Every day we buy fruits and vegetables, and if we really look at the label, we worry about where they come from. But how many of us have ever wondered what the numbers on the fruits and vegetables in the supermarket mean? It is, in fact, the detail known only to the employees.
Pay attention to food labels in supermarkets
You know those stickers we find on the fruits and vegetables we buy every day at the supermarket?
How many of you have ever stopped to understand what is behind the barcode and numbers?
See also: What was found out about melons from Cora, Lidl or Kaufland. Be very careful when you buy them
The code we most often find printed on the labels of the fruit and vegetables we buy at the supermarket is called the PLU code, the acronym for Price Look Up (price search).
These numbers can give us information about how the product was grown.
What do the numbers on the fruits and vegetables in the supermarket mean
If you see 4 digits, this means that the products are grown conventionally, that is, possibly with the addition of chemical additives and pesticides.
In this case, the code only indicates the type of product we are buying. We know that, for example, the code 4011 indicates a banana.
If you see 5 digits, the first of which is 9, in this case the products are organically grown. In this case, the number 9 tells us that we are purchasing an organic product, for the first digit, and the following 4 indicate the type of product. Again, an organic banana will have the code 94011.
See also: The truth about always fresh bananas in supermarkets. What do traders do with them so they don’t spoil
If you see 5 digits, the first of which is 8, it means that the product is genetically modified, so to recognize a GMO (organism modificat genetic), we just have to look at the PLU code. Such a code 84011 will tell us that it is a genetically modified banana.
Do the numbers on the fruit and vegetables in the supermarket help us?
As we reported at the beginning, in many stores or food districts, among the first things that the buyer encounters after entering the store is the display of fresh fruit and vegetable products.
It is often the first stop during shopping. Products can be displayed on counters or positioned in the center of a large area, and on shelves along a wall.
For the purpose, vegetables and fruits should immediately signal the freshness and quality of the food in the store.
See also: Thirst quenching fruits and vegetables. They keep you safe in the summer when the temperatures rise
In addition, careful play with the colors of vegetables and fruits can make their display more aesthetically pleasing to the eye.
Whatever technique is used to present fresh produce, the goal is to make it invite the shopper to approach and begin selecting items from the display case.
Supermarkets have built platform blocks of green crates where produce is brought in from farmers and the bins contain the vegetables or fruit on sale, ready for shoppers to pick and put into baskets.
And the numbers we were talking about before help us find out if these products are fresh, how they were grown and whether or not they are genetically modified.
The answer to this question is yes, these numbers help us find out as much relevant information as possible about what we buy.
