Health

The business of healthy food has grown enormously in response to increasing consumer demand. The ball started with a book called "E for Additives" which demonstrated what all the additives in food might do. The concerns grew the news that salmonella was endemic in the UK chicken flock. Then the pop stars started worrying about Diaminozide in apples. This chemical was withdrawn in 1989.

This was followed with Listeria, and then eventually the BSE crisis. Government scientists said a new form of CJD ( a crippling neural disorder)may be contacted from BSE infected beef. The classic image of good british food - beef, became associated with a dreadful disease.

In 2001 the way food is produced in the UK was put under close scrutiny when the foot and mouth (FMD) epidemic spread across the country. The sight of mass culling followed by burial or burning made many people ask, does our food production have to be like this?