Oh, those itty-bitty teeny-tiny stickers on fruit and vegetables stuck on by machine automation before leaving the packaging plant – sigh! You may have found one once or twice stuck to the side of your sink somewhere after someone washed there fruit or maybe on the side of the plate someone was eating from. It may just be that I am the official sticker disposer at my house at least once I get it off my fingernail and into the garbage anyhow.
Do you know some people collect and trade these? Well times running out for you folk so get trading! Labels that don’t get stuck to your sink by someone picking it off, have gotten washed down the sink drain and are causing problems at the wastewater filter systems because they get attached to screens and filters even block up pipes. Small sticker – big stinkers. Static stickers are easier to remove from the product but they still make there way down our drains so we’ll be saying good bye completely to both of these and hello carbon dioxide laser beams that etch information on the first few outer cells of our fruit and vegetables.
Once etched, the information cannot be distorted, peeled off, washed off or changed. Sounds scary to be a fruit or vegetable these days. So rather than PLU codes, or price look up codes on stickers it’s right on the fruit. Japan is already using scan able bar coding etched into wax on apple skin. So what do mothers there say “don’t forget to de-wax your apple before eating it?” So now that you know my kids won’t be ingesting any stickers it's is also a good idea to know what the coding actually means.
Conventionally grown fruit has 4 digits (pesticides are used in this process)
Genetically engineered has 5 numbers and starts with the number 8 (scientists have messed with it)
Organically grown fruit has 5 and starts with the number 9
I’ll pass this along to you to help you remember what to look for when shopping.
4 no more, 8’s not great, but 9 is fine!
You'd think that since Organic farmers weren't spending their money on pesticides or scientist that their produce would be cheaper.
P.S.
Nothing to do with this topic per say but has anyone ever known "milk" to go on sale?
I wanna say, yahhhhhh! for the etched on numbers and no more labels. There has been a game between my daughter and myself for a couple years. BUT she graduated in June and is now in Sundre at a retreat camp for 11 months so no more game. The game was she'd pick the labels off and then stick them somewhere for me (mostly) to find. I used to dislike it intensely that she'd leave them on the kitchen sink taps when she washed her fruit instead of throwing them in the garbage. Then, I got over it and I'd return the favour and leave the stickers on something of hers to find. She made sure before leaving on Aug 30th to put as many around the house as she could. One time, she left them on my bedroom mirror with "I love you" written in the d*st on the mirror. Oh, Annette, we've left them up just to remind us that she's not at home ..... The one we see every night is the one on the hallway light switch when we turn it off before turning in for the night.
ReplyDeleteP.S. No, I've never seen milk on sale either. Sometimes, my rice milk is but never the normal stuff. Barb
Love you Barb <3
ReplyDeleteAs I appreciate stickers / labels can be a pain when left around the house on appliances etc. good manufacturers of these labels make sure that they only stick to the fruit and easily removed when needed. The label can be colourful and is a great tool for brand awareness and carries useful information, either by human readable or barcode. The labels can be used to make some wonderful art as proved by artists (young and old) around the world which you cannot do with the mentioned etching on the skin which has many limitations not only physically but visibly. Each label is a piece of 'art'.
ReplyDeleteNever thought about it like that - piece of 'art'
ReplyDelete:D - nice!