FRENCH/EUROPEAN FOOD STANDARDS

Is it possible to apply norms and standards based on continental Europe to a tiny island like Saint Martin? It would depend on what the standards and norms apply to.


The most import thing to people anywhere in the world is that they need food to remain alive. Food has to be clean and nutritious in order to be eaten so yes, we do need standards.


Once upon a time St. Martin produced enough food to feed the people living on the island, or at least most of them. Some things like rice and potatoes, which do not grow on the island had to be imported. We even exported cattle to other islands at one time.


Then came the tourist boom and an influx of people. So many people that this amll, drought-prone island could no longer handle it. It also became easier to work in the tourist industry than to work in an agricultural industry in which lack of rain could kill the crop and in which city water cost too much to pay for and hope to make a living from agriculture.


So our food has to be imported now. And now our problems have started. France wants us to import from them, with all that that entails, the distance, the unreliability of transportation and higher prices.


But what about the few things that still grow here in the wild and that are imported from the other islands in the area? Europe has a winter whcih we do not have, and Europe does not grow coconuts, papaya, bananas, mangoes, kenips, guavas, sugar apple, soursop, pommes surettes, and a host of others. What is the standard of the mangoes that grow in my yard? The gooseberries that grow in my sister's yard? The bay grapes that grow in the neighbor's yard?


How do I make the sweets, drinks and tarts that we are accustomed to, our guavaberry drink for Christmas?


How can the standards of France or Europe be applied in this case? The very flour that we use and have used for centuries has been imported from the United States which is so much nearer to us than is Europe.


Should we be forced to use foodstuffs from Eurpoe which always cost more than food from the U.S? Should we not be able to legislate what we accept and what we do not accept?