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"The key is to make the most of the crop, which all supermarkets are doing," she tells The Salt in an email. "This could be using the best of the crop for bagged or loose produce, but [also] looking for alternative uses for those that don't make the grade — i.e. pre-prepared produce (a growing trend), ready meals and soups."

So what's driving the interest? The European Union relaxed strict rules governing the sale of imperfect fruit in 2009. But Tristram Stuart, a food waste activist with the group Feeding the 5000, says growing consumer awareness was also crucial.

"Supermarkets will cater to what public demand requires," he says. And, he notes, "there are not a lot of environmental measures out there that are going to save you money, but stopping wasting food is one of them."

And consumers will scoop up these tasty uglies when they know the story behind their unfortunate looks, says Waitrose spokesperson Jess Hughes.

"We always find these products are popular with customers — they always sell well," Hughes tells The Salt via email.

For now, there appear to be limits to just how much imperfection retailers will take.

"The experience of retailers in the U.K. is that customers naturally select, they always pick the cream of the crop," Ejaz says.

And even Intermarche has said its promotion of inglorious produce can only be occasional, as problems with suppliers occur.

Nonetheless, the fever is also making the leap across the pond: In Canada, Safeway is experimenting with "misfit produce" displays. And your local U.S. farmers market might just have "seconds" of peaches, tomatoes or apples for sale. Stay tuned: Plenty of activists stateside are hoping to bring ugly fruit to a supermarket or CSA near you soon.

food waste

Europe

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled unanimously that companies do not have to pay workers for time spent in anti-theft security screening at the end of a shift.

The decision is a major victory for retail enterprises and manufacturing businesses that could have been on the hook for billions of dollars in back pay for time spent in security screenings.

The Court's ruling came Tuesday in a case involving Amazon warehouses and a temp agency, Integrity Staffing Solutions Inc., which screened workers for warehouses in Nevada. The workers were paid hourly wages to fill customer orders and package them to ship. But, after they clocked out at the shift change, they were required to wait in line for an average of 25 minutes, as some 1,000 workers were processed through just two machines.

They sued the temp agency in charge of the screening, seeking pay for the time in line. But the Supreme Court ruled that under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act, a company is required to compensate workers only for duties that are "tied to the productive work" that employees are hired to perform. Writing for the Court, Justice Clarence Thomas said that it matters not that an employer requires an activity; the activity must be "indispensable," and "tied to the productive work" that the employee is hired to do.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Justice Elena Kagan, concurred in the decision, noting that while the screenings may have been related to the warehouse work, the employer could "skip them altogether" without the safety or effectiveness of the workers' principal duties being substantially impaired. Therefore, the screenings were not "integral" or indispensable" to work duties or worker job safety.

Cho Hyun-ah, whose family runs Korean Air, caused a stir over the weekend after she demanded that a Korea-bound jetliner return to a gate at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport, where it had been preparing to take off.

The reason? Seated in first class, Cho was angered that a junior steward served her macadamia nuts — in a bag instead of on a plate, and without asking first. When a senior steward struggled to cite the proper regulations, Cho had him kicked off the flight, forcing the plane holding some 250 passengers to return to the gate before they could depart for Incheon, South Korea.

Cho is the daughter of Korean Air Chairman and CEO Cho Yang-ho. Fallout from the incident has forced Cho, who's also known by the first name Heather, to resign her post as a vice president at the airline, where her duties included cabin service and in-flight sales.

"I will step down to take responsibility over the incident," Cho said Tuesday, according to the Korea Herald. "I also beg the forgiveness of those who may have been hurt by my actions, and offer my apologies to our customers."

But it's unclear whether Cho's resignation is from a single post or from the entire airline. Reuters reports that she "will remain a vice president with the South Korean flag carrier, the airline said late on Tuesday."

The airline did not assuage its critics when it insisted, at first, that the JFK incident was merely a case of maintaining standards.

"News of Cho's outburst spread quickly on social media," Korean newspaper Chosun Ilbo reports, "causing the carrier major embarrassment and confirming every suspicion Koreans entertain about the spoiled brats from big conglomerate families."

Many South Koreans are uneasy with the country's "chaebol" giants, The Financial Times says, referring to international conglomerates that are often operated under a family's centralized authority. The newspaper says relatives "often wield undue influence over management of group companies in spite of their small direct shareholdings."

The case also raised concerns about a possible breach in the airline's safety regulations, which place each plane under the pilot's responsibility. The Chosun Ilbo says a government regulatory agency's early report found that the chief steward reported the problem to the pilot, and that the pilot then orchestrated the return to a gate at JFK.

As aviation buffs will recall, Korean Air served as one of writer Malcolm Gladwell's examples of the dangers of hierarchical traditions in his 2008 book Outliers: The Story of Success.

Airlines

South Korea

Leonel Kaplan, an Argentine jazz musician, often has to travel abroad.

Before a recent trip to Europe, he went to a bank in Buenos Aires to change money and then went to get a haircut. Kaplan felt happy and relaxed and took the bus home after what had been an uneventful trip.

That, however, was about to change.

"As I get down from the bus, a motorcycle with two people wearing helmets cuts me off," he recalls. "One gets off and takes out a gun and says to me directly, 'Give me the 500 euros you got in the bank.'"

They knew exactly how much money he had changed. It was, he says, a pretty professional job.

Distrust Of Banks

In the region, Brazil, Venezuela and Honduras have the lock on murders – they are some of the most violent countries in the world. Argentina is still comparatively safe.

But according to an annual United Nations report on crime in Latin America, Argentina's robbery rate is 41 percent higher than even Mexico's, which comes in second.

To understand this unexpected and very specific surge in crime, you have to look at the country's recent economic history.

“ I would never put my money in a bank. Because I know it could disappear. A bank is no more secure than underneath my mattress.

- Leonel Kaplan, Argentine jazz musician

Robberies in Argentina started soaring after the 2001 default — when the country, in effect, declared bankruptcy. And that would seem to be logical: financial crisis equals more poverty and more thefts.

But that's not the whole picture. A number of analysts provide another explanation and it has to do with what Leonel Kaplan told me at the end of our interview.

He says he doesn't have a bank account.

"I would never put my money in a bank. Because I know it could disappear," he says. "A bank is no more secure than underneath my mattress."

People in Argentina don't trust the banks. That means they carry around cash — a lot of it — to pay for what they need, says Alan Ciblis, the chair of the political economy department of the National University of General Sarmiento.

"You can keep it in a safety box that they have in the vaults – that's probably the safest place," he says. "People have it under the mattress."

Ciblis says most people keep their savings these days in cash in a variety of places because of recent experience.

After the 2001 default, banks were locked down and accounts raided, which wiped out the savings of ordinary Argentines. Many people lost a lifetime of accumulated funds.

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Argentina's Default: 5 Headlines That Tell The Story

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The Inflation Factor

There's another reason Argentines don't want to put their money in banks – inflation.

"When inflation begins to creep up and you have some extra pesos and you put it in a certificate of deposit in a bank, but the interest rate is below the inflation rate, then you have negative rates and you're losing money," Ciblis explains.

Let's say inflation is at 40 percent a year in Argentina. The government doesn't provide reliable figures, but that's what most economists estimate is the current annual rate.

The bank, meanwhile, may only be giving you 20 percent interest. That means your money is losing its value.

As a result, most people would rather risk the possibility that a thief get into the house and steal the money hidden in the drawer, than face the near certainty that they will lose money in the banking system these days.

"In my opinion, the lack of trust in the banking system which is part of the Argentine culture now is an influence," says Alberto Binder, who studies crime. "But there are other issues – drug crime is growing."

"Argentina is basically a tranquil country, but that conceit is being used as a kind of opium," he says. "I think if you are a calm country surrounded by troubled ones, that should put you on maximum alert."

Crime in Latin America

Latin America

Argentina