UK retail giant backtracks on ‘food miles’

UK retail giant Tesco has beaten a retreat and now says it has no immediate plans to reduce fresh produce imports from Kenya.

Instead, the “food miles” debate has been referred to a yet to be constituted stakeholders’ committee, which among other things will collect views from producers and buyers and draft a carbon emissions policy.

During a high powered international conference in Nairobi last week, convened by the Kenya Flower Council, the supermarket was accused of attempting to implement a policy that would adversely affect trade without undertaking proper research to establish the extent to which developing countries’ airlifted products contributed to carbon emissions.

Tesco’s commercial director Richard Brasher, who attended the conference, said that the food miles policy would not be enforced until all facts are determined. “There are no immediate plans to reduce imports from Kenya,” he said.

Leading the onslaught against the UK retailers was EU head of trade in Nairobi Harvey Rouse, who said that existing research indicated that Kenya’s greenhouses produced less carbon than those of the Netherlands where due to lack of sunshine, the glass houses are artificially heated.

Mr Rouse agreed with the results of a study conducted by Cranfield University of the UK, at Oserian flower farm, which found that Kenya’s carbon emissions were 0.2 tonnes compared to the UK’s 9.32 tonnes.

Homegrown, a leading Kenyan exporter to the UK, said that any move that impacts on consumers’ perceptions must be treated with care because they have the final say on whether a product is sold or not.

Outgoing chief executive officer, Dicky Evans called for dialogue.

“The issue here is not who is producing more carbon but how all involved can work together to clean up the environment without disrupting trade,” he said.

KFC chairman Erastus Mureithi said that Tesco’s backing down on the food miles policy was greeted by the horticulture industry with a sigh of relief. However, he added, the controversy is a pointer that Kenya needs an aggressive marketing policy abroad given that over the past decade, the sector has invested heavily in meeting one EU import condition after another.

His sentiments were supported by Agriculture Secretary Dr Wilson Songa who cited the Maximum Residue Levels of the early 1990s and the most recent European Retailers Good Agricultural Practices.

The timing of the food miles sent shivers through an industry whose future faces a more serious threat if a trading pact is not concluded by end of this year to replace the Cotonou treaty. There are strong indications that the much talked about Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) are unlikely to be in place by January 2008, subjecting imports from developing countries to a 15 per cent duty and so effectively putting them out of reach of consumers.

Despite the reprieve on the trade miles, the KFC says the government has not been forceful enough in fighting for one of its most important foreign exchange earners.

Chief executive officer Jane Ngige said the council is petitioning the government to consider allocating a budget for international marketing activities for horticulture which has until now relied only on private sector initiatives. Mrs Ngige said it was ironical that it took the UK Secretary of Trade Hilary Benn to issue a strong and widely circulated statement against his country’s supermarkets’ decision on the food miles while the Kenya government is yet to make its official position known.

Mrs Ngige said that the government must immediately address the plan by the UK retailers to print a symbol of an aeroplane on packaging to indicate that a product has been imported and from where, which is supposed to be effected in the next three months. Mr Brasher was, however non-committal although Mr Rouse said the EU would lobby for the plane symbol requirement to be shelved.

Source: nationmedia.com