Wal-Mart goes local, no premiums expected

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Wal-Mart pledged to make affordable organic food available to its shoppers, and the organic industry gulped. Now, according to the Des Moines Register, the largest food retailer in the United States plans to double the amount of locally grown food it sells and ensure that all the food going past its cash registers is "produced in sustainable ways" by setting standards for the energy and natural resources impacts of food production.

The retail giant is still working on those sustainability standards for domestically produced food. Improving soil quality and conserving water and fossil fuels are key. Prototype standards are being developed for orange juice, wheat breakfast cereal and strawberry yogurt.

Agribusiness giants Syngenta, Monsanto, Tyson Foods and Stonyfield Farm are members of a consortium working through the University of Arkansas and Arizona State University to develop standards for a range of consumer products, including food. Wal-Mart wants to give consumers a way to measure the environmental impact of products. That might be a score on the label or embedded in the product code.

It doesn't look like Wal-Mart is going to stray from its reputation as a driver in the ìrace to the bottomî to produce cheap food. Iowa farm leaders expect that meeting the standards will be a cost of doing business, not a reason to get a premium, and are concerned about the possible destruction of farm income. BF