[alexchamberlain]

I think banning plastic completely in packaging is a much harder ask, as whether it is needed is rather nuanced (if I understand it correctly). For example, it's perfectly possible to deliver cucumbers to an end customer without them being shrinkwrapped. However, to deliver enough cucumbers to enough customers for a supermarket scale, I understand from several documentaries that plastic is still required in that case. (For those outside the UK, plastic covered cucumber is the social barometer for plastic packaging.) Banning plastic bags was easy and simple, and our laws don't tend to deal with nuance very well...

[mcv]

Interesting thing is, the non-organic cucumbers at my supermarket don't come in plastic, but the organic ones do. I never know which ones to get.

[jraph]

Yeah, this is terrible.

Obviously the people who want to buy organic and the people who want to avoid plastic the most are probably almost the same group. They know this. It feels like "Fuck you environmental-aware buyers" to me.

Of course wrapping everything non-organic is a no go as well, it would be terrible for the environment. And I'm afraid stopping the production of non-organic stuff ain't happening anytime soon.

I believe the real solution if possible until they fix this is to go to a market or an organic store where nothing is in plastic, at least for fruits and vegetables.

[philipallstar]

> Obviously the people who want to buy organic and the people who want to avoid plastic the most are probably almost the same group. They know this. It feels like "Fuck you environmental-aware buyers" to me.

They're different types of environmental. One is "I don't like pesticides and I have money" and the other is "I don't like eternal plastic waste".

[jraph]

Different things, same group of people (money matters aside - people don't buy because it's more expensive, but despite it), no?

The "I have money" part is obviously unfortunate. Buying healthy and environmentally-friendly shouldn't be conditioned by money. The next best individual thing is voting with one's own wallet in the meantime.

The "I don't like pesticides"¹ and the "I don't like eternal plastic waste" are very compatible. Both pesticides and eternal plastic waste hurt the environment in their own ways.

I suppose the target is the restricted set of people who are interested in organic products for their own individual health and who don't push the reasoning far enough to see that their health depends on the environment being healthy in the long term. Or, people who prefer buying organic food and who will make a compromise.

Do you have a different reading?

¹ we will note that organic doesn't mean "no pesticides", and is broader than just pesticides, but I accept the shortcut.

[philipallstar]

> (money matters aside - people don't buy because it's more expensive, but despite it), no?

I didn't say people buy it because it's more expensive.

[jraph]

Indeed, but removing the money part of your sentence:

> They're different types of environmental. One is "I don't like pesticides" and the other is "I don't like eternal plastic waste".

Makes its clear that both concerns would come from the same group of people, more or less.

Or not? This is my question to you. Just take my previous comment as "What do you mean, different?".

You have a point with your money thing. Supermarkets absolutely make their choices with individualistic assumptions, taking in account classes of people and their revenues, and I suspect this is how we ended up with this wrapped organic vegetables heresy.

[mcv]

Yeah, the issue is of course that the supermarket sells both kinds of cucumbers, and they need to be able to distinguish between organic and non-organic cucumbers, which is why they wrap one type in plastic. And of course it's better for the environment if that's the type they sell the least of.

So every step makes sense, but the end result looks ridiculous. Maybe they can use paper wrappers instead? Or maybe just settle on one type of cucumber.

[vanviegen]

The way I understand it, without the wrapping a much larger percentage of cucumbers need to be thrown away before ever being sold, due to spoilage. That's not a win for the environment.

[AlecSchueler]

> That's not a win for the environment.

How is this calculated? I know that growing a cucumber has an environmental cost but so does producing plastic, delivering it and then using machines to shrink-wrap every cucumber.

[vanviegen]

This study, for instance, [1] looks at CO2 emissions. Which may be a somewhat limited view, but the effect is rather large: adding 5 wrappers around a cucumber (4 of which being useless) would result in about the same CO2 usage as adding no wrapper. And that's not even considering spoilage after the cucumber has been bought by a consumer.

[1] https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/sustainable-food-system...

[AlecSchueler]

CO2 usage, I get you, but what about the plastic waste?

[alexchamberlain]

This is the problem though, right? It’s not one league table of environmental goodness - there are tradeoffs that as an educated consumer are impose to navigate.

[AlecSchueler]

Yes, I understand, that's why I questioned the unqualified claim "that's not a win for the environment" as if it's so clear cut.