Occasionally one of our customers writes us a polite note urging us to be more “green” in our packaging for the CSA. They are bothered by the plastic bags that we use to portion some items and the big liner bag we use in each box.
First, let me say that we are very aware of environmental concerns about packaging. We’ve given it a lot of thought and done a lot of research on it. Overall, we feel that receiving your vegetables this way is comparatively better for the environment than buying them from the store. Just in terms of packaging, most vegetables purchased from the store are put in bags, whereas we use bags only when we have items that are portioned out in advance or are at higher risk of being squished if they are loose in the box. Also, on average we get upwards of 15 uses out of the waxed boxes we use—in the wholesale trade, a single use is the norm.
Last year, in an attempt to address the concern about plastic we started portioning some items in paper bags. The paper bags have certain drawbacks, one being that if we have more than one item portioned in paper bags, we can’t see what’s in them and it makes it more likely that we will make packing errors, such as putting two of the same item in a box. We decided that marking each bag was prohibitively time consuming, and we have resigned ourselves to just making sure to check every crate to make sure the item is the one we think it is. Another drawback of the paper bags is that they don’t hold up well to moisture. For items like salad mix or spinach they are out of the question, and if they are next to a wet item in the box, the paper bags can end up getting wet and breaking. Still, we feel the paper bags are workable for some items and we will continue to use them where possible.
Lately we have looked into other types of plastic bags, including degradable plastics and the ones made from cornstarch that are “compostable.” Aside from being several times more expensive, we are not convinced that either of these options has that compelling an environmental advantage over the plastic bags that we already use. There are concerns about farmland being used to grow more and more corn for fuel and other non-food uses, as well as the chemical pesticide and petroleum input to grow those crops. In addition, the Biobags can start to degrade if they sit wet for a few days; and if they are accidentally shuffled into a load of plastic bags at the recycling center, it can ruin the whole lot.
When we started using the liner bags in the boxes several years ago, we cut down on our largest source of packaging waste, the boxes. We are now able to reuse the boxes nearly twice as many times before they become too weak to stack. Before the liner bags, we recovered far fewer boxes back from the pick-up sites. The liner bags have a more important function though, and that is to keep the produce fresh. Most of you join our program to get the freshest possible vegetables. The liner bags do a remarkable job of keeping the vegetables cool and moist in the boxes, so even if you’re the last one to get to your pick-up site, your veggies will still be fresher than you could get anywhere else but your own garden.
We are currently researching whether there are acceptable alternatives to the plastic strawberry baskets and clamshells that we use. We cannot reuse these due to health code, so we wish we had a more environmentally sound option available. We were initially excited by an option we found for berry baskets manufactured from palm fiber, until we read an article about how they are clearing forests in Southeast Asia to make palm fiber plantations.
We will continue to think about ways to cut down on packaging, including the use of plastics and the waxed boxes, during our down time this winter. Meanwhile, we hope that you can reuse any plastic packaging you get in your boxes, recycle it when you’re done with it, and trust that we will reduce as much as we can without compromising the quality of your produce.
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