From NZ with love

Tesco's apparent plan of labeling produce that has been air shipped to England is discussed in this piece from New Zealand.
From the story:

Major British retailer Tesco will soon label all produce airfreighted to Britain to inform environment-conscious customers of the energy costs of getting such products to market.
Concern has been raised that this may be linked to the food-miles concept, a flawed methodology that could have the potential to harm New Zealand's multimillion-dollar export trade to Britain.
In practice, the Tesco labelling will have a limited impact on New Zealand producers because 99.75 per cent of produce exported from New Zealand to Britain goes by ship, the most environmentally sound method by which it can be sent there.
Freight that can be shipped adds little more in energy consumption than the energy cost of taking the goods home from the supermarket by car. However, a much wider-ranging and ambitious undertaking by Tesco and other British retailers has been foreshadowed - to label goods according to their total energy costs and carbon emissions.
Unlike food-miles, which measure only transport costs, this new plan may actually help sell New Zealand produce. The labels would reveal to British consumers that New Zealand food producers use some of the most energy-effective practices in the world.
Tesco's aim is to develop a carbon-footprint labelling measure for all products it sells. These new "green" labels are intended to allow customers to compare and shop for the most energy-efficient items.


TK: I have to wonder how much an impact these "green" labels will have on purchasing decisions, and whether the labels could end up hurting the most economically vulnerable exporters in Africa.