How to be greener at the grocery store: Tips and tricks to reduce your carbon footprint.

Earth Day is the perfect occasion to rethink consumption habits that leave a greater carbon footprint. What’s a carbon footprint, you ask? The Institut de recherche et d’informations socioéconomiques (IRIS) defines it as an economic and environmental indicator that estimates a human activity’s impact on the biosphere. This means that environmental impact varies depending on the type of products in your grocery cart.

Changing some behaviours can therefore help reduce your carbon footprint. For instance, you can reduce waste, stay informed, avoid food waste, and prioritize greener options at the grocery store. 

6 useful tips to become greener at the grocery store

1. Reduce waste

• In the words of Bleu Jeans Bleu, Oublie pas de pas oublier tes sacs ! To avoid plastic bags, be sure to always have a bag on hand. A soft bag can easily be slipped into a backpack or handbag.
• Plastic utensils should be used as a last resort only. A picnic kit with reusable bamboo utensils and a reusable water bottle are a much better choice!
• Think reusable containers for your groceries. Every IGA store offers the possibility to put bulk products, cheese, meat, fish, and ready-to-eat items into your own containers. (Please note this service is temporarily suspended as a result of the COVID-19 situation.)
• Opt for reusable pouches instead of snack-sized plastic baggies. Good to know: These plastic pouches can be washed and used multiple times. You can get some of these pouches via a kit of eco-friendly items created by Earth Days and the Fonds Éco-IGA. This kit consists of items intended to help citizens become more eco-responsible; it will be distributed in IGA stores across Quebec and New Brunswick.
• Small reusable bags for bulk fruit and vegetables.
• Washable bees’ wax or fabric wraps to replace saran wrap.
• Opt for large formats rather than individual formats to reduce packaging.

2. Limit food waste

• Freeze damaged fruits and veggies for future use. You can turn them into a vegetable broth or fruit purée, for example.
• Buy only what you need. Instead of taking pre-packaged boxes of vegetables, go to the bulk section to get only what you need and avoid waste.
• Give misshaped or lightly damaged fruits and veggies a chance. 

3. Plan your grocery store visits

• Take stock of what’s in your fridge and freezer before heading out.
• Make a list and resist the urge to add more than you need to your cart once you’re there!
• Need to take the car to the grocery store or to have your groceries delivered? It’s best to make one big grocery for the week to prevent fuel emissions.
• Thanks to the FoodHero app, find out if products to be consumed quickly are available at your IGA store ahead of time.

4. Cook more

Get creative in the kitchen to avoid waste. Carrot tops, broccoli stalks, cauliflower leaves . . . there’s nothing to lose! Our Tablée des chefs recipes are most inspiring: strawberry tail jelly, broccoli leaf and stalk salad, and potato skin chips.

• Consume less processed food. A more eco-friendly alternative (fewer packages!), more affordable, and healthier too!
• Become a kitchen-sink recipe pro! Take pride in creating an exceptional meal with all your food scraps!

5. Make sensible, informed decisions

• Avoid ultra-processed food. They often use industrial oils (palm oil) that are very harmful to the environment. Plus, they are over packaged and have travelled thousands of kilometers to make it onto grocery-store shelves. More resources are therefore needed to produce and process this food.
• Choose local products bearing the Aliments du Québec logo, or those that have covered fewer kilometers to get onto the shelves, thus helping reduce greenhouse gas emissions generated by transportation.
• Add vegetable protein to your menu. Industrial farming of animals is significantly harmful to soil, water, forest, and biodiversity.
• Opt for organic products. This harvesting method is less harmful to the environment and to essential species, such as bees.
• Opt for fresh produce whenever possible.
• Consume fish that is sustainably sourced, a practice that is respectful of the environment. 

6. Stay informed

The Earth Day organization has tons of relevant information and offers action programs with concrete things you can do to help keep our planet healthy.

• Get informed on possible options to help you make informed decisions that will have a smaller impact on the environment.
• The À vos frigos workshops, a Fonds Éco-IGA and Earth Day initiative: Discover free conference-workshops to equip citizens in their fight against food waste.
• Other practical solutions to eliminate food waste: FoodHero, Love food, hate waste.
• Simple tricks to save food.
• A graphic representation to organize your fridge.

This article was written in collaboration with Earth Day