Clark Wolf is the host and organizer. The panel—on food and politics—includes me, talking about my memoir, Slow Cooked, An Unexpected Life in Food Politics; Chloe Sorvino, author of Raw Deal: Hidden Corruption, Corporate Greed, and the Fight for the Future of Meat; Alex Prud’homme, author of Dinner With The President: Food, Politics and the History of Breaking Bread at the White House; and Tanya Holland, author of Tanya Holland’s California Soul. Free, but register here. It starts at 5:00 p.m. and lasts one hour.
by Marion Nestle
Aug
6
2007
The Tesco Invasion
Michele Simon has just sent me a press release from the Urban and Environmental Policy Institute at Occidental College. This is about a report the Institute has just written on Tesco, a supermarket chain that holds a 31% share of the grocery business in the U.K. Tesco is about to open supermarkets (“Fresh & Easy”) in Los Angeles and other places in some Western states. According to the lead author of the report, Robert Gottlieb, who is Henry R. Luce Professor of Urban & Environmental Policy at Occidental: “Tesco has been especially adept at marketing itself as a socially responsible corporation…However, our examination of Tesco’s track record shows significant gaps between what it has promised and how it has achieved its current position….” This report makes interesting reading. Is Tesco really socially responsible? Does it raise the same kinds of issues as get raised about Whole Foods? Give the report a try and see what you think.