Back to the discussion on principled buying . . .
With food, in addition to avoiding specific countries or companies for ideological reasons, I also want to take food safety seriously. Some countries have very weak safety guidelines concerning pesticides, fertilizers, water and soil contamination, and chemical preservatives like formaldehyde and sulphur dioxide used to make "old" produce appear to be fresh. In addition, some countries have different standards for "organic" than North America and the EU, meaning that a product may be labeled "organic" but not meet the guidelines that you've come to expect.
Most of us are tuned in to where our fresh produce comes from, but do we really know where our packaged and frozen foods are coming from? I did a quick inventory of my own pantry, fridge and freezers and found:
- orange juice concentrate from Central America
- apple juice concentrate from China
- coffee from Mexico
- hazelnut spread (my daughter's) from Mexico
- other hazelnut spread (also daughter's) from Germany
- honey from Canada and Argentina
- cocoa powder from Holland and Germany
- shredded coconut from the Philippines
- mixed nuts from Argentina, Mexico, Vietnam, Brazil, India, Indonesia, Bolivia, Peru, Columbia
- canned pineapple from Thailand and Indonesia
- boxed pasta - "made with imported ingredients"
- canned tuna from Thailand
- unflavored gelatin from Brazil
- yeast from Mexico
- frozen Asian stir fry vegetable blend from China, Mexico
- frozen chicken breast fillets from Mexico
- frozen broccoli from Mexico
- frozen blueberries from Canada
No indication but most likely not USA-produced:
- black tea
- chocolate chips
It's not that all of the above countries are in question. I completely trust the safety of the honey and blueberries from Canada and the cocoa powder and hazelnut spread from Germany and Holland. I was just very surprised by some items. The peanuts in the can of mixed nuts came not just from the US ( as most of us would imagine) but also from Argentina and Mexico. And who would have thought that my big bag of yeast was produced in Mexico?
A lot of products don't indicate on the packaging where the contents are produced. Some brands are better than others at this. Many of Walmart and WinCo's house-brand items are produced outside of the US. But there are also a lot of their house-brands that are stamped USA. Here's a contrast -- my canned mixed nuts were from 9 different countries in addition to the US, while my bag of Great Value pecan halves were USA-only.
Some highly recognizable name-brand foods that you would think are American products are actually from other countries. For example Dole canned pineapple. Dole canned pineapple chunks, slices, and crushed are products of the Philippines and Thailand. Dole canned pineapple juice and Dole jarred pineapple chunks are products of the Philippines. If you want Hawaiian Dole pineapple you have to buy fresh pineapple that is labeled product of Hawaii.
USA-produced is not always most expensive. Sometimes the bargain version of a food is the USA-produced one, such as the Dollar Tree frozen blueberries that I bought. DT's frozen blueberries are stamped "product of USA" while the more expensive frozen blueberries from Walmart are stamped "product of Canada."
A complicated case is found with apple juice. Most of the frozen apple juice concentrate available in the USA is now made in China. The store-brands of frozen apple juice concentrate (AJC) from both winCo and Walmart are stamped with "Product of China." Old Orchard's website indicates that they source their apple juice concentrate globally (including from China) for bottling in the USA. Bottles of Mott's apple juice are stamped indicating that the product is made with apple juice concentrate from China and Turkey. There are two bright spots in apple juice production in the US, Tree Top and Martinelli's. The apples used in Tree Top apple juice are 100% grown in the USA. Tree Top supplies most of the American-grown and processed apple juice concentrate in the US. Martinelli's is another "made in the USA" apple juice, using 100% USA apples. Not concentrated, Martinelli's is bottled in large glass bottles or individual-size bottles and rather pricey. Apple juice particularly concerns me, because I use commercial apple juice as a base for some of my vegetable juices and my family really enjoys apple juice. I question the safety of China-produced apple juice. There was a study a while back concerning high arsenic levels in China-produced AJC compared to USA-produced AJC. Going forward, I'll be more likely to spend extra on USA apple juice and try to save money in the food budget elsewhere.
Although my family doesn't eat a lot of frozen fish, I have read that those products could be a concern, and I'm mentioning it because I know a lot of folks do buy frozen fish. Frozen tilapia and cod from China is often farm-raised. I have read a few articles that raise concerns about the farm-raised tilapia from China. The fish are raised in crowded and sometimes polluted water, possibly using more chemicals than are healthy. I don't want to tell you what to believe, so I recommend you search for more info on this, if it is a concern to you.
It isn't always just a matter of finding a USA-version for X,Y, or Z. There are some foods that I can't find as USA-produced, such as cocoa powder, canned tuna fish, or fresh bananas (not on my list, but something we consume a lot of). And there are some foods for which I could find a US substitute, but those would be very expensive, such as Hawaiian coffee and shredded coconut or South Carolina black tea. Due to their cost, those products would be more along the lines of specialty food items, in my opinion, and not basic groceries.
My personal plan is to choose one item that most offends me (based on country of origin) and try to work a better choice into our budget. When I've found ways to make that work, I'll add the next item. And, so on, until I feel satisfied with the sourcing of all of my family's food.
In the end analysis, if my budget were constrained and I had to choose between buying my food from a non-preferred country vs not buying enough food, buying enough food, even from a "bad" country, wins hands-down. It's like my thinking concerning buying organic produce vs buying "regular" produce. If buying "regular" produce means I buy and eat more fruits and vegetables than if I were to buy organic produce due to budget constraints, I think it's a better choice to buy the "regular" produce. The additional nutrients of more produce would hopefully outweigh any negative effects from residual pesticides and fertilizers.
Fortunately, there are some workarounds that remain frugal options for many of us. Growing a vegetable garden, going to local u-pick farms and orchards, buying from local farm stands, and eating in-season produce are all ways to ensure your produce is grown in the country(ies) of your choosing while not spending more for those items. And as you can see from my list of non-USA foods in my own kitchen, there were only about 2 dozen different foods that were produced outside the US. And of those, there are only about a half-dozen that I feel I should look into finding alternates. That's not too overwhelming.
(It's true what they say, writing something out helps clarify one's own mind about a topic.)
