Current Affairs Environmental Stuff

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sbbefc said:
Farmers annoy me from time to time. They expect subsidies and always complain.

Many of them, certainly some that I know, voted for brexit and vote tory. Yet moan when anything verging on a free market economy has an impact on them.

I understand they grow and rear the food we eat, but most UK farming could end over night and we'd still be ok. We're completely reliant on imports anyway. I rarely eat beef or lamb.
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Come from a farming family. The rich farmers and big land owners are a law unto themselves and hate being told what to do. Tend to find they are the least concerned with any environmental initiatives as well unless it means a tonne of cash coming their way.
 
Also, I work in housing and have worked in planning. The past 3 years has been incredibly difficult to gain planning permission in areas of Wales due to phosphates. The construction industry has been hammered by it. If there's damage being done it's fair enough and steps are being taken to rectify the issue. Yet the majority of phosphates in our water courses comes from farming practises. The Welsh Government daren't go after them.
 
JimmyJeffers said:
Come from a farming family. The rich farmers and big land owners are a law unto themselves and hate being told what to do. Tend to find they are the least concerned with any environmental initiatives as well unless it means a tonne of cash coming their way.
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Same here and I grew up in a small market town. I don't mean to tar every farmer with the same brush, but you're right it's mainly the big land owners.
 
I absolutely loathe the NFU, have been through so many case studies where they are the only local stakeholder preventing community led environmental action unless they essentially get a pay off. That being said, in the same case studies there are often fantastic individual farmers who offer incredibly innovative solutions, and much of their time.

The open eye gallery currently has a climate lab exhibition on in town, entry is free and its based upon the regenerative farming by the gaia foundation and many others. Its right by James Street, pop in if you have chance.
 
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sbbefc said:
Farmers annoy me from time to time. They expect subsidies and always complain.

Many of them, certainly some that I know, voted for brexit and vote tory. Yet moan when anything verging on a free market economy has an impact on them.

I understand they grow and rear the food we eat, but most UK farming could end over night and we'd still be ok. We're completely reliant on imports anyway. I rarely eat beef or lamb.
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Generally speaking (although I think it was a meeting rather than a protest having now spoken with an attendee), most of the farmers there would have been for the tighter protest laws and think welfare's for scroungers. Irony.

Most 'successful' farmers now have sucked at the teat of redistributed state finances for a long time now, and what's more, used them to expand by buying up the smaller family farms surrounding them and made money by being able to operate at scale on tighter margins thanks to cheap energy, making plenty of money for the agricultural sector, supermarkets and middle-men in the process. Very few of these aren't cockwombles of the first order. I have absolutely no sympathy for these guys, especially as gaping cracks appear in their business models as cheap labour and energy become more scarce. Yanno, the one where 'I've two-thousand acres of raspberry monoculture to pick - how can I do that profitably on my own?' gets rolled in front of the BBC cameras. I do have time for the small farmers that are hanging in there though, and I don't think it's in our interest to have our food production consolidated in a few massive Corporate holdings, pretty much writing legislation themselves.

Imo the problem's systemic, and we don't pay enough for our food (suits property market, consumer good producing industrialists and service sector), and a lot of what we do pay to supermarkets doesn't reach the farmers as their business model tends to be very low margins on corporate processed, high on the basics and maybe in-house processed.


It appears there were political canvassers from both left and right there last night. Whilst there were a couple of particularly poo arguments : that if Wales reduces output by 10pc(tree cover), then Brazil will gladly chop that down and send the food over and we've just exported the problem; or the classic -why can townies cut there hedge at any time and we're restricted?. There are also ones that may be sound - eg. that the new regulations fail to address the large variations in geography, or terroir, of Wales, giving four years to establish a hedge, even for hill farms iirc.

Tell them to 'koff and keep their filthy townie money for their local pub landlord or in case someone out there needs a yacht. Trouble is, most of the small farms that have been hanging on may well end up in some corporate portfolio. Lose-Lose.

Should nearly all be small farms selling locally. People should value food more.
 
Walken said:
I absolutely loathe the NFU, have been through so many case studies where they are the only local stakeholder preventing community led environmental action unless they essentially get a pay off. That being said, in the same case studies there are often fantastic individual farmers who offer incredibly innovative solutions, and much of their time.

The open eye gallery currently has a climate lab exhibition on in town, entry is free and its based upon the regenerative farming by the gaia foundation and many others. Its right by James Street, pop in if you have chance.
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No. Farmers suck.
 
orchard said:
Generally speaking (although I think it was a meeting rather than a protest having now spoken with an attendee), most of the farmers there would have been for the tighter protest laws and think welfare's for scroungers. Irony.

Most 'successful' farmers now have sucked at the teat of redistributed state finances for a long time now, and what's more, used them to expand by buying up the smaller family farms surrounding them and made money by being able to operate at scale on tighter margins thanks to cheap energy, making plenty of money for the agricultural sector, supermarkets and middle-men in the process. Very few of these aren't cockwombles of the first order. I have absolutely no sympathy for these guys, especially as gaping cracks appear in their business models as cheap labour and energy become more scarce. Yanno, the one where 'I've two-thousand acres of raspberry monoculture to pick - how can I do that profitably on my own?' gets rolled in front of the BBC cameras. I do have time for the small farmers that are hanging in there though, and I don't think it's in our interest to have our food production consolidated in a few massive Corporate holdings, pretty much writing legislation themselves.

Imo the problem's systemic, and we don't pay enough for our food (suits property market, consumer good producing industrialists and service sector), and a lot of what we do pay to supermarkets doesn't reach the farmers as their business model tends to be very low margins on corporate processed, high on the basics and maybe in-house processed.


It appears there were political canvassers from both left and right there last night. Whilst there were a couple of particularly poo arguments : that if Wales reduces output by 10pc(tree cover), then Brazil will gladly chop that down and send the food over and we've just exported the problem; or the classic -why can townies cut there hedge at any time and we're restricted?. There are also ones that may be sound - eg. that the new regulations fail to address the large variations in geography, or terroir, of Wales, giving four years to establish a hedge, even for hill farms iirc.

Tell them to 'koff and keep their filthy townie money for their local pub landlord or in case someone out there needs a yacht. Trouble is, most of the small farms that have been hanging on may well end up in some corporate portfolio. Lose-Lose.

Should nearly all be small farms selling locally. People should value food more.
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the brexit dust bowl.
 
Rita_Poon said:
the brexit dust bowl.
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I'm sure some of the thinking was along the lines of reducing restrictions on food imports to enable the suppression of wages to have competitive labour with the likes of India (The Moggster). Most of the crap that's being produced here are for commodity markets (with little to no qualitative consideration). If/when there are multiple crop failures from climate weirding that's going to the highest bidder/those that can afford it, not necessarily here. Yanno, like the potato famine, but closer to home.
 
orchard said:
I'm sure some of the thinking was along the lines of reducing restrictions on food imports to enable the suppression of wages to have competitive labour with the likes of India (The Moggster). Most of the crap that's being produced here are for commodity markets (with little to no qualitative consideration). If/when there are multiple crop failures from climate weirding that's going to the highest bidder/those that can afford it, not necessarily here. Yanno, like the potato famine, but closer to home.
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Your comment spurred me on to see a parallel between the farmers in the great plains of the 30's and the self inflicted (brexit and environmental poisoning) dust bowl of the modern day. Someone should coin 'brexit dust bowl' if it's hasn't been already. A solid drought through europe and an escalation on the Ukraine front pressuring fuel more could see the system snap. Imagine the covid hoarding but for actual real reasons instead of selfish stupidity.
 
Rita_Poon said:
Your comment spurred me on to see a parallel between the farmers in the great plains of the 30's and the self inflicted (brexit and environmental poisoning) dust bowl of the modern day. Someone should coin 'brexit dust bowl' if it's hasn't been already. A solid drought through europe and an escalation on the Ukraine front pressuring fuel more could see the system snap. Imagine the covid hoarding but for actual real reasons instead of selfish stupidity.
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Want to add no/little snow pack in the US/Canadian breadbasket regions this year to the mix ? Canadian drought-watch is fairly colourful already. Oh, and maybe add the Alps and Himalaya. :(
 
orchard said:
You didn't mention the 'Hot Poets' last night, did you?
If the LWA are in, it's generally fine by me.
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The hot poets are involved with the exhibition, saw some stuff from them but I actually don't know to what extent. Was chatting to a couple of the girls from 'we feed the UK' who are responsible for the actual set up of it and they were pretty delighted, and seemed really thrilled to be meeting various folk who got involved.

Its easy and compleetly understandable to get bogged down in the bad news surrounding climate change, this has a really positive vibe and concentrates on telling positive stories. I was lucky enough to make a few contacts as well.
 
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