Egg Scandal

Heard about the egg scandal?

700,000 eggs have been contaminated with an insecticed that is banned in products destined for the food chain (a large jump from the inital reclaimed product total of 21,000).

How has this happened? Again? Why is our food plagued with these scandals and how many just slip throught the net; unfound, unreported and unfair?

Welfare. It all comes down to our farming welfare practices, and the agricultural standards that we allow on our farms, here and abroad. Chickens in particular are faced with some of the more lax, and therefore worse, living conditions globally. This is often made up for through the use of excessive chemicals, because that's the answer to everything apparently. Got a super bug, caused by pharmaceutical overuse, spray another chemical in there and hope for the best.

You may go out of your way to buy free range, organic eggs, subject to higher welfare standards, but what about the rest of the supply chain and pre-prepared products that we buy that have eggs in them? The egg and cress sandwich you picked up for lunch, the cakes you bought from the supermarket for your friend at the office's birthday, the poached egg on your brunch out with the girls, or the egg fried rice from the takeaway.

Transparency on these issues is so important but so is our interest. The ONLY reason these farms and food production companies have been allowed to get away with treating their stock so poorly is because we, the people, the consumers, have turned a blind eye to the industry in favour of ever cheaper food. But that reduction in price comes at a cost. The costs are simply externalised instead. Those costs are felt by the animals kept in cages. Those costs are felt by the planet, as greenhouse gas driven climate change, that is partly the result of the petrochemical fuelled agricultural pesticide industry. Those costs are felt by us at home when a family member or friend is diagnosed with cancer, or a bacterial infection, like MRSA, untreatable by standard antibiotics.

The only way for this to improve is for people to start caring about where their food comes from. THIS is why the RegenerEat campaign is so important. Your interest in where your food has come from will make all the difference to the people that produce it, to the animals that exist for your consumption and the soil that is ploughed for your daily bread. For the sake of your health and the health of the environment you live in, take more care.