Kopi talk - Mr Tan Hui Yee says going oganic or not is a simple act of exercising conscious choice.

'I THINK that you have to be a cocaine dealer to be able to afford to eat ethically,' my colleague declared recently.

She had just enjoyed a meal made with ingredients like organic free-range chicken, which cost $33 each, and organic free-range pork, which cost a jaw-dropping $49 per kg. This was part of a food tasting session arranged for this Saturday Special Report on ethical eating.

The animals were bred in the United States and New Zealand on organic feed and had access to pastures instead of being cooped up in pens at conventional farms.

Sure, the meat was exquisite, but she and a couple of other colleagues at the tasting felt the cost was just too high for everyday consumption.

That’s fair enough, but it is a stretch to conclude that ethical eating is too expensive as the practice is as much about what you avoid eating as it is about what you eat.

Someone who adopts a vegetarian diet to reduce animal suffering could end up spending less than a conventional diner as meat dishes always cost more at food outlets.

And meat lovers can always eating less steak, chicken and so on, which would mean - again - lower food bills.

Detractors love to thumb their noses at organic food on the basis of its relatively higher cost. Going organic, they say, is just too impractical for the average person.

But organic can be used as a benchmark for sustainable agriculture rather than some standard for ethical eating. In other words, it’s okay not to choose organic produce, as long as you demand your food producer grow your vegetables in a manner that is safe for you as well as the environment.

Internationally certified organic standards can be hard to meet, especially for small farmers who have no means of knowing if chemicals had been used on their soil by previous occupants. A farmer who tries his darndest to reduce pollution and support wildlife on his land deserves support – organic or not.

In fact, part of the process of ethical eating is communicating your choices to those who matter.

Have you ever wondered if those prawns at your fishmonger’s were farmed or wild-caught? (Prawn farming has been blamed for the destruction of the region’s mangroves.) Have you bothered to ask him about it?

If enough people did, he might just think twice about stocking that product in the future.

Simply put, there are no gold standards to ethical eating, no checklists to follow. It is a simple act of exercising conscious choice over what you put in your mouth.

Those who choose to walk this path do what they can, and don’t beat themselves up over the stuff that they miss.

It’s okay to slip up, they say.

Redemption is just a meal away.

Thanks For the Article and write up by Tan Hui Yee Correspondent