BIO

I bet you already bought Bio products at least once. Environmentally friendly and sustainable produced groceries, which you can buy in every supermarket nowadays. There is a great range - you can buy organic yoghurt, milk, vegetables and fruit without spending a lot of money. And at the same time, you're doing something good for the environment and your body. But wait, isn't it weird?

Usually fair produced, good quality products are much more expensive than their cheap supermarket counterparts. So how can these 'Bio' products be so keen?

First of all, products are bio, when they're produced without any chemical fertilizers, pesticides or other artificial chemicals. In the European Union products which match these requirements (and a few others) are denoted with the 'EU-BIO-SEAL'. There are also other signs from different companies with vary from country to country. A lot of these are way stricter than the EU with their standards. Consumers should inform themselves about the several signs in their country.

So producing such these kind of things isn't as cheap and easy as producing average groceries because the companies need to pay for more space for the animal to provide a more species-appropriate keeping and for the assessments which come alongside obtaining the sign. Also things like vegetables, fruit and grains need more time to grow because of the waiver of chemical pesticides. So they're not able to produce as much as usual companies.

So how is it possible for the supermarkets to offer such cheap organic products?

It is because a lot of the groceries, which look like bio products because of their package and their name aren't really bio. Companies use terms like 'controlled farming' or 'near-natural' to imply naturalness. Also the the names and colours which are used amplify this impression. Green, white and light blue are the most common ones, because they remind us of nature. The names are mostly variations with the words green, bio or vital. So the information on the packaging should be always read carefully.

Another important point is that, bio does not mean local, like many people think. Bio products can be shipped over the whole earth and have a terrible life cycle assessment, but they will still be bio. So people who want to stick to healthy eating without straining the environment, should buy seasonal products at local farmers or markets. There it's clearer where the goods come from and how they were produced. Also it should be kept in mind that it is way more expensive to produce organic stuff, so the price is obviously higher than from usual and 'fake' bio products.

 

Read more about the EU-BIO-SEAL here:

https://ec.europa.eu/agriculture/organic/downloads/logo_en

 

Rosa von Scheidt

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