How not to be fooled by greenwashing?

greenwashing

Can we always count on the truthfulness of food producers? How to recognize if products in stores are really eco? Do you know what is greenwashing?

The trends emerging in the world are a great argument for making big money by great companies. It is no different in the case of the popularity of natural, healthy, from organic farming …

Greenwashing,  is doing very well, and when we enter the store, we can be easily fooled by beautiful words, carefully selected by a team of marketers.

Let’s start with the fact that the health trend is not going away, which we are really happy about! Consumers’ awareness is growing, they are often able to spend more to get the product they buy really healthy. The problem, however, appears on the other side. Big corporations know their clients’ behaviors very well , preferences and choices and use this knowledge effectively in production. There would be nothing wrong with that, if not for the fact that their main goal is to earn money, and at the same time including looking for savings – most often in the quality of products.

Let’s get down to business …

Do you know that to call a product organic, it must contain at least 95% of ingredients of natural origin? There is no question of genetic, chemical or artificial modification fertilizers. Producers with an eco-label are subject to annual quality checks. Important! There is a very simple rule that will allow you to verify whether a  product is actually controlled and it is eco. It’s about an EU green leaf. On such a product you  should find information about the place of cultivation or the number of the certifying unit.

In other cases, you will be dealing with pseudo-organic products, that is those pretended to be ecological.

How to spot fake eco products?

Let’s say no to greenwashing. Producers love to use strong words that assure us of the highest quality products. It can be “fit”, “eco”, “bio” and many more. Our perception catches as well colors of products and automatically assigns it to e.g. healthy products. Producers will do everything so that their products fit the health trend, despite the fact that the content is full of  harmful substances. How not to be fooled?

Reading compositions

The basic skill that everyone who cares about their own health should possess is reading compositions on product labels. While the product itself looks a lot encouraging and suggesting health, the composition can show us something completely different. The examples are complete mass. Do you know healthy muesli and granola? After all, it is on beautiful, colorful packaging they say they are fit! What happens when we check the compositions? Sugar comes first.There are many examples.

When going shopping , it is worth getting into the habit of turning the product over and looking at it composition. If the list is endless, it means that this product will definitely not bring usnothing good.

Useful information:

There are phone applications that allow you to scan products in stores. After scanning, the phone will show you if the product has a healthy composition, and if not, what actually is harmful.

What products should you watch out for in stores?

It is worth taking a closer look at the ingredients of gluten-free, fit or bio products. Do you know bio bars? AND drinks with added vitamins? Or maybe fruit yoghurts? Usually each of them is stuffed with gigantic amount of sugars, but some of us will not find out, because it’s enough for us information that the product is bio and fit.

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