The salad shortage focused attention on the failures of our 24/7 dietary culture. But it also provides a chance to rethink the way we eat fresh fruit, veg and green leaves

I’m afraid the lettuce shortage was just the tip of the iceberg. We may have run low on salad leaves but, more worryingly, we were low on empathy for poor southern Spain where flash floods followed by snow wrecked the crop. Our relentless consumer-rights focus meant that the emphasis was clearly on “weather-related supply challenges”, supermarket speak for “My God, we are running out of salad!” Sustaining a dietary culture of 24/7 access to all fresh fruit and veg in all seasons was never going to be easy.

A packed salad uses at least 10 times more energy than a local lettuce

These shortages highlighted the vulnerabilities of our salad economy. Air freighters and supermarket “presidents of perishables” (actual job description) flew in salad leaves from Mexico to try to plug the deficit. The middlemen supplying the giant retailers strive for 99% availability (that’s how they keep their contracts).There’s huge pressure on them, but what about the pressure on the planet? Bagged salads – diva leaves in non-recyclable plastic packaging – are the worst example. Twice as expensive as whole lettuces, these leaves are notoriously likely to be thrown out as food waste.

This is eco crime enough but cooling, peeling, cutting, washing, drying, weighing, packaging and sealing leaves, along with the need to keep them chilled throughout, means that a packed salad uses at least 10 times more energy than a local lettuce. The British Food Journal said that “increasing energy costs may lead the price of the commodity out of the market” in the near future. Prepare now, switch to slow salad. That means field-grown varieties from a local source (the British growing season runs from May to October). Out of season? That’s what the currently trendy cauliflower is for. Put an end to these crazy salad days.

The big picture: Terray Sylvester at Standing Rock

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Dogged protest: a volunteer at the Standing Rock protest. Photograph: Terray Sylvester/Reuters

While President Trump claimed he hadn’t had one concerned call over the Dakota Access pipeline at Standing Rock, the rest of the world looked at evidence of one of the world’s most sustained ecological battles. Much of that evidence comes in the form of elegiac photographs of the frozen protest from Oregon photographer Terray Sylvester, who seems to have more or less relocated to Standing Rock.

Well dressed: faux fur

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Soft, warm and cruelty-free: Helen Moore faux fur.

The rise of good faux fur seems unstoppable, a fact that has evidently unsettled the International Fur Federation (speaking on behalf of the real fur industry). The organisation is behind a report warning that some fake fur contains animal fur and so people who think they’re wearing the synthetic version may not be. The answer is to go for the most reputable label and aim high. Helen Moore is the UK’s first lady of the highest quality fake fur (from impeccable sources), producing ranges for fashion and interiors from her north Devon workshop and sewing room (where staff are paid a living wage) since 1982. Fake fur is all about the quality of the colour – and Moore does it so well, supplying her clothes in brown, black and grey and introducing dusky rose pink and pistachio into her ranges, too.

Email Lucy at lucy.siegle@observer.co.uk or follow her on Twitter @lucysiegle