Definition[edit source]

This page is encyclopedic and wrong. Please fix it or better yet delete it. This content would be better debated on wikipedia. --Lonny 11:49, 6 February 2012 (PST)

Please don't put it on Wikipedia. Wikipedia has a policy forbidding articles created by making stuff up, and if it was moved there, it would get deleted again. --67.160.38.148 16:29, 6 February 2012 (PST)
That is a great point. I was thinking that on Wikipedia, more people would have the time to correct it, or at least argue against it. --Lonny 16:37, 6 February 2012 (PST)
I removed most of the obvious errors (in particular that a long shelf life equates to sustainable) and put in some additional points. Then I realized that I'd pretty much rewritten the article :-). See if you think it's worth keeping now. --Chriswaterguy 17:25, 6 February 2012 (PST)
I like it more now... but it is just a concept, whereas there are probably supermarkets already doing this. If we want to keep speculative pages like this, let's add more such as social justice (e.g. slave labor), nutrition, cost and community ownership. Thanks for making it more tolerable. And thank you KVDP for pointing out areas of Appropedia that could be developed. --Lonny 19:57, 6 February 2012 (PST)
Hi Chris, Lonny, and mysterious user 67.160.38.148,

I offcourse respect your decisions, and if the article as kept the way it is now, that's fine. However the initial intent was to focus on shelf life, which, as Chris points out, is normally not associated with sustainability. I am however certain that in practice it is, despite that I also never saw any reports linking the two together. At present, the term "sustainable supermarket" does exist (I didn't make it up), yet seems to refer to some changes supermarket owners do and of which they believe it makes the supermarket "green" (greenwashing); this mostly refers to more efficient cooling, reducing plastic packaging/bags, reducing transport (distance between supermarket and area of production), ... See http://web.archive.org/web/20100510075134/http://www.onsetcomp.com:80/application_stories/new-study-looks-impact-sustainable-practices-supermarket-sales , http://web.archive.org/web/20120716051441/http://www.skmconsulting.com:80/Knowledge-and-Insights/Achieve-Magazine/Issue3-2009/article4.aspx , http://makewealthhistory.org/2011/10/13/sainsburys-%E2%80%93-a-sustainable-supermarket-by-2020/ , http://www.greensteve.com/313/supermarket-sustainability-how-do-they-score/

However, there certainly is a link between shelf life, and increased food waste, and obviously, allot of labour, energy (transport), natural resources (intermediate food production, water for culativation, fertilisation, ...) is wasted if food goes bad (although I agree that when properly recycled (almost never the case, most supermarkets dump organic waste, packaging, ... straight into the dumpster, some even destroy/pollute food with bleech), the waste of energy/natural resources is very limited. By intermediate food production I btw mean food ie cultivated to feed an animal, itself slaughtered for food (allot of food/energy goes to waste like this).

In regards to the proper recycling noted above, I mean that all packaging needs to be seperated from organic material (food, beverages, ...). As I mentioned above, this is generally not done by supermarkets, although it should be. In a appropriate context, it is vital, so it would be beneficial to mention it in the article. In order to do so, I allready made Biodegradable waste (including the bio-waste bin, missing at wikipedia's article on this, and Cradle-to-cradle design (needs to be reworked, but allready includes my schematic which would be useful). I'm not sure whether the first article would be clear for anyone, since waste management may differ significantly depending on the country. In my country (Belgium), biodegradable waste is seperated from garbage (the first being disposed in a green container, the other in yellow bags). This is a perfect system, yet it isn't followed to the letter by most (most simply throw away packaging with organic substances (food/beverages) in the yellow bags.

Hence, the only possible solution to feed people cost-effectively and ecologically, is (I believe) to just sell conserved/long lasting foods, and change people's eating behavior. This is something which btw is not done in any supermarket, anywhere, the reason being offcourse that this would (at first) lower the amount of customers considerably (people generally don't want to change their eating habits). The list of foods I provided (now deleted) was intented to be a guideline for doing this, and could btw also be of value as a guideline to self-sufficient food production systems. I see these (ie Community-assisted agriculture) as a better solution than supermarkets, but then again within cities/densely populated/urbanised areas, supermarkets will still need to be used.

KVDP 01:59, 14 February 2012 (PST)

Hi KVDP. I agree on some points, but still find many problems with your starting point. How about you develop it first in your userspace?
Lonny, re "If we want to keep speculative pages like this, let's add more such as social justice (e.g. slave labor), nutrition, cost and community ownership." I don't have a problem with articles starting out incomplete, but we could do with an "incomplete" notice for when there are a major areas missing, like here. I see there's already {{incomplete}} for projects, so I'm starting {{incomplete topic}} and adding it to this page. --Chriswaterguy 00:11, 17 February 2012 (PST)
Seems like a supermarket with long shelf life products will be created: http://www.london24.com/news/business/stelios_plans_to_set_up_easyjet_style_no_brands_food_store_1_2321729

109.130.231.27 00:04, 8 August 2013 (PDT)

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