon footprint to poor countries.

READ: I Tried and Nearly Failed to Understand British Food

Ultimately, the researchers suggest that it's a pretty cheap shot to blame less affluent nations for what is ultimately the fault of consumers and a government which is not really concerned with what is going on beyond its borders.

"Total environmental impact is ultimately driven by consumption," according to researchers. "Yet governments mostly focus on low impact per unit of production within national boundaries and give less consideration to addressing consumption volumes and patterns."

And it's not like the UK couldn't sustain itself like it did in the centuries before industrial sea and air travel. "Theoretically, the UK could achieve full self-sufficiency; however, this would imply drastic shifts in consumption patterns away from stimulant crops, animal products, and many types of fruit and vegetables, which may not be feasible or acceptable."

It would just mean less tomatoes in the winter and perhaps less Chilean sea bass.