family Christmas or 15 liters of oil ... 
Place of global warming in the media, public concerns and political debate is growing, as is the concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) atmosphere.
The week before Christmas, I husked the ads from my nearest supermarket to prepare the family meal as expected. And here is what I could cook up to eight people, in parentheses, the mileage between the country of production and Belgium as well as the kilograms CO2 emitted only for intercontinental air transport of the products purchased. The analysis focuses on the transportation by air because it emits, on average, 60 times more CO2 than transportation by sea.
First, to look pretty, I enthrone a beautiful bouquet of twenty roses in the center of the table of great days. The source of these beautiful flowers is Kenya and mode of transport is by air (6550 km, 5.2 kg of CO2).
Decorum well planted, so lets start with a cream of asparagus soup with prawns. The green vegetable comes directly from Peru by plane (10,500 km, 12.5 kg of CO2) and lobsters were fed once shelled and frozen, by boat from Indonesia (14,000 km). Note that, in terms of CO2 emissions, it is still better to buy prawns reared in Southeast Asia rather than the same crustacean caught in Scotland - what a paradox! Indeed, he once caught in European waters, will make an extraordinary journey by boat to Thailand where, when husked, it will return to the European market (22,000 km). Relocation due to the fact that I prefer, on the eve of Christmas just like the other 364 days a year, buy shelled crustaceans. And like 70% of consumers have opted for this time saving ...
After two bottles of Chilean Sauvignon Blanc (11,900 km) to pale yellow, we attack the main dish. Determined to offer exotic dishes my dear guests, I have long hesitated between the springbok - this beautiful antelope - Namibia (8,300 km), the Australian kangaroo (16,700 km), the ostrich of South Africa (8,900 km), the deer in New Zealand (18,700 km) and the Canadian bison (5,600 km). A little lost, I finally committed to a simple steak and chips, salad comforts of home. Under the title might be funny
"it has for its Argentine" , my supermarket offers me a beef steak Argentine came by plane (11,300 km, 14.5 kg of CO2) at a price 30% lower than the White Belgian-Blue-... How can you resist? For the homemade chips, I buy potatoes labeled "organic" from the south of France by truck. As for the salad, it comes from Spain. Then the space of a moment, I wonder ... Why is it said that it is the traditional Belgian dish par excellence? But this trivial matter dissipates quickly because I have to quickly open bottles of Cabernet Sauvignon California (8,900 km), a marvel whose palate is round and full bodied.
And my wife who takes care of the dessert as expected. A fruit salad made with only fresh fruits found in the store promotion. Brace yourself, it is nashi pears from South Korea, mangoes, papayas, figs and melon Charentais Brazil, passion fruits from Colombia, grenades of the United States, strawberries Israel Central American pineapple, cherries from Argentina and carambola in Malaysia. We decided to add two Kiwis from New Zealand, an orange Africa South Belgian and an apple so that all continents are represented in the same container. Obviously, as we approach the stroke of midnight, he is still 10 ° C outside and my three year old son tells me it's not Christmas yet, since there was snow, a serves as a cost: a total distance of 126,000 kilometers and a bill of approximately 9 kg of CO2 emitted. Thereupon I uncorks a bottle of sparkling white from Tasmania, an island south of Australia (17,100 km).
Ultimately, flowers and wine included, the total distance traveled by all these products is 209,000 kilometers, more five trips around the world, with emissions of 41.3 kg of CO2. This equates to CO2 emissions of a conventional vehicle covering the distance of 258 kilometers, or approximately 15 liters of gasoline for less than six pounds of food!
Yet, with a nice bouquet of holly at the center of the table, a delicious pumpkin soup as a starter, followed by the same steak and chips, salad with local produce, fruit salad without strawberries, cherries come by air and ... French wines we would decrease more than 80% of CO2 emissions from transport.
sure that we put on our plates is one of many small acts as citizens we can do to reduce our environmental footprint. Freight transport by air was 2 billion tons-kilometers
carried in 1960. In 2006 this figure rose to 150 billion. And the share of CO2 emissions due to air transport is increasing every year. A supermarket
chanting "Live like you want" , another proclaims
"And everything becomes possible" . We are convinced. And if we as consumers do not buy more cherries from Argentina, Israel strawberries or blueberries from Chile in winter, they do offer more. Together we can force change. And all this without really losing our quality of life comfortable.
But if the consumer finds it, he must be helped to make their choice knowingly. We therefore appeal to politicians to legislate in this area and the application requires distributors logo (a red airplane and boat blue, for example) systematically and clearly indicating the mode of transport used for intercontinental transport of these goods.
Pierre Ozer, Research Fellow in the Department of Science and Environmental Management, University of Liège
Dominique Perrin, seeks heart to the University Faculty of Agronomic Sciences of Gembloux
The Collective "Red Plane" welcomes the positive (e-mail, news, comments on this blog, etc..) That follow the article "Christmas with the family or 15 liters of oil" , published in La Libre Belgique of January 30, 2007. 
