Whole Foods Sustainable Foods
By: Megan Graham and Ariel Joey
Ensure Sustainable Food
Every year there’s more demand for “sustainable food” and “natural food products.” We’re here for you! In developing our standards, we research everything from food additives to antibiotics in meat production, sustainable seafood to organic skin care. If you want to know what goes into the products you buy, our standards make it easy, because if it doesn’t meet the standards, we don’t sell it.
Chemical Use
An estimated 5.2 billion pounds of pesticides are used worldwide each year. Agriculture uses 70% of the world’s accessible fresh water. Since 1960, an estimated one-third of the world’s farmable land has been lost through erosion and other degradation. Agriculture accounts for 10–12% of the world’s human-generated greenhouse gas emissions. Pollinators are crucial to more than two-thirds of the world’s crop species, yet bee and butterfly populations are in serious decline.
GMO's
Currently, we offer more than 25,000 certified organic products and about 11,500 Non-GMO Project Verified products in our stores.* (Organic items must be non-GMO to be certified.) Being the first to do a lot of this work with GMO transparency means we are paving the way for those who will follow. And it does take time to work through all of the details. But we owe it to our customers and supplier partners to not rush into decisions that could affect them adversely.