In this blog, we have mainly discussed the pollution caused by the production of food. However, the transportation of foodstuff via trucks, sea freights or even aeroplanes is another source of pollution. In recent years, some environmental advocates have supported the idea of reducing “food miles”, how far food travels from production to the final consumer, as a means for consumers to reduce their individual pollution footprint (Weber & Matthews, 2008).

In South Korea, the country imports 42.9% of its food and has an extremely high food mileage per capita of 6,000km (Lee, Lee & Lee, 2015). This has resulted in a local movement towards urban agriculture as a solution to reduce the food mileage issue and its associated pollution. According to a study by Lee, Lee & Lee (2015), converting empty urban spaces and rooftops in Seoul into Urban farms can drastically reduce their food mileage and reduce 11,668 tons/year of CO2 emissions. This quantity is equal to the CO2 emissions for 1155 persons on the annual basis of 10.1 tons of CO2emissions per capita in 2007 (Lee, Lee & Lee, 2015).

Does this mean we should all buy local vegetables and meat? Should Singapore implement more aggressive urban/local farming policies?

A separate study based in the United States provides an alternative perspective. Based on Weber & Matthews (2008)’s study they estimate the average American household’s pollution impact related to food to be around 8.1 t CO2e/yr, while delivery “food-miles” only accounts for around 0.4 te CO2e/yr and total freight accounting for 0.9 t CO2e/yr. Therefore, for the average American household, “buying local” could achieve only a 4−5% reduction in GHG emissions due to the majority of the pollution being emitted in the production stage of food (Weber & Matthews, 2008).

Hence, going local or reducing the mileage of food appears to have a limited impact on the overall pollution emitted from food. However, further research specific to Singapore will be needed before making any conclusion. This is because food mileage for Singapore might be very different from the United States, we have limited land for local farming and have a higher dependency on sea freight transportation for food.

 

References

Weber, C. L., & Matthews, H. S. (2008). Food-miles and the relative climate impacts of food choices in the united states. Environmental Science & Technology, 42(10), 3508-3513. https://doi.org/10.1021/es702969f

Lee, G., Lee, H., & Lee, J. (2015). Greenhouse gas emission reduction effect in the transportation sector by urban agriculture in seoul, korea. Landscape and Urban Planning, 140, 1-7. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landurbplan.2015.03.012

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