Word: supermarket
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...plastic, which is difficult to burn or recycle and, because it is not biodegradable, will clog landfills for centuries. Early efforts to produce plastics that decay were less than successful: some disintegrated under sunlight, unavailable at the bottom of landfills. Others came apart after contact with water, causing supermarket executives to shudder at the thought of what would happen to the groceries in a plastic shopping bag containing a leaky milk bottle. But now there is a method of adding cornstarch to some plastics. Bacteria eat the starch, causing the plastic to fall apart into pieces that can be ingested...
...though inflation in the rest of the economy remains at tolerable levels. The Government said last week that during July the Consumer Price Index rose 0.4%, an annual rate of 5.2%. But the subindex for food and beverages jumped 0.9%, raising the possibility of double-digit inflation at the supermarket. Among the hardest hit in July: fruits and vegetables (4.7%), poultry (7.4%) and eggs (9.6%). Prices for many meat and dairy products are rising because the cost of animal feed has gone...
...those luscious-looking strawberries lining the shelves at the local supermarket carry a dangerous amount of residue from pesticides? Consumers have long wondered, but had no guarantees of purity unless they shopped at an organic-foods store. Now the $313 billion supermarket industry is starting to seize on pristine produce as a major selling point and competitive issue. In California "certified clean" has become a battle cry among rival grocery chains. The pesticide fears have been fanned this summer by Cesar Chavez, the United Farm Workers of America president, who last week concluded a 36-day hunger strike protesting...
...standard of "certified clean," a tiny California- based company called NutriClean has sent grocers scrambling to get an independent stamp of approval for their produce. Founded four years ago by Chemist Stanley Rhodes, the twelve-employee firm serves growers and grocers alike, sampling produce in the field and on supermarket loading docks. The NutriClean tests check for several pesticides that are not routinely screened by the Food and Drug Administration. Says Frank McMinn, vice president of advertising for Raley's, a 53-store Sacramento-based supermarket chain that was one of the first to tout its NutriClean testing...
...furor has put chemical companies on the defensive as well. The Chavez hunger strike, accompanied by a boycott of California grapes and several supermarket chains, was partly inspired by an incident last year in which 75 farmworkers harvesting grapes sprayed with the insecticide Zolone came down with flulike symptoms. Under pressure from state agriculture officials, the chemical's manufacturer, Rhone-Poulenc, stopped selling the substance to grape growers. This year Rhone-Poulenc is carrying out a controversial test in which it paid 25 college students as much as $1,500 for one week to harvest a central California vineyard that...