Around Christmas friends and family come together to celebrate the holiday and have a good time with loved ones. Naturally, this generally involves a lot of eating and drinking – prawns, roast chicken, salads, pudding, ice cream, wine, beer...
Christmas by and large entails a quite lot of consumption and can be very polluting – think of all the paper Christmas cards, wrapping of presents, lights twinkling all night and gifts to buy. The good news is you can try to reduce your carbon Christmas footprint by preparing an eco-friendly dinner. Here are some things you can keep in mind.
Choose organic and seasonable products
We can’t say it enough – go for organic. Skip the chemical sprays, herbicides and pesticides and choose for options that are better for both the environment and your own health. Organic farming also ensures that biodiversity is maintained in the food we eat. And most importantly, organic ingredients will make your dinner taste so much better.
And that’s also the greatest reason to buy seasonal products: they just taste better! They have more flavour, are healthier with more vitamins and minerals present, are more sustainable and environmentally cost less.
Use fresh and local products
Support local farmers and independents rather than buying from big chains. There’s no need for your fruits and veges to have been trucked across the country or flown around the world, creating heaps of greenhouse gases. Fresh food tastes better and has not been kept in storage for months.
Short supply chains and farmers’ markets keep income and employment local, fostering tourism and niche markets. And a sustainable local food system will also increase the sustainability of farms in the region, not to mention help maintain biodiversity.
