WHERE TO FIND ETHICAL
FOOD IN AUSTRALIA

Wherever you buy food—whether at supermarkets, organic food shops, farmers’ markets, or restaurants—talk to the managers about the ethical concerns most important to you. Tell them about the five ethical principles shown on this book. Ask them for information about the sources and production methods of the foods that you usually buy. Ask them to stock some of the products or brands that you know meet your ethical standards, and then, of course, be sure to go back and buy them. This will make ethical foods more available to other consumers, so your request is an ethical act in itself.

More and more restaurants are including vegetarian, organic, sustainable and other ethical choices on their menus. Look for these at the places where you frequently dine. If none are offered, ask the management to offer them. If they won’t accommodate you, check the restaurant listings in your phone book and phone them to ask what they offer. Just making the calls helps to alert them that providing ethical food choices will attract customers. You can also find restaurants that offer organic and/or vegetarian food choices at www.ecoshop.com.au. General restaurant guides also sometimes provide this information.

Animals and the Environment

The surest way to avoid harming animals and the environment is to avoid animal products altogether. A national list of vegetarian restaurants is maintained by the Australian Vegetarian Society at www.veg-soc.org/html/restaurants.html. The Vegetarian/Vegan Society of Queensland has a helpful website that includes advice, recipes and shopping and restaurant guides—the latter aimed at Queenslanders—at www.vegsoc.org.au. Victorians can go to the website of the Victorian Vegetarian Network, www.vnv.org.au. Vegetarian starter kits can be ordered on the website of Animal Liberation Victoria, www.alv.org.au. Information on nutrition and recipes are also available from Animal Liberation South Australia, at www.animalliberation.org.au.

Many other websites around the world offer nutritional advice and recipes. One excellent American site is www.veganoutreach.org. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals offers two helpful websites: www.GoVeg.com and www.VegCooking.com. If you don’t even want to buy meat for your companion animal, you can even try vegan pet food from www.veganpet.com.au/products1.htm.

If you feel that you can’t go all the way, all at once, at least try vegan meals some days each week. You may already be doing this unintentionally if you choose some of the offerings at Italian, Chinese, Middle Eastern, or Indian restaurants. It’s really not that difficult, and you’ll like the food. Another option is to follow the three R’s—Reduce, Refine, Replace— recommended by the Humane Society of the United States at www.humaneeating.org.

Above all, avoid animal products that come from factory farms. Buying organic animal products is one way to do that—see below for details. The Rare Breeds Trust of Australia seeks to preserve rare breeds of farm animals that are not reared by the big corporate farmers. It maintains a list of producers and butchers who sell meat from these animals, at www.rbta.org/meatmarketing.htm, but the desire to preserve rare breeds is no guarantee of good animal welfare, so before buying their products, you should check into the conditions in which the animals are kept.

Fair Trade

Information about fair-traded foods is available from the Fair Trade Association of Australia and New Zealand at www.fta.org.au. Oxfam Australia gives details on buying fair trade coffee at www.oxfam.org.au/campaigns/mtf/fairtrade. To learn more about the international fair trade movement, go to the site of the Fair Trade Labeling Organizations International at www.fairtrade.net.

Local Farms

Whenever you can, buy from local farmers who are willing to talk to you about your concerns and to show you their methods and systems. Information about local farms and farmers’ markets is available from Australian Community Foods, at www.communityfoods.org.au and www.farmersmarkets.org.au.

Organic

We wrote about Macro Wholefoods in Chapter 12. To see if one is located near you, visit their website at www.macrowholefoods.com.au. You can also find places to buy organic or ecologically friendly food at several other Australian websites. A good place to begin is:

www.ecoshop.com.au/directory%20pages/organic.htm. Other sources are: www.organicfooddirectory.com.au and www.worldwholefoods.com.

For information on genetically engineered food and how to avoid it, see: www.greenpeace.org.au/truefood/guide2.html.

A list of self-service wholefood stores, which buy in bulk and reduce packaging, is available at: http://users.chariot.net.au/~gloria/wholefood.html.

Sustainable Fish

If you eat marine animals, choose species that come from sustainable fisheries. The Australian Marine Conservation Society offers The Sustainable Fish Finder, a national guide to sustainable fish at www.amcs.org.au.