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From farm to fork: Find out about food miles

Choose or swap ingredients in a recipe to reduce food miles, and explore the environmental impact of your food choices.

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You’ll need

  • Pen or pencils
  • Paper
  • Device to access internet
  • Books
  • Print outs of information about seasonal food and food miles

Before you begin 

  • Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. Take a look at our guidance to help you carry out your risk assessment, including examples.  
  • Make sure all young people and adults involved in the activity know how to take part safely.
  • Make sure you’ll have enough adult helpers. You may need some parents and carers to help if you’re short on helpers. 

Planning and setting up this activity

  • You should be especially sensitive if you know the topic of food is difficult for anyone. For example, some people in your group may use foodbanks or know people who do.
  • Always let people know about running this activity in advance and give people the chance to let you know if they’re not comfortable taking part.
  • You may need to make other adjustments, such as making sure everyone knows they can leave the activity at any point or having alternative activities available.
  • Make sure you look out for individuals and provide a safe and calm space for them to process their emotions. You may need to offer reassurance for anyone who is nervous, upset or unsure. Always follow the Yellow Card.

All food makes a journey from where it is grown or produced to your plate.  ‘Food miles’ are the distance food has travelled to get to your plate. Food must travel from the farm it is grown on or the factory it is made into a supermarket or shop to be sold. You can check where your food is from by looking for a 'country of origin' sticker. For example, strawberries grown and sold at a local farm have travelled very few food miles before they reach our plate. However, oranges grown in Spain and then transported to our supermarkets by plane and lorry have travelled a lot further. The local strawberries produce a smaller number of food miles than the oranges that travelled from another country. When adding up food miles you might need to include your journey to and from the shop. If you travelled by car, bus or train, these all create carbon emissions and add to the food miles. Transporting food around the world on lorries, boats and planes uses up a lot of energy. Using fossil fuels (coal and oil) to provide energy releases harmful gases such as carbon dioxide into the Earth’s atmosphere. (Source: BBC Bitesize, 2025).

Globally, food miles are responsible for about 3 billion tonnes of CO₂ emissions (and other greenhouse gases) each year. (Source: Nature Food, 2022)  

We can reduce food miles by choosing foods that are in season and grown locally, buying from local farmers and producers, growing your own food and reducing food waste.

  

Try this activity

  1. Choose a simple recipe with five or more ingredients. You could make fruit kebabs or pitta pocket pizzas.
  2. Keep all the ingredients in the packet.
  3. Everyone should look at where each ingredient came from by checking the packaging. You could mark each one on a map.
  4. Next, estimate the distance your ingredients have travelled to reach your plate. You can use maps or online tools to help calculate the food miles.
  5. You may wish to find out if it's something that's grown locally or in the UK, and whether it’s currently in season.
  6. Now, find out if any of the ingredients could be swapped for locally sourced or seasonal alternatives.
  7. Recalculate the food miles for your new food choices.
  8. Next, start cooking and use your ingredients to make your food.
  9. After or while eating, get into small groups. You should research the environmental impact of food miles and share what you’ve found with someone else.
  10. Now, think of ways to tell more people about reducing food miles and how they could make a difference. You could make posters, create art out of food packaging wrappers, write a seasonal recipe book for Scout camp or make some social media posts to raise awareness. You should think about what you eat at home, and on Scout camps or activities. 

Reflection

This activity helped you explore food miles, and the impact of our food choices on the environment. 

Was there anything that surprised you about the food miles of the ingredients you chose?

Does understanding food miles make you think differently about your food choices?

As you develop your cooking skills, it’s important to think not only about how to cook, but also why you choose the ingredients you do, and the impact your choices can have.

What could affect someones ability to reduce their food miles, or make more sustainable choices?
Can your cooking skills impact your ability to reduce food miles? How?

Safety

All activities must be safely managed. You must complete a thorough risk assessment and take appropriate steps to reduce risk. Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. Always get approval for the activity, and have suitable supervision and an InTouch process.

You must run your activities in line with the Safeguarding Code of Conduct for Adults (Yellow Card) and report any concerns to the UK HQ Safeguarding Team.

Online safety

Supervise young people when they’re online and give them advice about staying safe. Take a look at our online safety or bullying guidance. The NSPCC offers more advice and guidance, too. If you want to know more about specific social networks and games, Childnet has information and safety tips for apps. You can also report anything that’s worried you online to the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Command. As always, if you’ve got concerns about a young person’s welfare, including their online experiences, follow the Yellow Card to make a report.

  • Check for allergies or dietary needs and adjust ingredients if needed. Use separate tools, such as chopping boards, toasters, and tongs, to avoid cross-contamination. Check with parents or carers and keep any packaging for them to check.
  • Some people may find eating difficult for different reasons, such as sensory sensitivities, eating disorders, food preferences, or fasting. The National Autistic Society has helpful guidance on some common food issues. People may wish to use ear defenders, move around while eating, or sit apart from others while eating.
  • It’s OK if someone doesn’t like or want to try certain foods—offer alternatives but never force them.
  • Cooking can be noisy and smelly, which might be overwhelming. Offer ear defenders, fragrance-free soap, or breaks. Keep noisy equipment in another room or do loud tasks, such as blending, before everyone arrives.
  • Cooking involves lots of jobs, so let people work alone, in pairs, or in groups. Make sure everything is accessible and allow people to sit or stand. Tools such as easy-grip peelers or funnels can help, and pre-chopping or pre-measuring can make things easier. People can take on roles that suit them, such as measuring, pouring, stirring, or chopping.
  • Make sure that everyone can see the packaging. You may need to make the words larger, or write the countries clearly on sticky notes and add them to the packaging. People could also use magnifying glasses. Make sure to use colours that can easily be identified for anyone who’s colourblind.

All Scout activities should be inclusive and accessible.

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If you enjoyed this activity, you could:

  • Test out your modified, lower-food-miles recipe. How does it compare to the original?
  • Reduce your food miles by growing some of your own ingredients or using ingredients that would otherwise go to waste.
  • Learn more about what else contributes to the carbon footprint of food, including the energy used to grow and produce different foods. Some foods require more energy than others.