Community Eco-Challenge, Southern Group Environmental Health Committee, Riverside House, Armagh, BT61 9EG. Tel:02837515800  Fax:02837515801  Email:info@communityecochallenge.com

Calculate your Ecological footprint! Click here      Calculate your Ecological footprint! Click here      Calculate your Ecological footprint! Click here      Calculate your Ecological footprint! Click here PROCESSED & PREPACKAGED FOOD A lot of what we eat today is highly processed i.e. the food is changed significantly from its natural form, and contains many additives and preservatives. It is also highly packaged. Take for example, microwave meals—they usually come in a cardboard box, which you remove. The food is then in a plastic tray, which has a layer of plastic film around it. On top of this, things like microwave chips or pizzas, often come in packs, so the four already highly packaged meals, are then put in another bigger box, covered in more plastic! In reality, much of the price of a ready-meal is in the packaging! It is estimated that food like this requires 15 times more energy to produce than the raw food. If that doesn't convince you, what about the nutritional value?! Typically, a ready meal has significantly less less valuable nutrients, than the same meal cooked at home. On top of that, the fat and salt contents are usually much higher. All the additives in them can also dull your taste buds to natural flavours—you end up eating more processed food to get the taste you want, and natural food doesn't taste as good as it should.