Reiterating its commitment to social and environmental responsibility, London’s Borough Market has published a new Food Policy to provide an aligned approach not just to the food sold by traders but to everything that happens at the market.
The policy will be implemented with immediate effect and sets standards for quality, environmental sustainability, social and economic sustainability, animal welfare, knowledge and transparency, opportunity, health, variety and accessibility.
The move highlights Borough Market’s belief that it ‘should provide the opportunity for people of all backgrounds to buy the fresh ingredients and minimally processed products that underpin a healthy diet’.
“Many of the policy’s principles can already be seen in practice across the market, but as a forward-thinking trust that has long set the pace for the wider food industry, we don’t want to rest on our laurels,” explains Shane Holland, Borough Market trustee and executive chairman of Slow Food in the UK. “We know that there is still work to be done to ensure that these principles are applied meaningfully, consistently and transparently across the whole of Borough Market. Once this has been done, the results should prove hugely beneficial to the Market’s customers, traders, tenants, staff and trustees.”
The market will set new standards for each category of food available at the market and these will apply to all traders, with the market’s operations team on hand to support existing traders to align with the policy.
Commenting on the move, Ruth Westcott, campaign co-ordinator from food and farming alliance Sustain, says: “We welcome Borough Market’s new food policy which includes a great vision for how the market should operate responsibly for the environment and the community.”
