Category Archives: Farming
Cartoon by Ralph Underhill (and an odd NFU story)
I don’t have a great deal of admiration for the NFU’s grip on science and so when I was sent a link to them advertising a job (but please read to the end of this post) for a scientific adviser and spokesperson I was quite sceptical – you might even say, cynical. When I read …
The price of food
We come back to the price of food every now and again in this blog. It’s not a subject I know that much about but I’m happy to go along with the general consensus that we have cheap food and that food has become cheaper over the last 40 years or so. I read in …
Guest blog – The flight of the neonicotinoids by Matt Shardlow
Matt Shardlow is the Chief Executive of the Invertebrate Conservation Trust Buglife. Buglife is the only organisation in Europe committed to saving all invertebrates; the charity has twenty four members of staff and a growing portfolio of conservation projects. The charity’s priorities include the sustainable management of brownfield sites; saving endangered Biodiversity Action Plan Priority …
More on the EU budget
Institute for European Environmental Policy. NFU. Martin Harper’s blog. CAPreform.eu Defra website – nothing at all. I am always shocked by the fact that our government doesn’t think it has any obligation to feed back on the results of major EU decisions – like settling the budget for the next five years. It’s hardly surprising …
Last week’s news
It’s quite difficult to get past the headlines to understand the details of the EU budget agreement. Yes the budget has been capped thanks to some good negotiation by plucky David Cameron but what does that mean – particularly for the environment? I bought the FT, Independent and Guardian on Saturday and found them no …
Bankrupt policies from Defra
Last week George (Gideon) Osborne had to do something different because it was clear that his economic policies weren’t working (he did the wrong thing, but he did have to do something) whereas there is no sign that Defra is going to do anything different even though their policies aren’t working either. The differences between …
Ralph Underhill cartoon
Buglife’s Matt Shardlow gave evidence to the Environmental Audit Committee on Wednesday and said: “The economic case for neonicotinoids is marginal at best the environmental cost is a price too high to pay. The use of these indiscriminate pesticides must be suspended before it is too late to halt the alarming decline in …
Not so blithe now
I entered three poems for the Rialto/RSPB poetry competition but, not surprisingly, none of them won a prize. I’ve always liked Shelley, red Shelley, for his lyricism but also for being a campaigner and an angry one at that. If he were back with us he might (or might not) write this: Not so …
Benefits
‘Tory MPs press Osborne on benefits‘ was a headline on the FT website on Tuesday evening, referring to the wish of some Conservative MPs to cut benefits in order to reduce government spending. Apparently the linking of benefits to inflation could be changed to a link to earningsbut only over the Liberal Democrats’ bodies – …