• IAMOBSCENE [none/use name]
      ·
      2 years ago

      There's a significantly larger market for these fruit cup things in Asia than anywhere else, with pears being grown all over. Apparently the packing machinery is so sophisticated that it makes more sense to ship pears around the world, and supposedly the time spent in transit ripens them, where global supply chains would just be crippled by storing pears somewhere temporarily to let them ripen.

      It's one of the least egregious examples of market inefficiency in some ways, ocean freight is relatively ecological compared to automobile shipping, but we have to ignore the elephant of unsustainability in the room with regard to any kind of plastics packaging and energy generation used in shipping.

      • ZoomeristLeninist [they/them, she/her]M
        ·
        2 years ago

        canning has been bastardized by the plastics industry. metals are very easy to recycle/reuse and are better for storing food (no microplastics, doesn't deform/degrade under heat). this plastic crap isnt real canning, you need metal or glass so you cant heat what you're storing to create a vacuum

        • CheGueBeara [he/him]
          ·
          2 years ago

          Unfortunately they line cans with plastics now so you've still got microplastics. But they are recyclable and you can burn off the (very thin) plastic lining in the process, so it's way better.

      • came_apart_at_Kmart [he/him, comrade/them]
        ·
        edit-2
        2 years ago

        i wonder what prevented and still prevents sophisticated processing infrastructure from being developed near where labor intensive, extractive systems generating "raw material" developed. lol just kidding, it's not a mystery at all!

        also, saying ocean freight is ecological compared to automobile shipping is a crap comparison. just about everything is ecological compared to automobile shipping. the fuel used for maritime shipping is like a step above asphalt and extremely carbon intensive. carbon emissions for the maritime sector was at the same level as the entire country of Germany in 2018 (the #5 emitter) and is expected to balloon up by 250% before 2050.

        maritime shipping is largely ignored by international climate talks because no nation wants to take responsibility and it's heavyweights typically enjoy weird extralegal territorial statuses and can play shell games like no other industry. like a dozen companies can have a stake in a single ship, through a complex network of ownership.

        maritime shipping is a serious ecological problem and will continue to be so until it is decarbonized.

        https://www.wired.com/story/container-ships-use-super-dirty-fuel-that-needs-to-change/

        short video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TS2cszwTTcg

        • star_wraith [he/him]
          ·
          2 years ago

          Yep, the whole thing that makes this kind of process "economically efficient" is that the environment is footing most of the bill. If you factor in environmental destruction into the equation it's no longer "economically efficient".

      • wtypstanaccount04 [he/him]
        ·
        2 years ago

        Now if they stopped using oil and replaced it with nuclear reactors or sails we might get somewhere