Growing greens helps cut carbon emissions

14:29 2nd November 2009

Garden and greenhouse fans who grow their own food from seed are helping to cut the UK's impact on the environment.

That is the view of environment secretary Hillary Benn, who recently launched a task force aimed at encouraging more Brits to get their hands dirty and cultivate some fruit and vegetables.

The government group hopes the drive will also provoke people to eat more healthily.

"If we grow and eat more fruit and vegetables here - in our greenhouses, in our orchards, in our fields, our allotments and in our own back gardens - it will be good for our health, our farming community and our landscape," Mr Benn said.

Government statistics show that just ten per cent of fruit and 58 per cent of vegetables consumed in Britain in the last year were from UK soil.

Transport, packaging and refrigeration emissions from food grown abroad contribute to global warming and food grown and eaten in the UK can help reduce this effect.

The initiative follows an RHS appeal encouraging Brits to eat English apples, after a bumper harvest was recorded.