LONDON — Keir Starmer hailed a “landmark deal” with the European Union back in May which he promised would slash red tape. One month on, however, and Starmer’s promises still seem like a distant dream in Northern Ireland, as businesses brace for yet more Brexit paperwork. From July 1, a whole raft of new food products sold in Northern Ireland will have to carry “Not for EU” labels as part of the third and final phase of a controversial labeling rollout. The rules — set out in the Windsor Framework deal between the U.K. and EU — are supposed to ensure that goods are not moved onward from Northern Ireland to the Republic of Ireland, an EU member country. But in light of the U.K. prime minister’s fresh EU deal, businesses are questioning why the new labels should be introduced at all. Under the terms of the deal agreed by Starmer, Britain is preparing to sign up to European single-market regulation on animal and plant health, known as sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) rules, removing the need for the labeling. “We are being required to implement a very cumbersome and onerous regulation from July 1 until the date that the [SPS] deal is put into law, which may only be a matter of months,” said Roger Pollen, head of the Federation of Small Businesses in Northern Ireland.  “There will almost certainly be manufacturers who will say: ‘No, we’re not doing that’, and stop supplying the market, leading to gaps on shelves and broken supply chains, simply because the EU are sticking on a point of principle despite the imminent SPS deal.” ‘FRANKLY FARCICAL’ The labels are deeply controversial for businesses, who claim they are not only off-putting to consumers but costly for manufacturers and “cataclysmic” for food exports.  The latest rollout will cover some fruit and vegetables, fish, and composite products such as pizzas and quiches. Meat and dairy products sold in Northern Ireland already carry the labels. The requirement was originally supposed to apply U.K.-wide, but that plan was scrapped last year following a huge backlash from businesses — with the caveat that they could be reimposed if supplies to Northern Ireland are detrimentally affected.  A senior retail figure, granted anonymity to speak freely, said industry was “furious at the government’s failure to stand up to the EU and demand that retailers be treated as trusted traders. If the U.K. and EU have agreed to align on SPS standards, then it is frankly farcical to proceed with phase-three labeling.” Meat and dairy products sold in Northern Ireland already carry the labels. | Janos Vajda/EPA A spokesperson for the Cabinet Office, tasked with the implementation of the Windsor Framework, acknowledged that the need for the labels would likely be “diminished” as a result of any SPS agreement. “In the meantime,” they said, “it is important to implement the existing arrangements for the Windsor Framework and we will continue to work closely with businesses across the United Kingdom to support them in implementing these arrangements.” That message was hammered home at a recent meeting of the Specialised Committee on the Implementation of the Windsor Framework — co-chaired by the U.K. government and the European Commission — where both sides reiterated their commitment to the “full, timely and faithful implementation of the Windsor Framework,” including the “correct implementation of the labelling safeguards.”  A Commission spokesperson said suspending the implementation of the Windsor Framework until an SPS agreement is reached “creates risks for the integrity of the EU internal market, which the EU does not accept. It is important to recall that the EU and the U.K. currently have different SPS rules. “Honouring existing agreements is a question of good faith, this is why the EU and the U.K. both committed to the full, timely and faithful implementation of existing international agreements between them,” they added. ‘EU HAS SHOWN NO COMPROMISE’ But the lack of flexibility has left industry disappointed — and in some cases blaming the EU.   “The EU has shown no compromise and insisted on ‘full and faithful’ implementation of the rules despite agreeing to probably remove them in the near future,” the retail figure said. “The government’s failure to resist this unreasonable behavior is extremely disappointing and U.K. consumers will end up bearing the costs [with] increased prices.” Pollen agreed. “The only people who can actually step in and be magnanimous about this are the EU and they’ve resolutely refused to do that so far.  “I think they should just be pragmatic and say: Look, we’ve reached this overarching agreement on SPS with the U.K. On that basis we are not going to require businesses supplying Northern Ireland to have to go ahead with phase-three labeling for a grace period of a year to 18 months. “Then, if the deal is ‘papered up’ in law by that stage, this bureaucratic labeling won’t be required at all.”  But a figure close to discussions about the future of the scheme — granted anonymity to speak freely — called for realistic expectations of when an SPS deal was likely to happen. “First of all, the U.K. needs to align itself to EU standards, where it has diverged,” they said. For example, the U.K. has authorized emergency use of certain pesticides that are banned in the EU. Some suppliers may decide to drop out of the Northern Ireland market altogether. | Mark Marlow/EPA “Then, on the EU side, the Commission will not have their mandate to get into technical discussions from the European Council until at least mid-Autumn and the European Parliament will want some sort of input into the technical process.  “Either way, those things aren’t going to happen overnight, and while relationships from the political agreement are still buoyant, the technical discussion will be much more intense and fervent.” ‘THROUGH-THE-LOOKING-GLASS POLICY’ Despite industry’s concerns, retailers are generally “well prepared — especially when it comes to own-brand products,” the same senior retail figure quoted earlier said. But they added that there are still a “considerable number of suppliers, including sizable brands who are not ready, and who don’t want to play ball.” While some suppliers may decide to drop out of the Northern Ireland market altogether, others are getting round the issue by bringing unlabeled goods through the “red lane,” a customs channel for goods entering Northern Ireland from Great Britain that are intended to move into the EU, where they face full EU customs checks. The absurdity isn’t lost on Pollen. “They [businesses] are prepared to go through that added bureaucracy just to ease a different type of bureaucracy. It’s through-the-looking-glass policy.” With the U.K. and EU unlikely to budge on labeling any time soon, Rod Addy, director general of the Provision Trade Federation, which represents food processing, manufacturing and trading companies, is pinning his hopes on a swift SPS deal.    “Our view would be that the government and industry need to quickly identify the most important sticking points and come up with quick fixes so the deal can be pushed through relatively quickly and business and government can enjoy the benefits in months, not years,” he said. 

LONDON — The U.K. government has put planned Brexit border checks on fruit and vegetables on hold while it negotiates a sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) agreement with Brussels. The proposed SPS deal, committed to by both sides at a U.K.-EU summit last month, would remove the need for border checks on plant and animal products entirely. While the agreement will take months to negotiate, on Monday the government announced it would postpone the introduction of the next raft of checks on so-called “medium risk” fruit and vegetables imports in light of talks. The checks on fresh produce were yet to be introduced and have been repeatedly delayed amid concerns about disruption they pose to supply chains. Industry figures welcomed the move and said it was “common-sense,” pointing to earlier calculations that the checks would have led to £200 million in higher costs and resulting higher prices. “This Government’s EU deal will make food cheaper, slash bureaucracy and remove cumbersome border controls for businesses,” Biosecurity Minister Helene Hayman said. “A strengthened, forward-looking partnership with the European Union will deliver for working people as part of our Plan for Change.” SPS checks on food imports including meat, fish and dairy were introduced from April 30 2024 by the Conservative government after years of delay — but checks on fresh produce are yet to go live. A planned October 2024 date was put back by the Labour government to July this year, but this has now effectively been delayed indefinitely. The government has said the checks are now scheduled to come in on January 31 2027 — by which time they will likely not be required due to the planned SPS agreement. That agreement will see the U.K. align with EU sanitary and phytosanitary rules in order to cut red tape on food, plants and animals at the border. Nigel Jenney, chief executive of the Fresh Produce Consortium, said: “This is a unique and sector-specific exemption, and one we’ve fought long and hard to achieve.” “We’re proud to have secured a common-sense solution that protects our diverse and critical industry — from supermarket supply chains to the thousands of SMEs in wholesale and foodservice.”

THE MEDITERRANEAN DIET IS A LIE Italy’s food is supposed to be the world’s healthiest. So why are so many of its kids obese? By ALESSANDRO FORD in Nicotera, Italy CGI illustration by Chan Yu Chen for POLITICO It’s the most famous diet in the world. It might also be the most misunderstood, I think, as I scarf ink-black spaghetti al nero di seppia, savor a Lamezia red and drizzle olive oil on Calabrian ’nduja meatballs. Cerulean blue waters bob below, flecked by the basil green of nearby Sicily and the Aeolian Islands. I chew fast so my dining companion can deliver another helping of history. “This cuisine dates back millennia,” declares a proud Antonio Montuoro, president of the International Academy of the Mediterranean Diet. Food is just a part of it though. “The other parts are the panorama, the beauty of nature, our historic centers, our heritage,” he enthuses, extracting his fork from a potato peperonata to point at the scenery around us.  “All this is part of the lifestyle of the Mediterranean diet,” the 72-year-old explains serenely, mopping tomato sauce off his plate with a thick hunk of artisanal bread.  It’s a beautiful story and a terrific seasoning for our meal. The only problem is it’s not true. Fifty years since the term was coined by the American physiologist Ancel Keys — and a decade and a half after UNESCO recognized it as an intangible cultural heritage of humanity — the Mediterranean diet has become a mishmash of hyperbole, half-truths and howlers, stirred together for political and commercial ends. Advertisement Amid backlash against the Green Deal and agricultural protectionism hardening across Europe, southern politicians and lobbies have weaponized a series of recipes and ingredients to fry the European Union over its liberal climate and trade policies, while boosting lucrative — and often unhealthy — exports to America and Asia. Italian politicians have always been sensitive about food, but Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has taken that to new extremes, pursuing a vendetta in Brussels against attempts to cut meat consumption, draft warnings against booze and pick a common front-of-pack nutrition label for the EU. The right-wing figure claims ad nauseam that these stigmatize her ancestral food traditions, and has stoked a gastronationalist frenzy to enlarge support for her Brothers of Italy party. Public health has greatly suffered in Italy as a result. The country struggles with one of the EU’s highest rates of childhood obesity. One-tenth of citizens drink alcohol daily, and salt overconsumption costs it more than France, Spain and Greece combined, according to a recent report by the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization.  Compare modern Italian eating with the original idea of the Mediterranean diet and you reach an unavoidable truth: The Mediterranean diet is dead.   So why do we keep hearing about it? CUCINA POVERA There are two competing theories on how the Mediterranean diet was born. Both begin with Ancel Keys, its founding father. A Colorado-born polymath with PhDs in biology and physiology, Keys got his start in the world of nutrition in the 1930s, developing a portable provision for United States troops as they prepared to enter the World War II (the famous “K-ration”). An energy-dense brick of sausage and sweets, the K-ration was hardly salutary. But then neither was contemporary American food, whose fatty abundance was killing middle-class men in droves. At the time, doctors were baffled: This was the best-fed cohort of the richest nation on Earth. What was going on? Keys and his chemist wife Margaret figured it was down to diet, specifically too many saturated fats, and in 1951 they flew to southern Italy to prove it. A colleague had told them working-class Neapolitans rarely suffered from heart attacks and generally lived longer than, say, Minnesotan executives. The Keys measured the locals’ serum cholesterol. It was much lower.  Advertisement But correlation isn’t causation, so the couple set up a pilot study in Nicotera, a sunny seaside town at the toe of the Italian boot. The Keys recruited 35 families and, for the next three years, took blood samples, calculated body mass and ambushed Nicoterans at mealtimes to see what — and how much — they were really eating.  It was “cucina povera” (peasant cooking), described Montuoro, whose relatives remember being accosted by the peculiar foreign researchers. Everything they ate was local and organic, rooted in traditional recipes furnished by subsistence farming.  The results of Keys’ research were incredible. Besides scarce coronary disease, the experiment found minimal cancers or degenerative illnesses. Off the back of their findings, scientists organized the “Seven Countries Study,” the largest epidemiological investigation in history, spanning 12,000 men across three continents. It turned the Keyses into celebrities, and the couple put out several bestselling cookbooks. “How to Eat Well and Stay Well the Mediterranean Way” was published in 1975, bringing a cornucopia of rustic dishes to the overfed households of industrial America. Idyllic imagery was key to its success, helping blow the notion of la dolce vita across the Atlantic. This contributed to a dramatic fall in heart attacks, saving thousands and spurring the global rise of Italian food. Freshly picked tomatoes at a Mutti factory near Parma. | Miguel Medina/AFP via Getty Images So far, so good. Where the two theories split is on what the Keys really found in Nicotera. Orthodoxy holds that the American duo discovered a fantastically nourishing, mostly plant-based regimen centered on moderation and communal eating, as well as a food pyramid much like the one we all saw as children. According to their data, young men got one-third of their daily intake from cereals, one-third from fruit and vegetables, one-fifth from wine, and one-tenth from animal proteins and olive oil. Sugar and salt were negligible. It’s the dominant interpretation and the one modern nutritionists rely on when they assert that the Mediterranean diet is the world’s healthiest. But there’s another version. Backed by iconoclastic academics and anthropologists, this rendering argues that Ancel Keys’ books were never meant to be descriptive — they were prescriptive. “Italians have never practiced the Mediterranean diet,” said Alberto Grandi, author of “Italian Food Doesn’t Exist” and professor at the University of Parma. “The goal is to make Americans eat better and so [Keys] builds an ideal food model,” a fictional amalgam of ingredients cultivated around the Mediterranean basin, insisted Grandi. The diet wasn’t discovered so much as invented — and Nicoterans’ leanness was due to a different ingredient: hunger. Advertisement Keys “went to the people’s houses and people were ashamed. They’d say ‘Come back tomorrow because today we won’t eat anything.’ Or they’d only have polenta or chestnut flour,” Grandi contends. Claiming such individuals enjoyed some ancient, gastronomic elixir is “really offensive to the memory of our grandparents and great-grandparents. Because they went hungry.” It’s a controversial take that has made Grandi notorious in Italy. Several of my interviewees dismissed the northern academic as an attention-grabbing sensationalist. Others, however, backed him, citing archeological evidence, Keysian exegesis and parental memories. It’s impossible to know for sure and, in a way, it doesn’t matter. The bottom line is that while the Mediterranean diet may stand above others in eminence, its feet are mired in mystery. And for many, that’s convenient, since this ambiguity has been crucial in transforming the coarse peasant cooking of mid-century Nicotera into the slick brand of mass marketing we know today. CUCINA COMMERCIALE Icons take time to build and the Mediterranean diet was no different. Affluent, modish northerners initially laughed at the Keyses’ notion that they should imitate the impoverished, backward south, said John Dickie, professor of Italian studies at University College London and author of “Delizia: The Epic History of Italians and Their Food.” It took twenty turbulent years to change their minds. First was the economic miracle of the 1960s, which industrialized Italy at the same time as agriculture’s “green revolution” drove people from farms to factories. Next were the “years of lead,” during which anarchists and mafiosi bombed the state. Then came the financial crash triggered by the 1970s oil crisis. Overwhelmed, Italians turned to a mythical past, embracing folksy foods and a culinary crusade for so-called “authenticity.” “What we associate with the Italian diet, these supposed traditions, loads of them date from the [period] when Italians have left peasant living far behind and covered it with a nostalgia for the countryside,” said Dickie.  An anti-American backlash followed. The Slow Food movement erupted in 1986 after a McDonald’s opened in central Rome. Angry at the “banalization of food,” the left-wing peasant alliance wanted a return to Italy’s gastronomic lineage, including the increasingly well-known Mediterranean diet, said Barbara Nappini, the current president of Slow Food Italy.  Right-wingers liked that too, and they soon adopted the lingo. Farmer unions and food companies spotted the opportunity and lobbied the European Economic Community — the forerunner to the EU — for intellectual property protection and overseas promo, which they received in the 1990s. Yet even as the largely meat-free Mediterranean diet attracted burgeoning interest from the medical profession, in the popular imagination, it was growing ever more open to interpretation. The health craze of the 1990s stamped the diet into fitness magazines, which were less fussy about animal proteins. Meat and cheese slowly acquired more prominence, as did olive oil, while fruits and vegetables were gradually passed over.  “Europeans’ heritage fever begins,” remembered Michele Fino, a winegrower and professor of European law. “Cheeses, cured meats, vegetable preserves, baked goods, pasta — a whole, huge range.” Along with wine, these are the moneymakers, creating more added value and netting more profit than the humble cereals, fruits and vegetables promoted by the Keyses. They are also the less healthy products though, meant to be consumed sparingly. It was around this time that the World Health Organization classified alcohol as a carcinogen, for which there is no safe level of use (processed meat got the same grade in 2015, with red meat listed as “probably carcinogenic”). By the time UNESCO recognized the diet as an intangible cultural heritage of humanity in 2010, a mental switch had been made. In theory, UNESCO recognition isn’t intended to confer any commercial benefit. In practice, this one endorsed — and unleashed — one of the world’s most successful brands. “The Mediterranean Diet” became synonymous with “Mediterranean food” — as if whatever Italians ate was wholesome by definition. The Galbani cheese plant in Casale Cremasco, near Milan. | Marco Bertorello/AFP via Getty Images That year Italian agri-food exports totaled a modest €27 billion, topped by fresh fruit and vegetables (over €4 billion in value), which were roughly still on par with meat, cheese and processed pastas combined. Over a decade later, exports have tripled, streaking past €70 billion last year. The composition has also flipped. Wine dominates the ranking (€8 billion), followed by pastas and dough-based goods (€7 billion), dairy (€6 billion), and processed vegetables (tomato sauces and such). Fresh produce has grown too, though not as much as cured meats and olive oil, which now account for a couple of billion each. This evolution has been mirrored by a shift in how Italians eat. Supermarket shelves in the country have swollen with doughy snacks and processed sauces, sparking an obesity and overweight crisis. Southerners and children have been particularly affected, with the latter ranked Europe’s second-most obese (behind kids in Cyprus and just ahead of neighboring Greece, Croatia and Spain). Ultra-processed foods and sugary drinks undoubtedly play a big role, but so do local staples. While it is convenient to blame fatness on foreign imports, under-18s are also the highest meat, dairy, pasta and dessert consumers, as well as the least careful about excess salt and the lowest fruit and vegetable eaters, according to the country’s statistics institute.  The plates of today’s Nicoteran children are more likely to hold a gelato than a tomato. Yet that hasn’t stopped companies waving the diet around to flog foods their grandparents would’ve hardly recognized. “Mediterranean diet sets records on world tables,” crowed Coldiretti, Italy’s largest farmer union, in a press release this month, as it celebrated the boom in sales of trademarked wines, olive oil and factory-made pastas. According to Massimiliano Giansanti, the head of Italy’s third-largest farmer union, Confagricoltura, it’s all gravy. When I asked whether people were confusing terms, he admitted “there’s a potential risk,” but he argued we shouldn’t tell people what to eat. “We’re exporting the products of our Mediterranean diet to the world,” he concluded proudly. CUCINA POLITICA Italians are said to have two obsessions: football and food. Former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi famously exploited the first, scoring big electoral points by manipulating the craze for calcio (his Forza Italia party was named after a football chant). Giorgia Meloni has taken to the second, cooking up a pungent gastronationalism with her Agriculture Minister and ex-brother-in-law Francesco Lollobrigida. Meloni was berating Brussels about food before she came to power, making attacks on the Farm to Fork strategy, the agricultural arm of the Green Deal, into a pillar of her platform. Addressing a European Parliament event in 2021, the then-opposition politician alleged there were “discriminatory policies” against meat, referring to EU plans to cut livestock emissions and encourage more sustainable, plant-based diets. Advertisement The European Commission also wanted to establish a bloc-wide food label to help consumers make better choices. The top contender was France’s Nutri-Score, which provided shoppers with a simple, five-color nutritional rating from green to red. Meloni denounced it as “crazy,” arguing it favored French products and unfairly penalized Italian staples, like salami, Parmigiano Reggiano and olive oil (in reality, these fatty products got the same score as their French counterparts). Lobbies like Coldiretti and Confagricoltura had a solution though. Researchers had amassed evidence that the Mediterranean diet (the all-but-vegetarian one) was among the world’s healthiest. Italy’s money-spinning meats and cheeses were still in its matrix, no matter how minimal. Why not just say the Nutri-Score clashed with the unassailable Mediterranean diet?  So Meloni did. After her landslide victory in October 2022, she marshaled a multipronged influence effort in Brussels to bury the front-of-pack labeling legislation. While Lollobrigida fulminated at the monthly meeting of agricultural ministers, Meloni’s lawmakers joined flash mobs and demonstrations outside. Italian politicians have always been sensitive about food, but PM Meloni has taken that to new extremes. | Adnan Beci/AFP via Getty Images There, Coldiretti and Confagricoltura staff heaved signs saying “Italian produce = quality” and “No to Nutri-Score.” Behind the scenes, the Italian ambassador also met with Agriculture Commissioner Janusz Wojciechowski — part of Meloni’s European Conservatives and Reformists political family — and pressed him to scrap the labeling law. Days later, the Pole’s chief of staff emailed the health commissioner, who was leading on the file, to argue against the French system, according to documents recently released to NGOs in a freedom-of-information act.  “It was the hijacking of the Mediterranean diet,” Serge Hercberg, a professor at the Sorbonne and the inventor of Nutri-Score, told me over the phone. “They knew it was false. They had to know. But by force of repetition, they thought they’d be able to convince, and they did.” More than 300 scientists published a report refuting the allegations in 2023, but by then it was too late. The Commission shelved the law. “It’s Goebbels’ line,” said Hercberg. “Repeat a line often enough and it becomes the truth.”  The playbook was so successful that Rome repeated it with alcohol, insisting the Commission’s intention to put cancer warnings on booze violated the Mediterranean diet.  Advertisement Historically, they had more of a point here given the liver-curdling quantities of booze that Nicoterans drank, but scientifically the research had moved on. We now know coastal communities were not healthy because of wine drinking but in spite of it. No matter. The Commission dropped that plan as well. Ireland eventually went it alone, facing a barrage of Italian criticism, with Lollobrigida claiming it was a protectionist conspiracy to bash wine in favor of local whiskey (despite the fact they will bear the same label). Lollobrigida also attacked lab-grown meat and went after veggie sausages, banding together with far-right parties in Spain, France, Hungary and Poland to harangue Brussels over its supposed attempts to dismantle national food traditions.  As absurd as the accusations were, they’ve won hearts and minds. Right-wing or left, nearly every single Italian I spoke to for this article was opposed to Brussels’ agri-food policies. They were convinced their cooking was among the world’s healthiest and that obesity was imported by foreign corporations. That’s partly true. But it’s also partly false, and until Italians acknowledge they are no longer eating as their ancestors did, they and their kids will be the ones paying the price. The Mediterranean diet is dead. Somebody please tell the Italians. Giovanna Coi contributed to this report. Advertisement

BERLIN — Germans love their discounters. And the rest of the world seems to as well. That is, if you’re buying from them and not selling to them. Lidl operates nearly 9,000 stores outside its home market, while Aldi Süd and Aldi Nord have opened around 7,600 shops abroad, according to data from Heilbronn University showing that German discount supermarkets have expanded into 62 different countries. That stark expansion into foreign markets is, however, increasingly affecting suppliers and their sustainability efforts, as supermarkets like Aldi and Lidl use their growing market power to push down food prices. “Lidl and Aldi are known for being very aggressive on pricing,” said Stephan Rüschen, a food retail professor at the University of Heilbronn. “They have the market power to lower the price level in every country they go to.” That’s due to the success of their business model, which is based on running cost-effective shops — think simplistic stores without decoration where products sit in cardboard packaging instead of being neatly organized on shelves — combined with a focus on hard negotiations with suppliers. “Through price pressure and market power, they can determine who enters the German market and who does not,” said Steffen Vogel, a global supply chain expert from Oxfam. He added that Germany’s four big retailers have established a market concentration of 87 percent at home and thus hold a gatekeeping function.  “Ultimately, those entering the market are the ones that are prepared to accept dumping prices.” And while José Antonio Hidalgo, director of the Association of Ecuadorian Banana Exporters (AEBE), is used to German retailers squeezing prices, he described a recent campaign by Lidl — offering to buy bananas for less than €0.89 a kilogram — as the “straw that broke the camel’s back.” Alongside items such as Nutella and butter, bananas are seen as a strategic product that attracts customers and can draw them away from the competition.  Shoppers going into discount stores usually head straight to the fresh produce section, where they will find two varieties of banana piled up on the shelves — a cheaper option within easy reach and more expensive, but sustainable, alternatives nearby. “In the fruit and vegetable sector, bananas are the most important item,” said Rüschen, the food retail professor. “It’s the product with the highest turnover and one where customers are highly price-sensitive.” Alongside items such as Nutella and butter, bananas are seen as a strategic product that attracts customers and can draw them away from the competition. | Justin Sullivan/Getty Images PRETEXT FOR EXPLOITATION Banana import prices in Germany declined by 20 percent between 2015 and 2018 and were below the 2008 price in 2021, according to an Oxfam report from that year.  “German banana buyers are the worst [with regard to price negotiations], because they know Germany is the most important European market for Ecuador,” said Jorge Acosta, who leads the banana workers’ union ASTAC, which represents around 3,500 laborers across Ecuador. Low prices “give companies a pretext to say that’s why we can’t respect the rights of workers,” said Acosta, who has received numerous death threats in his fight against worker exploitation in the banana sector. Suppliers, meanwhile, argue that extra burden is heaped on them by sustainability regulations, such as certification schemes or Germany’s due diligence act, which forces large companies to ensure their products do not contribute to labor or environmental violations. “[German discounters] say they are committed to sustainability … But prices have decreased, while requirements grow,” said AEBE’s Hidalgo. Exporters are looking for a single European Union fair trade mechanism that would guarantee higher prices from European supermarkets to cover extra sustainability costs. But according to Hidalgo, only Aldi Süd has agreed to such a scheme — while its competitors continue to push for cheaper fruit. Responding, Lidl said it “takes its responsibility toward the employees in the supply chain very seriously,” adding that if wage gaps on banana plantations are identified, these are closed by food vouchers or cash payments. Banana import prices in Germany declined by 20 percent between 2015 and 2018 and were below the 2008 price in 2021. | Georges Gobet/Images But such structures are, according to observers, far from watertight. “The wage data is often manipulated,” Oxfam’s Vogel said. While workers tend to be correctly paid according to their payslip, they often receive less after the transfer or must work more hours than officially stated, he added. Higher in-store prices do, however, not automatically guarantee better conditions. Germany’s more conventional supermarkets are performing even worse in terms of transparency and human rights when compared to the discounters, according to Oxfam’s 2022 supermarket check. Regardless of who offers a product, it is usually the weakest link in the supply chain that is first affected when prices get pushed down. “Small- and medium-sized banana producers can only export through large contracting companies,” said Acosta, the union leader. “And if they do so, they have to sell their products at miserable prices.” The number of small banana farms in Ecuador (up to 5 hectares) decreased from about 42,000 to just over than 16,000 between 2015 and 2018, while the number of businesses harvesting on more than 100 hectares of land grew, according to the country’s statistics office. Alessandro Ford contributed reporting.

Russian agriculture safety watchdog this week temporarily banned imports of tomatoes, peppers, fresh melons, wheat, flax seeds and lentils from Kazakhstan. “The decision was made due to the failure of competent authorities in Kazakhstan to take action and in order to ensure the phytosanitary safety of the territory of Russia,” the Rosselkhoznadzor authority said on its website. The restrictive measure comes shortly after Kazakhstan, Central Asia’s largest economy, refused to join BRICS, the bloc of emerging economies of which Russia currently holds the presidency. “At present and most likely in the foreseeable future, Kazakhstan will refrain from submitting an application to BRICS,” the Kazakh president’s spokesperson, Berik Uali, said in an interview with local news on Wednesday. Uali added that President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev has repeatedly spoken out in favor of the United Nations as a “universal and irreplaceable international organization,” and said that the U.N. Security Council should be reformed to take into account interests of regional powers. Kazakhstan’s decision represents a blow to Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is trying to brand BRICS as an alliance of “the global majority” as part of Moscow’s efforts to challenge a dominant West and challenge sanctions related to Russia’s war on Ukraine. Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that BRICS does not replace the U.N., on the contrary, “it complements, rather than contradicting, its international nature.” “Kazakhstan is our friend, our strategic partner, our ally. We value our relations. This is the first thing. Therefore, of course, Kazakhstan itself makes decisions on the format of its participation in certain organizations,” said Peskov. The tensions come ahead of the BRICS summit scheduled to take place from Oct. 22-24 in the Russian city of Kazan, where Tokayev will participate as a guest in an extended meeting next Thursday.

LONDON — The Labour government will on Monday scrap an unpopular Brexit policy requiring food sold across Great Britain to carry “Not for EU” labels. But ministers haven’t ruled out bringing them back in at a later date. The eleventh-hour policy reversal follows a huge backlash from businesses, who claim the labeling rules are not only off-putting to consumers but costly for manufacturers and “cataclysmic” for food exports. Under the plans inherited from the previous Conservative government, meat and dairy products sold across the U.K. would have been required to carry the labels from Oct. 1 this year. The labels were then set to be applied to even more products, including fruit, vegetables and fish, from July next year. The labeling rules already apply to food sold in Northern Ireland as part of the Windsor Framework agreement between the U.K. and the EU and are supposed to ensure that goods are not moved onward to the Republic of Ireland, an EU member country. But by applying the policy GB-wide, the government has been accused of over-applying the Brexit deal. On Monday, however, the government is expected to confirm that it will not be proceeding with the October deadline as planned, with further guidance due to be set out to businesses. Two food industry figures with knowledge of the plans confirmed that the policy could be reintroduced if market monitoring and analysis shows supplies to Northern Ireland are detrimentally affected. They were granted anonymity to speak freely. The development comes after POLITICO reported over the summer that the new Labour government was reviewing the policy, following heavy lobbying from food and drink businesses. The scrapping of the October deadline will be welcomed by food and drink businesses, which have campaigned for months against the changes. CALL FOR CLARITY In a letter to ministers sent over the summer, food trade bodies had pressed the government for an “immediate decision not to proceed or, at a minimum, the announcement of a formal six-month moratorium to allow more time for deliberation,” complaining that they had been “left in complete limbo.” The Labour government is seeking a veterinary — or sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) — agreement with the European Union as part of a wider “reset” in U.K.-EU relations, which would potentially remove the need for the food labels altogether. In their letter, the food trade bodies said the labeling policy would “sit uneasily with the current government’s stated aim of seeking a new and closer relationship with the EU, particularly in the area of SPS controls which have been at the origin of many of the problems currently associated with moving goods from GB to NI. “We would strongly urge you to draw a line under this poorly handled chapter and make the earliest possible announcement to that effect.” A government spokesperson said: “Ministers are carefully considering the evidence provided in the recent consultation on UK wide ‘Not for EU’ labeling. We are committed to taking all necessary steps to protect the U.K. internal market and are continuing to engage with businesses to ensure the smooth flow of goods to Northern Ireland.” Joseph Bambridge contributed to this report.