I have mentioned before
the case of Scottish shelled prawns which reach our supermarket
shelves via Thailand. It is just a fact of globalisation life that
wages in Asia are generally lower than the West - so much lower in
fact that it is profitable to fly prawns 12,000 miles to take
advantage, rather than subject them to the price mark-up they'd incur
if well-paid Brits peeled them. So is this in fact appalling? Or is it good economic sense? Are we exploiting Thai workers and putting Brits out of work, or are we supporting the Thai economy and helping to contain British inflation?
This topic came to the
fore again recently with the discovery that the ingredients used in
the manufacture of Slazenger tennis balls for Wimbledon had travelled
a total of 50,570 miles to the courts. We were all expected to shout
'shock, horror' at this revelation (or some such comment). But the
fact is this is just another example of globalisation and a beneficial one. Thanks to
siting their factory in the Philippines, most of the materials used
in the manufacture of the tennis balls cone from nearby producers,
such as Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia and of course China. Had the
factory still been in the UK, the 50,000 mile total would easily have
been exceeded (and of course the present costs). But who knew that it took 14 ingredients from 12
countries to make a tennis ball?! My only slight disappointment is that the
wool comes from New Zealand and is flown to the UK for weaving before
being flown to the Philippines. Surely we can produce wool in the
UK? That would reduce the travel a little. Ironic that in that case
British wages are acceptable for the processing of wool. I suppose
it's also a shame that the balls are then only used for about 20
minutes before being discarded. So, after flying over 50,000 miles
to get to Wimbledon, the balls then fly less than half a mile before
they're finished with. Perhaps that’s the real crime?
While I was wondering
what I really felt about the state of affairs that filled our
airports with unpeeled prawns and tennis balls, burning expensive
aviation fuel and occupying valuable runway slots, which ultimately
push up the price of my holiday travel and cause demands for airport
expansion in my green and pleasant land, I looked at the sandwich I
had just made myself for lunch.
Today I was eating
humus with beetroot, a delightful combination that would have been
unthinkable some years ago, especially with the delicious sun dried
tomato and olive bread I was using. So is this collection of delightful taste sensations a benefit of
globalisation or am I a victim of supermarket marketing and
responsible, through my encouragement of modern manufacturing methods, for the rape
of poor Third World workers, the wanton squandering of precious
resources and global warming?
We have a tradition in
the UK of importing from all over the world. From at least the 16th
century, Britons were addicted to sugar (from the West Indies) and
spices (from India), not to mention tea and chocolate and tobacco. In fact, although the use of aircraft is a
relatively recent phenomenon, most of our food products are now
imported, apart from the very basic ingredients (although many basic
ingredients are also imported – we currently have a juniper disease
for example which means that this very British ingredient –
essential to our gin! - is currently imported from Bulgaria). I
mention this in particular, since my beetroot was flavoured with
onion and juniper berries. The humus had added flavouring
ingredients too - lemon and coriander.
So I had the humus with
ingredients from I reckon 10 different countries, including India,
Argentina and South Africa, the beetroot used ingredients from 5,
including Barbados and Vietnam, and the bread also from 5, mostly
European, although we do import some salt from Australia. I am
assuming that many ingredients, such as the beetroot, flour and
water, etc, came from somewhere local. No guarantee of course, but,
with that assumption, I calculate that my sandwich had travelled
66,520 miles before I got to eat it. More than a tennis ball!
I hadn't thought before
how delicious it is destroying the planet.
