ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGE

DEGRADATION THROUGH RAW MATERIAL PRODUCTION

Food miles and air freight

What does the syllabus say?

‘Examine the concept of food miles and the environmental consequences of increasing volumes of air freight’.

Food miles definition

A measure of the distance food travels from its source to the consumer. This can be given either in units of actual distance or of energy consumed during transport.

FOOD MILES FACTS AND FIGURES

• In the UK food travels around 30 billion kilometres each year. This includes imports by boat and air and transport by lorries and cars.
• The EU, the world’s largest food importer, has increased imports by 20% in the last 5 years.
• Between 1968 and 1998 world food production increased by 84%, population increased by 90% but the transport of food increased by 184%.

MORE FOOD TRANSPORT FACTS AND FIGURES FOR THE UK

OTHER CONSIDERATIONS

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• Transport only accounts for 5-10% of energy used in the supply of food.
• We must consider how the food is grown, how it is stored and for how long and the calorie/nutritional intensity of the food itself.
• Also the energy required to get the food from the shop to home and the energy required to prepare and cook the food.
• Remember the benefits that exporting agricultural produce has for LICs.

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FREIGHT TRANSPORT OF FOOD BY AIR

Accounts for less than 1% of all freight transport but is growing rapidly.

Three main environmental effects …

• Emissions on take-off and landing lead to local pollution
• Emissions in flight contribute to climate change
• Noise pollution is also caused

WORLD GROWTH IN AIR FREIGHT

World map of air freight

Size of country proportional to the amount of air freight generated

WORLD AIRLINE ROUTES

PASSENGER AND FREIGHT

NOTE - 2/3 of all air freight is carried on passenger flights

Other sources of information

• YouTube - look at the two videos on our website (food miles)
• Links on our webpage
• ‘Global Interactions’ p.102-105

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Food miles and air freight tasks

1. Evaluate food miles and their environmental impact as a concept.

List food miles facts and figures to show the growth in transport of food.

Draw a table to give arguments both for and against this concept

i.e. ‘the transport of food has a significant environmental impact.’

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2. What are the environmental consequences of the increase in air freight?

Use the graphical data to list data about the following..

• The increase in air freight and its spatial distribution
• Environmental impact of air freight
• Contribution food transport makes to amount of air freight
• Future patterns