Gill Hodgson , founder and honorary president of peak From The Farm , has been delve into some of the ethical claim made by major players in the British flowered manufacture and found many of them to be unfounded and dangerously misleading . She explains what led her to these find and why she has now typeset up conventional channels to fight floral greenwashing .
When I began a calendar month of Instagram place about greenwashing , I had no idea that I was bug out up another movement . I seem to have a flair for thinking up a good thought and then look on in terrorise amazement as mass turn to me as some sort of expert ; anticipate me to know answer and look sensible .
As with prime From The Farm , The War Against Greenwashing Flowers began with a shadowy approximation that ' someone ought to do something , ' and decide over a G&T to consecrate a calendar month of my Instagram account to sharing what I knew about some of the untruths told on internet site and in adverts about the provenience and credentials of the flowers people buy .
© Hse0193 | Dreamstime.com
It was the shabbiness of check Organic Blooms , FFTF members in the South West , invest in fourth lieu on a list of the UK ’s ethical florists that started me off . By any rational , fair evaluation , Organic Blooms would top any ethical board , so I change by reversal my attention to the three online floristry companies who had beaten them .
read website and sustainability report together with many hours of YouTube revealed the judgment outgrowth to be a sham : companies importing more than half their flowers from Africa were describing themselves as constitutional , and all three companionship placed above Organic Blooms – Arena Flowers , Prestige Flowers , and Bloom – had make up to be awarded extra points .
I wrote about them on Instagram – googling the intricacies of the law of libel first and being careful only to order the truth . The more I found out , the crosser I became . I ’d always been cynical about the efficacy of carbon offsetting but had n’t opine the extent and range of businesses offering to make another look shiny . There ’s a murky populace within a murkier world with one thousand thousand of pound being pay so that bad environmental practices can extend unabated . All this seemed a long way from the guiltless - depend letterbox heyday that started me on the quest .
It ’s the customers ' perception of what they ’re buying that ’s wrong , and that has to be switch . Clever phraseology and ambiguous claim have learn buyers into a make - believe earth where a smiling Freddie himself cycles up the drive and delivers British - arise flower to their threshold .
This is the chip I ’m railing against : not the fact that these flowers are imported , but the distance the party are go to show that they ’re really doing the world a favor .
A grouping has now formed to continue the work I commence and to press greenwashing in the bloom reality . you could find Greenwash The bloom on Facebook and @greenwashtheflowers on Instagram . Please do follow and give your support to the team . you could , should you wish , find all 31 of my mini - articles on my Instagram account @fieldhouseflowers , where they ’re corralled together in a serial publication .
For more selective information : Flowers from the Farmwww.flowersfromthefarm.co.uk
