TOPIC 3 Flashcards
How can paper and cardboard packaging impact the environment?
Paper and cardboard packaging can drive deforestation, leading to habitat loss and reduced biodiversity.
How can mining for packaging materials impact the environment?
Mining for materials like aluminium and metal can harm ecosystems due to deforestation and consume vast amounts of energy
How can plastic impact the environment?
Plastic is cheap to make and versatile to use, fossil fuels and Green House gases from factories negatively affect the environment.
As plastic breaks down due to sunlight and heat it releases GHG; methane and ethylene and creates microplastics
What are microplastics and where can they be found?
Microplastics are small plastics such as spheres found in exfoliators, sunscreen, toothpaste.
Macro plastics such as packaging break down into microplastics.
Microplastics can be found in water, soil and air
How does wasted food contribute to greenhouse gas emissions?
Discarded food takes up space in landfill which releases further greenhouse gases like methane as food rots
What’s the difference between compostable, Degradable and plastic?
Compostable
- leaves NO microplastics
can be put in compost or organics bin
Degradable
- is not completely dissolved in nature
- Contaminates environment with microplastics that can end in food chain
Plastic
-Cannot dissolve in nature
-Contaminates environment with microplastics that can end in food chain
What are some sources of food waste in primary production?
- Produce loss due to pests, diseases or weather
- Damage during production, packaging or handling
- Change in consumer preferences
- Inability to meet specifications (quality, size, colour etc)
What are some sources of food waste in processing and distribution?
- Product damaged or perishes dring handling or processing
- Contaminated (chemical, physical, biological)
- Spoil due to poor storage (e.g temp)
- Damaged food packaging = unable to sell
What are some sources of food waste in retail/hospitality/food services
- Poor stock management (over -ordering, improper stock rotation, storage, and handling practices)
- Limited access to facilities to recycle or repurpose (e.g donate to food bank or many soup with leftovers)
What are some sources of food waste in the household?
- Confusion over use by and best before date
-Over-purchasing or over-cooking of food which is then wasted
-Limited knowledge of how to safely store or repurpose leftovers
How can producers reduce food waste?
- Improving technology to harvest/collect crops more efficiently
- Invest in proper storage with adequate ventilation/controlled temp to optimise product shelf life
- Improve collaboration/communication with retailers to help farmers understand stock demands
- Utilise crop waste to make fertilisers
- Sell ‘ugly’ or imperfect fruit and veg directly to consumers for low price
How can retailers reduce waste?
- Invest in proficient technology and employee training to monitor stock levels, expiration dates and sales data to avoid overstocking produce nad food expiring on shelves
- Offer discount on foods approaching expiry with clear labels to promote sales
- Implement food waste tracking system so that data can provide targeted areas of frequect food loss to address
How can consumers reduce food waste?
-Little and often –> do more smaller shops more often to avoid overpurchasing food
- Write a shopping list as it lessens the chance of impulse buys
- Plan meals and serve what you need
- Ask for a takeaway container at restaurants and eat the rest later to avoid wasting food
- Make use of freezer to preserve food for longer
- Get a compost bin
What is the impact of livestock farming on land availability?
Land clearing for agriculture destroys natural vegetation, removing habitats for native animals. this results in fewer plant and animal species in the area.
Increased water use and decreased water quality reduce bioavailability due to insufficient useful water available to native plants and animals
What is the impact of livestock farming on soil quality?
Livestock farming can cause erosion by eating all of the vegetation that would prevent the erosion from happening.
The hooves can also ‘compact’ the soil which causes more water run-off instead of soaking in increasing erosion which leads to topsoil loss
Discuss the use of antibiotics in livestock farming and its impacts
Vets use antibiotics to treat or prevent disease in livestock improving yields, however, they can cause negative effects in humans.
E.g antibiotic residue can be found in milk and may cause allergic reactions.
Concerns about bacteria becoming immune to the antibiotics humans consume which would have a significant impact on the healthcare system
What is monoculture?
Monoculture is the production of a single crop in one area at one time
Most environmental issues linked to primary production are due to monoculture
What are some benefits and disadvantages of monoculture?
Benefits:
- Cost (bulk purchase of seed)
- Easier to plant and harvest same species
- Use of same type of fertiliser and pesticides
Disadvantages:
- Same nutrients are removed from soil each year this is why fertiliser is required
- Overuse of pesticides ( which can spread to other areas)
- Planted + harvested at same time = loss of top soil from erosion –> top soil contains high levels of nutrients
What is the impact of monoculture on land availability?
Land that is able to effectively grow crops is called arable land.
With increasing population size farmers are being pushed further out form cities due to urbanisation.
This places increase demand on farmers who are trying to farm on arid land, which is unable to sustain crops
What is the impact of monoculture on soil quality?
Primary production requires deforestation of native vegetation for crops and pastures. Deforestation and harvesting of crops leads to reductions in soil quality due to soil erosion and increased soil salinity
What is dryland salinity?
Refers to the increasing salinity of soil.
Soil salinity increases when the groundwater rises.
As it rises it dissolves naturally occurring salts in the soil, making the water more salty when it reaches the surface.
Overtime the land and its surroundings become too salty to farm
Discuss monoculture and its link to soil erosion
Soil erosion is when land is cleared or harvested the topsil is left bare and is able to be washed or blown away.
Removal of topsoil decreases soil quality as it holds the most nutritnets. This can also reduce the nutrient content in food which can affect health.
If large amounts of topsil are removed, land can become infertile making it harder to grow crops
What is fertiliser in monoculture, and how does it impact the environment?
Fertilisers are added to overcome the issue of infertile soil to increase yields. Fertilisers are chemicals that add nutrients to the soil that are required for plant growth.
Fertilisers are added to soil or sprayed, both methods leave fertilisers that are unable to be absorbed into soil. This excess fertiliser can be washed away and run-off into nearby water sources
What is eutrophication and what are its impacts on the environment?
Excess fertiliser can run-off or leach into rivers and lakes causing eutrophication.
Increased nutrients in water from fertilisers promote the growth of blue-green algae across the surface of the water.
The algae prevents sunlight from entering the water and takes up all the nutrients and oxygen available.
Overtime the water can become starved of oxygen and nutrients killing other organisms that live there.
Some blue-green algae produce toxins which are toxic to both humans and animals
