6 Minute English

INTERMEDIATE LEVEL

This week's question

Which of the following foods can be grown in Britain

throughout the year? Is it:

a) strawberries?
b) kale? or,
c) rhubarb?

Listen to the programme to find out the answer.

Vocabulary

use-by date
date until which food may be safely eaten, usually
printed on the food container

eat local, eat seasonal

slogan used to encourage people to buy and eat
fresh food which has been grown in their local area
during the current season

middleman
business people who buy produce directly from
producers, and make money by selling it on to shops
or customers

commissioned
receiving a payment which is directly related to the
amount sold

worst-case scenario
the worst, most serious and unpleasant thing that
could possibly happen in a situation

blanket (+ verb)
(adverb) applied in the same uniform way to
everything, even when there are differences
between those things
TRANSCRIPT
Note: This is not a word-for-word transcript.
Neil
Hello. This is 6 Minute English from BBC Learning
English. I'm Neil.

Sam
And I'm Sam.
Neil
Does this situation sound familiar to you, Sam? You
reach into the kitchen refrigerator looking for
something to eat, only to find a brown lettuce, a sad-
looking cucumber, and some two-week old fish, all
past its use-by date - the date printed on the food
container showing how long it is safe to eat.

Sam
Oh, I'm guilty of wasting food, Neil - me and many
others. According to the UN, one third of the food we
grow ends up in the rubbish bin. And it's not just
food that's wasted - it's also the resources used to
produce that food, things like water, land and
transport.

Neil
In this programme, we'll be talking about food
waste. We'll meet the people trying to stop us from
throwing good food away, and, as usual, we'll be
learning some new vocabulary as well.
Sam
Here in the UK, big supermarkets import food from
abroad for customers to enjoy all year round.
Summer fruit like strawberries and mangos are
flown in from tropical countries and sold in winter,
increasing carbon emissions as well as waste.
Neil
Yes, that's why you hear the phrase, 'eat local, eat
seasonal' to encourage people to buy and eat food
which has been grown in their local area, at that
time of year. So, Sam, my question is - which of the
following foods can be grown in Britain throughout
the year? Is it:
a) strawberries?
b) kale? or,
c) rhubarb?
Sam
Hmmm, it's definitely not strawberries 'cos they
only grow in summer, so I'll say b) kale.
Neil
OK, I'll reveal the answer later. We've talked about
supermarkets in Britain, but food waste is
happening all over the world. In Puerto Rico, too,
most people shop in supermarkets, making it
difficult for farmers to choose what to sell, and how
much to charge for their fruit and vegetables.
Sam
Josefina Arcay is a farmer who wanted to make it
easier for customers to buy local food. She started
an online shop to connect shoppers with farmers
directly, without the supermarkets. Here Josefina
explains her project to Jo Mathys, reporter for BBC
World Service Programme, People Fixing The World.
Jo Mathys
So Josefina, that's the farmer who we heard earlier
growing those giant avocados, she used to have to
sell her crops to these kind of middlemen.
Josefina Arcay
We had a lot of… I don't know how you call
carreros... it's just people that have a big truck and
they will just come by, and they will say, 'What do
you have? Ohhh… that's too expensive! Wooh… very
expensive! I want it half that price'. So I didn't have
any way of controlling how I was going to sell - it
just depended on these people coming.
Jo Mathys
And a lot of these carreros are kind of commissioned
by the supermarkets. All this leads to food waste
because it's really hard for farmers, like Josefina, to
predict which crops they're going to be able to sell.
Neil
Josefina used to sell her food to carreros or
middlemen - people who buy food directly from the
grower, and make money by selling it on to
customers. Josefina had no control over what to sell,
and a lot of her food went to waste.
Sam
Usually middlemen are commissioned - they
received a payment from the supermarkets directly
related to the amount they sell. But with Josefina's
online shop, farmers get a fair price for their food,
customers get high-quality, fresh vegetables, and
less food is wasted.
Neil
Another problem is that we throw away food after
we've bought it. In fact, UN estimates that 60
percent of food waste happens in this way, often
because it's past the use-by date and might not be
safe to eat.
Sam
But according to green designer, Solveiga Pakstaite,
these use-by dates aren't always accurate,
something she discussed with BBC World Service's,
People Fixing The World.
Jo Mathys
Well, food makers don't know how people will keep
their products, so for instance, they might forget to
put their groceries straight in the fridge when they
get home. So what they do is they calculate the use-
by date using a very cautious estimate.
Solveiga Pakstaite
Food producers and supermarkets… they kind of
have to calculate it to the worst-case scenario
because they don't know which product is going to
get stored at the wrong temperature, so they have to
blanket apply a shorter date to protect consumers.
Neil
Supermarkets set cautious use-by dates for the
worst-case scenario - the worst that could possibly
happen in a situation, for example, someone getting
sick and dying of food poisoning. In other words,
they blanket apply use-by dates. Here, blanket is an
adverb meaning applied in the same way to
everything, even when there are differences
between those things.
Sam
Doing this protects customers from bad food, but it
also means a lot of safe-to-eat food gets thrown
away. Maybe it's best to stick to local, seasonal food
after all. Anyway, Neil, what was the answer to your
question?
Neil
Right. I asked you which food could be grown in
Britain all year round. You said kale, which was… the
correct answer! Unlike strawberries and rhubarb,
kale grows in all seasons, and what's more, it's good
for you too! OK, let's recap the vocabulary we've
learned starting with use-by date - the date until
which food is safe to eat.
Sam
The slogan eat local, eat seasonal encourages people
to buy food which has been grown locally during the
current season.
Neil
A middleman buys produce directly from the
producer, before selling it on to customers for a
profit. If he is commissioned, he received a payment
directly related to the amount he sells.
Sam
The worst-case scenario describes the most serious,
unpleasant thing that could happen in a situation.
Neil
And finally, the adverb blanket means applied in the
same uniform way to everything, even when there
are differences between those things. Bye for now!
Sam
Bye bye!

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