<Let's Talk Gas Tax (Poll) The Oil Drum DrumBeat: September 19, 2006>
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30 comments on UK Agriculture, Organic Farming and Relocalisation

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alistairC on September 19, 2006 - 12:39pm Permalink | Subthread | Comments top
A couple of years ago I shipped a container load of (organic) wine from France to New Zealand.

I was rather shocked to discover that assembling the 6000 bottles from the various regions (Bordeaux, Burgundy etc) to a warehouse in Marseille was more expensive than shipping them from there to Auckland (from memory, up to 20 euro-cents, and less than 10 cents, per bottle respectively).

So when people asked me if shipping stuff around the world wasn't contradictory with the idea of organics, I asked them if any of their organic food had ever travelled by truck.

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JN2 on September 19, 2006 - 12:58pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Good point. A friend of mine maintains the carbon cost is less to ship timber from Latvia to London (3,900 miles) than it is to truck it down from Carlisle (300 miles).
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Chris Vernon on September 21, 2006 - 3:49am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
That's interesting. I think people talking up relocalisation as a response to peak oil frequently fail to recognise just how incredibly efficient container shipping of non-perishable goods is.
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30 comments on UK Agriculture, Organic Farming and Relocalisation

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