We are already in the middle of the first month of the year and the Christmas festivities, the reception of 2023 and the Holy Kings are behind us. There remains nothing more than a traditional and powerful “gastronomic closure” on February 2, in which we will live the Fiesta de la Candelaria with its respective tamaliza that we should not miss.
Who prepared pasta for dinner at Christmas parties? Did someone toast with wine or beer? Did anyone eat a delicious apple salad at Christmas or New Year’s dinners?
Then, what did you accompany your piece of Rosca de Reyes with? Maybe it was a frothy chocolate. And whether or not they got El Niño Dios (for the record, I didn’t say “little doll”). Will they eat their tamales on Candlemas? They can also accompany them with a rich chocolate atole. Or for “the diet”, and that the tamale does not get so fat, you can have a hot coffee for these cold days.
I hope you enjoyed them and will enjoy them in the future, because the future for several of the foods I just mentioned is not rosy and they are about to disappear.
That’s how it is. As we have already mentioned on previous occasions, the effects of climate change fall on the planet’s food security, which translates into the restriction of the production of certain foods, causing many of the products that we are used to consuming and that are part of the from our daily or daily diet can disappear.
Reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC. The Intergovernmental Palen on Climate Change) show that climate change points to an increase of two more degrees in global temperature by the year 2050, with its consequences worldwide, such as the increase in heat waves, a decrease in fresh water reserves and a rise in sea level, effects that we are already experiencing and that are not part of a science fiction work.
These events are having consequences on crops, fishing and livestock and, therefore, on the food we consume.
The increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will weaken the quality of food; Rising temperatures will reduce crop yields and desertification will increase migratory pressure (which we already suffer, apart from insecurity and wars).
It will not hit all the inhabitants equally, and that also already represents a crisis that will increase inequalities in the world, leading to economic, political and social crises. As the journalist Esther Vivas mentions in her book The Food Business: “Everything indicates that in the not so distant future people with purchasing power will continue to have access to food and not people with lower incomes: it is a direct consequence of the model of globalized industrial agriculture”
Some foods that are already considered in danger of disappearing, that may begin to become scarce and will become more expensive are:
Chocolate
Coffee
bananas
Stone fruits (peaches, nectarines, plums, etc.)
Wine (the grape)
Olive oil
Cereals (rice, corn, wheat, consequently, pasta, tortillas, bread and beer)
Avocado
Red meat
And the list can continue to grow. Shall we sit down and see what happens?
There are brands that are not passive and present interesting campaign proposals in this regard. As is the case of the Aldi supermarket chain.
He has an initiative, which he has worked with his agency DDB, called “Extinction Date” which aims to raise awareness among consumers about the effects that climate change can cause in the crops of some foods such as bananas, coffee, cocoa, honey or wine, until causing its disappearance.
With this campaign they promote a key behavior: Responsible Consumption; making it clear that (according to the same company) “just as food has an expiration date, it can also have an expiration date if we do not do something to mitigate it. The focus of the campaign aims to promote access to tools for consumers and companies that want to reduce their impact on the environment, for the benefit of the entire planet”.
The campaign spot opens with a very powerful phrase: “The things we love should never disappear” and shows us different places and people related to the production and consumption of the aforementioned foods, and as a background, a version of the success of 1979 by KC and the Sunshine Band, from which they take up the main phrase of the same, as a pleading and loving call to those products that are “extinguishing”: Please don’t go.
Along with this invitation for people to learn information about endangered foods, they take the opportunity to communicate the actions that the supermarket chain is already doing for the good of the planet and its inhabitants (such as the consumption of national products to avoid long distribution transfers , the sale of certified products that come from sustainable crops, the reduction of plastics in its packaged and own-brand foods with the aim that all its own-brand packaging is recyclable, reusable and/or compostable by 2025, among other actions) .
A campaign that does much more than communicate for awareness. Round and that sets guidelines for many companies to do the same in favor of the most important part of their business: People.