Learning English

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Learn more about the environment
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• Deep-sea mining
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Introduction

According to the UN, one third of the food we grow ends up in the rubbish bin. In this programme, we'll meet the people trying to stop us from throwing good food away - including a farmer and a green designer. And, of course, Neil and Sam will teach you some new vocabulary as well.

This week's question

Which of the following foods can be grown in Britain throughout the year? Is it:

a) strawberries?
b) kale? or,
c) rhubarb?

Listen to the programme to find out the answer.

Vocabulary

use-by date
date until which food may be safely eaten, usually printed on the food container

eat local, eat seasonal
slogan used to encourage people to buy and eat fresh food which has been grown in their local area during the current season

middleman
business people who buy produce directly from producers, and make money by selling it on to shops or customers

commissioned
receiving a payment which is directly related to the amount sold

worst-case scenario
the worst, most serious and unpleasant thing that could possibly happen in a situation

blanket (+ verb)
(adverb) applied in the same uniform way to everything, even when there are differences between those things

TRANSCRIPT

Note: This is not a word-for-word transcript. 

Neil
Hello. This is 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English. I'm Neil.

Sam
And I'm Sam.

Neil
Does this situation sound familiar to you, Sam? You reach into the kitchen refrigerator looking for something to eat, only to find a brown lettuce, a sad-looking cucumber, and some two-week old fish, all past its use-by date - the date printed on the food container showing how long it is safe to eat.

Sam
Oh, I'm guilty of wasting food, Neil - me and many others. According to the UN, one third of the food we grow ends up in the rubbish bin. And it's not just food that's wasted - it's also the resources used to produce that food, things like water, land and transport.

Neil
In this programme, we'll be talking about food waste. We'll meet the people trying to stop us from throwing good food away, and, as usual, we'll be learning some new vocabulary as well.

Sam
Here in the UK, big supermarkets import food from abroad for customers to enjoy all year round. Summer fruit like strawberries and mangos are flown in from tropical countries and sold in winter, increasing carbon emissions as well as waste.

Neil
Yes, that's why you hear the phrase, 'eat local, eat seasonal' to encourage people to buy and eat food which has been grown in their local area, at that time of year. So, Sam, my question is - which of the following foods can be grown in Britain throughout the year? Is it:
a) strawberries?
b) kale? or,
c) rhubarb?

Sam
Hmmm, it's definitely not strawberries 'cos they only grow in summer, so I'll say b) kale.

Neil
OK, I'll reveal the answer later. We've talked about supermarkets in Britain, but food waste is happening all over the world. In Puerto Rico, too, most people shop in supermarkets, making it difficult for farmers to choose what to sell, and how much to charge for their fruit and vegetables.

Sam
Josefina Arcay is a farmer who wanted to make it easier for customers to buy local food. She started an online shop to connect shoppers with farmers directly, without the supermarkets. Here Josefina explains her project to Jo Mathys, reporter for BBC World Service Programme, People Fixing The World.

Jo Mathys
So Josefina, that's the farmer who we heard earlier growing those giant avocados, she used to have to sell her crops to these kind of middlemen.

Josefina Arcay
We had a lot of… I don't know how you call carreros... it's just people that have a big truck and they will just come by, and they will say, 'What do you have? Ohhh… that's too expensive! Wooh… very expensive! I want it half that price'. So I didn't have any way of controlling how I was going to sell - it just depended on these people coming.

Jo Mathys
And a lot of these carreros are kind of commissioned by the supermarkets. All this leads to food waste because it's really hard for farmers, like Josefina, to predict which crops they're going to be able to sell.

Neil
Josefina used to sell her food to carreros or middlemen - people who buy food directly from the grower, and make money by selling it on to customers. Josefina had no control over what to sell, and a lot of her food went to waste.

Sam
Usually middlemen are commissioned - they received a payment from the supermarkets directly related to the amount they sell. But with Josefina's online shop, farmers get a fair price for their food, customers get high-quality, fresh vegetables, and less food is wasted.

Neil
Another problem is that we throw away food after we've bought it. In fact, UN estimates that 60 percent of food waste happens in this way, often because it's past the use-by date and might not be safe to eat.

Sam
But according to green designer, Solveiga Pakstaite, these use-by dates aren't always accurate, something she discussed with BBC World Service's, People Fixing The World.

Jo Mathys
Well, food makers don't know how people will keep their products, so for instance, they might forget to put their groceries straight in the fridge when they get home. So what they do is they calculate the use-by date using a very cautious estimate.

Solveiga Pakstaite
Food producers and supermarkets… they kind of have to calculate it to the worst-case scenario because they don't know which product is going to get stored at the wrong temperature, so they have to blanket apply a shorter date to protect consumers.

Neil
Supermarkets set cautious use-by dates for the worst-case scenario - the worst that could possibly happen in a situation, for example, someone getting sick and dying of food poisoning. In other words, they blanket apply use-by dates. Here, blanket is an adverb meaning applied in the same way to everything, even when there are differences between those things.

Sam
Doing this protects customers from bad food, but it also means a lot of safe-to-eat food gets thrown away. Maybe it's best to stick to local, seasonal food after all. Anyway, Neil, what was the answer to your question?

Neil
Right. I asked you which food could be grown in Britain all year round. You said kale, which was… the correct answer! Unlike strawberries and rhubarb, kale grows in all seasons, and what's more, it's good for you too! OK, let's recap the vocabulary we've learned starting with use-by date - the date until which food is safe to eat.

Sam
The slogan eat local, eat seasonal encourages people to buy food which has been grown locally during the current season.

Neil
A middleman buys produce directly from the producer, before selling it on to customers for a profit. If he is commissioned, he received a payment directly related to the amount he sells.

Sam
The worst-case scenario describes the most serious, unpleasant thing that could happen in a situation.

Neil
And finally, the adverb blanket means applied in the same uniform way to everything, even when there are differences between those things. Bye for now!

Sam
Bye bye!