Food firms vow to put more veg on plates

LEADING organisations from the Welsh food industry have made pledges to radically change the way they produce, manufacture, supply and serve their meals to include more vegetables.

The aim is to make it quicker and easier for adults and children to eat a healthier diet.

Research shows that eating too few vegetables contributes to 20,000 premature deaths in the UK every year and that we should all be eating at least an extra portion every day.

Data released by think tank the Food Foundation this summer showed that UK consumers are buying two-thirds fewer vegetables than the amount recommended by health experts.

The “Peas Please” initiative is urging all organisations involved in the production, supply and consumption of meals to back the campaign to put more vegetables on our plates and improve the health of the nation.

Companies that made Veg Pledges last week, leading the way to dramatically improve and increase our vegetable consumption, included Castell Howell, SA Brains and Co, Puffin Produce, Lantra, Riverside Real Food, the Federation of City Farms and Community Gardens and Penylan Pantry, the Soil Association, WRAP Cymru and Charlton House, caterers to the National Assembly for Wales.

This week, a simultaneous event organised by the Food Foundation saw pledges from Lidl, Coop, Sainsbury’s, Tesco, Greggs, Mars Food, Nestle, Sodexo, Baxter Storey Interserve and Simply Fresh.

These pledges will amount to millions more portions of vegetables being added to meals in the UK with potential to give a welcome spur to British horticulture at a time when the sector faces considerable uncertainty.