The Food Scout

Okay, I’ll save you a trip to the dictionary. Xenophobia (pronounced zen-oh-foh-bee-uh) means “fear of foreigners.” It is a ten-dollar word that sticks with me because it is one I happened to scan in my textbook just before closing it to take a Poly Sci exam in college and it ended up being on the test.

But I’m bringing it out of my past into this blog because it appropriately describes the cloud that’s beginning to hover over the food supply and is likely to have a growing effect on food sourcing and distribution.

In the same week that Reuters reported that Food for Health International, a maker of shake powders and supplements, is making a “China Free” claim on its ingredients, we also learn that Whole Foods is planning to focus on Hawaiian-based producers to supply its new Hawaiian store, a PR move that is likely to have a positive halo effect on its “locavore” consumers while saving the company some significant shipping costs into the Hawaiian islands, of course.

But while Whole Foods’ move is one that plays on the positive reasons for buying locally produced products, there are plenty of negative motivators driving consumers to “think local.” In the past year, we’ve seen a shopping basket of food safety issues revolving around everyday foods including peanut butter, soda pop, lettuce, and chocolate, with past scares relating to meat, apple juice, and eggs. It is these mounting concerns that have probably driven an amazing 92 percent of American to support country of origin labeling (known appropriately as “COOL” legislation), introduced to only seafood with the 2002 Farm Bill. So far, lobbyists in Washington have been successful convincing legislators such protectionist laws would be too onerous to food producers, but according to a recent NYT article, the tide may be shifting with the China issue.

Another example of protectionist or xenophobic thinking could be labeled on the news that certain organizations are banning bottled water, including the city governments of Salt Lake City and San Francisco. Although Mintel research predicts that bottled water sales will increase a staggering 61 percent by 2010, I believe that people will start thinking twice about whether they need to be drinking water shipped in from another state or country, or whether they should drink local water, whether for environmental or safety reasons.

My bottom line is that all this food scare stuff could bring the xenophobes together with the tree huggers and build a larger support base faster for foods and beverages with a minimum of “food miles” on them (see the March 23 & 27 “Food Miles vs. Fair Trade” blogs in the Food Scout Archive).