Farming & Agriculture news

• How do we feed the world without destroying it? | Bob Geldof

  16-10-2019 08:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  An international summit next year will tackle the world’s most enduring crisis – hunger. Radical action is neededHunger is the most awful and profound expression of poverty. It exists in every country. It is something that most people can identify with on some perhaps primordial level. It is innate. The fear of hunger is etched into our DNA, passed down the generations from hungry, scared ancestors. It is in our bones. It is in my Irish bones.First, the good news. For several decades
  
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• Mussolini as farmer – archive, 15 October, 1928

  15-10-2019 06:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  15 October, 1928: Encouraging Italy to be self-supporting, the Duce acknowledges farmers who have increased grain outputRome, Sunday
  In the Argentina Theatre at Rome this morning the Duce distributed prizes ranging from £20 to £200 to Italian farmers who had increased the grain output within the past year. Among the names of the £20 prize-winners was that of Benito Mussolini himself, who had tripled the output on his small experimental farm holding in his native village of Carp
  
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• Trump's mounting troubles in Iowa could spell doom for Republicans | Art Cullen

  13-10-2019 12:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Iowa Senator Joni Ernst is facing tough questions on impeachment and trade that have implications far beyond the mid-westPresident Trump may have already lost Iowa and the rest of the midwest, but now he risks throwing the Senate into play.Until last week, Senator Joni Ernst, a Republican from Iowa, was pretty safe, with high approval ratings and an ability to lie low in her re-election bid. Now, she is facing tough questions back home about trade and impeachment that are making her squirm. Rela
  
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• If the shoo fits: cows painted with zebra stripes keep flies in line

  11-10-2019 02:29 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Insect bites can be significantly cut using a cunning disguise, researchers findPainting a cow to look something like a zebra has been found to reduce fly bites by 50%.Researchers believe painting stripes on to cattle is a world-first and could become an environmentally friendly alternative to pesticides. Related: Farmers jailed in Australia for smuggling Danish pig semen in shampoo bottlesRelated: Why the zebra got its stripes: to deter flies from landing on itContinue reading...
  
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• What we can do to halt Britain’s wildlife decline | Letters

  07-10-2019 18:57 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Gareth Morgan says farmers hold the keys to unlocking nature’s recovery, Prof Julian Wiseman highlights research on the impact of domestic and feral cats, David Mills thinks the problems are caused by loss of habitat, while Penny Snook raises the impact of chemicals on frogsThe State of Nature report (Revealed: the shocking decline of UK wildlife, 4 October) confirms what we already knew – we are losing the battle to save nature. Fundamentally, despite some successes for rare species
  
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• Populations of UK’s most important wildlife have plummeted since 1970

  03-10-2019 20:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Quarter of mammals and nearly half of birds assessed are at risk of extinction, says State of Nature reportPopulations of the UK’s most important wildlife have plummeted by an average of 60% since 1970, according to the most comprehensive analysis to date.The State of Nature report also found that the area inhabited by officially designated “priority species” has shrunk by 27%. The species are those deemed most important and threatened, and include hedgehogs, hares and bats, ma
  
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• Climate-sceptic academic seeks $1.5m in donations to fight unlawful dismissal appeal

  23-09-2019 04:17 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Peter Ridd’s former employer James Cook University appealing after a court ruled the professor’s sacking was unlawfulThe climate-sceptic academic Peter Ridd has asked supporters to donate another $1.5m to fund ongoing legal costs after his former employer, James Cook University, lodged an appeal against an unlawful dismissal ruling.This month the federal court awarded Ridd $1.2m in compensation. The court has made clear its finding related to Ridd’s employment rights and not hi
  
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• Creamy, untreated and in a glass bottle: Britain’s taste for old-fashioned milk

  21-09-2019 16:43 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Dairy farmers cash in on a growing trend to replace both homogenisation and plastic with a revival of the traditional ways“When the milk price crashed five years ago, we were in a bad way,” says Bryce Cunningham, a third-generation farmer running Mossgiel farm in Ayrshire. “Fifty, sixty years ago, you could make a living on a dairy farm; now you’re expected to just survive. So I thought, ‘If we did it the way they did it before, could we survive?’”The fa
  
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• Creamy, untreated and in a glass bottle: Britain gets a taste for old-fashioned milk

  21-09-2019 13:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Dairy farmers cash in on a growing trend to replace both homogenisation and plastic with a revival of the traditional ways“When the milk price crashed five years ago, we were in a bad way,” says Bryce Cunningham, a third-generation farmer running Mossgiel farm in Ayrshire. “Fifty, sixty years ago, you could make a living on a dairy farm; now you’re expected to just survive. So I thought, ‘If we did it the way they did it before, could we survive?’”The fa
  
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• We can all do our bit to tackle the climate crisis | Letters

  19-09-2019 20:02 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Readers offer their views on how governments and citizens can help to reduce humans’ environmental impactGreta Thunberg, the young Swedish climate activist, has tapped into a global passion for change from the outdated, exploitative system to a holistic and responsible one (Thunberg tells US Congress: ‘I want you to take real action on climate’, 19 September). The industrial paradigm separates materials from their histories. Forests may have been torn down, lakes polluted, peop
  
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• Reef protection laws pass despite industry attacks on their scientific basis

  19-09-2019 09:02 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Queensland’s government will limit the agricultural pollution harming the Great Barrier ReefThe Queensland government has passed new regulations to limit agricultural pollution damaging the Great Barrier Reef in the face of a hostile campaign that has sought to discredit consensus science.On Tuesday the state made relatively minor commitments to agricultural groups, including an undertaking not to vary new limits for farm sediment and chemical runoff into reef catchments for at least five
  
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• Farmers attacked on danger chemicals – archive, 19 September 1979

  19-09-2019 06:30 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  19 September 1979: A Royal Commission report warns of the ‘unnecessarily extravagant use of pesticides’Farmers and Whitehall officials are too complacent over the effects of pesticides, according to a report published yesterday by the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution.The unnecessarily extravagant use of pesticides, is deliberately encouraged, says the report. Many farmers considered themselves to occupy a privileged position, assuming that what was good for agriculture was
  
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• Toni Slabas obituary

  13-09-2019 18:40 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  My friend Toni Slabas, who has died aged 70, was an internationally renowned plant biochemist. He came from humble beginnings and quietly made a positive impact on the lives of many others.At Durham University, where he was professor of plant sciences from 1990 to 2013, Toni established a world-leading group in plant biochemistry with a particular interest in seed oil production and cell wall biochemistry. He set up a spin-out company, Creative Gene Technology, developing new technologies to imp
  
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• Celebrate With Us at The StowAg Show

  11-09-2019 15:59 via Farming Monthly National
  The StowAg Show will mark 50 years of proudly being “the experts in your field” and you are warmly invited to attend. The show, which will be their biggest event yet, will be a day of celebration held at the StowAg headquarters in Longborough in the heart of the Cotswolds.
  Featuring many of StowAg’s leading suppliers and manufacturers, the day will provide veterinary talks, product and live-animal demonstrations in addition to showcasing new product lines – with some excl
  
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• Tasmanian farmer jailed for 11 months for importing garlic

  10-09-2019 11:15 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Letetia Anne Ware imported garlic bulbs that were potential carriers of devastating plant pathogenA Tasmanian farmer has been given an 11-month jail sentence for illegally importing garlic bulbs that could have put Australia’s agricultural sector at risk.The farmer and former chair of the Australian Garlic Industry Association Letetia Anne Ware, 53, imported almost 2,200 garlic bulbs from the US and Canada. Related: Insect treats create buzz as experts ponder future of food and farmingCont
  
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• Tasmanian farmer jailed for 11 months for illegally importing garlic

  10-09-2019 11:15 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Letetia Anne Ware imported garlic bulbs that were potential carriers of devastating plant pathogenA Tasmanian farmer has been given an 11-month jail sentence for illegally importing garlic bulbs that could have put Australia’s agricultural sector at risk.The farmer and former chair of the Australian Garlic Industry Association Letetia Anne Ware, 53, imported almost 2,200 garlic bulbs from the US and Canada. Related: Insect treats create buzz as experts ponder future of food and farmingCont
  
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• Philippines culls 7,000 pigs in outbreak of African swine fever

  09-09-2019 09:21 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Infected pigs found in two towns near capital Manila, as country becomes latest to be hit by diseaseThe Philippines has reported its first cases of African swine fever, becoming the latest country hit by the disease that has killed pigs from Slovakia to China, pushing up pork prices worldwide.The virus is not harmful to humans but causes haemorrhagic fever in pigs that almost always ends in death. There is no antidote or vaccine and the only known method to prevent the disease from spreading is
  
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• 'It can kill you in seconds': the deadly algae on Brittany's beaches

  08-09-2019 15:24 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Activists say stinking sludge is linked to nitrates in fertilisers from intensive farmingAndré Ollivro stepped carefully down the grassy banks of an estuary in the bay of Saint-Brieuc, Brittany, not far from his beachfront cabin. The pungent smell of rotting eggs wafting from decomposing seaweed made him stop and put on his gas mask. It was a strange sight in what is usually a tourist hotspot.“You can’t be too careful,” said the 74-year-old former gas technician, who is
  
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• Brexit deadline piles pressure on UK farmers to export surplus

  07-09-2019 09:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  No deal would drastically curtail access to EU while entry to Africa would come at priceFarmers across the UK are scrambling to finish their harvests and ship their surpluses abroad before the Brexit deadline of 31 October, when a no-deal departure would force them to abandon European markets in favour of Africa.There has been a relatively good harvest of wheat and barley this year after the rollercoaster weather of 2018, when a freezing spring followed by a record-breaking heatwave wrought havo
  
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• The secret to winning the Midwest: Democrats must fight big agriculture | George Goehl

  04-09-2019 12:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Factory farming sucks up money and pollutes rural communities in swing states like Iowa
  Not since the Rev Jesse Jackson’s candidacy for the Democratic nomination in 1988 have we seen presidential hopefuls so fiercely and consistently bring the issues facing family farmers into the national conversation. This year, five candidates for the Democratic nomination say they support a ban on factory farms. Related: Epic floods and trade wars – the US farmers battered by politics and climate
  
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• Benefits to farmers of global heating outweighed by losses, says report

  04-09-2019 07:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Value of European agriculture could fall 16% in 30 years due to drought and higher rainfallAny advantages to European agriculture from a warming world will be outweighed by the losses from extreme events and environmental stress, leading to a probable large economic loss for farming in the next 30 years, research on the impacts of the climate crisis has found.While some have pointed to longer growing seasons and a wider range of crops becoming viable in northern Europe as benefits from temperatu
  
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• Scientists isolate drought-resistant gene in barley

  02-09-2019 01:01 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Research led by Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, will help crops resist global heatingThe discovery of a gene in barley responsible for drought resistance will help future-proof crops against some of the effects of climate change, scientists believe.Researchers spent nearly five years isolating the specific gene – HvMYB1 – from more than 39,000 genes in barley. Tests proved that plants in which the gene is more prominently expressed are better able to survive drought. Continue read
  
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• AgForce backs calls for review of consensus science on Great Barrier Reef

  01-09-2019 20:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Exclusive: top Queensland farmers’ group supports controversial scientist Peter Ridd’s questioning of climate science
  Queensland’s most influential farm lobby group, AgForce, has backed calls for a review of consensus science on the Great Barrier Reef, as the state’s agricultural sector intensifies its campaign against proposed water quality regulations.On Friday the release of two key reports painted an alarming picture of the state of the reef. The Queensland-led water
  
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• Extreme weather to blame as France’s wine output set to fall by 12%

  30-08-2019 18:25 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Spring frosts and summer heatwaves have taken a toll on French vineyardsFrance’s wine output is expected to fall 12% this year, after spring frosts followed by summer heatwaves took a heavy toll on vineyards across the country.Overall production is estimated to reach 43.4m hectolitres (1.15bn gallons), down from 49.4m hectolitres last year, the country’s agriculture ministry said on Friday. Related: The French must drink less wine, say health officialsContinue reading...
  
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• 'Shooting the messenger': water experts say NSW minister wrong to question drought findings

  28-08-2019 03:51 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Correspondence shows NSW Natural Resources Commission anger at being criticised by water minister Melinda Pavey over Barwon-Darling findingsThe New South Wales Natural Resources Commission has warned the water minister she is “shooting the messenger” over their findings that water management in the Barwon-Darling river had brought on drought conditions in the Lower Darling three years early.The Sydney Morning Herald has obtained correspondence from the commission in which it strongly
  
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• Gina Rinehart and the not very good adventures of the dead sawfish | First Dog on the Moon

  19-08-2019 09:51 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  It is unlikely there will be an investigation or if there is it will be inconclusive. And nobody will be surprisedSign up here to get an email whenever First Dog cartoons are publishedGet all your needs met at the First Dog shop if what you need is First Dog merchandise and prints Continue reading...
  
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• Enjoy your walk in the country, but please don’t abuse farmers’ hospitality | Ben Eagle

  16-08-2019 11:37 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Visitors who ignore the Countryside Code put our livelihoods at risk. It’s time to educate the public about caring for the landDuring the summer holidays, you may be heading into the British countryside for a leisurely walk. However, the idea of the rural idyll is not what you may think. Country paths are often strewn with dog poo left by irresponsible owners, litter blown into ditches or piles of flytipped rubbish. Most people who access the countryside respect it and want to look after i
  
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• Brexiteers promised a new dawn for UK farming, not agricultural Armageddon | Polly Toynbee

  15-08-2019 13:33 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  A new report sounds the death knell for Britain’s farms in the event of no deal. It’s not the vision our farmers were soldA small flock of sheep is trotting down Whitehall today to join a meeting of farmers who are coming together to mark the launch of a devastating report on the impact of a no-deal Brexit. The report rings the death knell for upland hill farming, but sheep are only the first in the line of fire: it also warns that half of Britain’s farms would go out of busine
  
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• State government-funded managers urge cane farmers to question reef science

  14-08-2019 20:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Exclusive: Speaking tour by controversial academic Peter Ridd is being supported by sugarcane managers paid for with Queensland government fundsSugarcane industry managers funded by grants from the Queensland government to help cane growers reduce pollution flowing onto the Great Barrier Reef are promoting lectures by a controversial scientist who argues farm runoff is no threat to the reef.Peter Ridd began a speaking tour of regional Queensland on Monday amid fierce opposition to proposed state
  
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• Managers funded by Queensland government grant urge cane farmers to question reef science

  14-08-2019 20:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Exclusive: speaking tour by controversial academic Peter Ridd is being supported by sugarcane managers paid for with state government fundsSugarcane industry managers funded by grants from the Queensland government to help cane growers reduce pollution flowing onto the Great Barrier Reef are promoting lectures by a controversial scientist who argues farm runoff is no threat to the reef.Peter Ridd began a speaking tour of regional Queensland on Monday amid fierce opposition to proposed state regu
  
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• Farmers jailed in Australia for smuggling Danish pig semen in shampoo bottles

  14-08-2019 04:22 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Two men from GD Pork pleaded guilty in WA to breaching biosecurity laws to gain ‘unfair’ breeding advantage
  Two pig farmers in Western Australia will be jailed after being convicted of illegally importing Danish pig semen concealed in shampoo bottles.Torben Soerensen has been sentenced to three years in prison, while Henning Laue faces a two-year sentence after pleading guilty to breaching quarantine and biosecurity laws. Related: Sawfish deaths on Gina Rinehart station kept quiet by
  
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• Meat, dairy and nurturing the soil | Letters

  13-08-2019 19:30 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Dr Phillip Williamson, Yvonne Ingham and J Peter Greaves respond to Guardian coverage of the IPCC special report on climate change and landGeorge Monbiot is grossly unfair to describe as “pathetic” the new IPCC special report on climate change and land (Here’s the true cost of eating meat. It’s worse than you think, 9 August). There was no fear of the farming industry, nor any other pressure to suppress the science. Furthermore, the “not mentioned” Nature pape
  
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• Widely used pesticide in US particularly harmful to bees, study finds

  06-08-2019 20:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Agriculture has become 48 times more toxic to insects in last 25 years as neonics are used on over 140 different types of crops
  Agriculture in the United States has become 48 times more toxic to insects over the last 25 years, largely due to a controversial, widely used class of pesticides that are particularly harmful to bees, according to a study published on Tuesday.Neonicotinoid pesticides, also known as neonics, are used on more than 140 different types of crops, from apples to rice. Neonic
  
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• Pesticide widely used in US particularly harmful to bees, study finds

  06-08-2019 20:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Agriculture has become 48 times more toxic to insects in last 25 years as neonics are used on over 140 different types of crops
  Agriculture in the United States has become 48 times more toxic to insects over the last 25 years, largely due to a controversial, widely used class of pesticides that are particularly harmful to bees, according to a study published on Tuesday.Neonicotinoid pesticides, also known as neonics, are used on more than 140 different types of crops, from apples to rice. Neonic
  
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• SA water minister vows to divest from Macquarie after it buys into cotton giant Cubbie

  06-08-2019 01:30 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  David Speirs warned his shares in the station, located in the Murray-Darling Basin food bowl, could ‘cloud over his decision-making’ South Australia’s water minister has vowed to divest his shares in Macquarie Group to avoid a potential conflict of interest, after the company bought a substantial stake in Australia’s largest cotton farm.Macquarie Group announced on Friday its agricultural fund had acquired a 49% interest in Cubbie station, located in the Murray-Darling Ba
  
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• We must change food production to save the world, says leaked report

  04-08-2019 00:30 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Cutting carbon from transport and energy ‘not enough’ IPCC findsAttempts to solve the climate crisis by cutting carbon emissions from only cars, factories and power plants are doomed to failure, scientists will warn this week.A leaked draft of a report on climate change and land use, which is now being debated in Geneva by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), states that it will be impossible to keep global temperatures at safe levels unless there is also a transform
  
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• We must transform food production to save the world, says leaked report

  03-08-2019 17:37 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Cutting carbon from transport and energy ‘not enough’ IPCC findsAttempts to solve the climate crisis by cutting carbon emissions from only cars, factories and power plants are doomed to failure, scientists will warn this week.A leaked draft of a report on climate change and land use, which is now being debated in Geneva by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), states that it will be impossible to keep global temperatures at safe levels unless there is also a transform
  
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• IPCC leaked report: Going vegetarian and controlling land use are key to climate crisis

  03-08-2019 14:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Scientists in Geneva warn that cutting carbon emissions from cars and factories is not enoughAttempts to solve the climate crisis by cutting carbon emissions from only cars, factories and power plants are doomed to failure, scientists will warn this week.A leaked draft of a report on climate change and land use, which is now being debated in Geneva by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), states that it will be impossible to keep global temperatures at safe levels unless there is
  
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• Sugarcane farmers label scientific consensus on reef 'unsubstantiated scaremongering'

  01-08-2019 02:34 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Growers hosting lectures by academic who says Great Barrier Reef is ‘in great order’Queensland sugarcane farmers – among the biggest polluters of the Great Barrier Reef catchment – have labelled the scientific consensus about the natural wonder as “unsubstantiated scaremongering”.Their peak organisation, Canegrowers, says it is attempting to bring “balance” to scientific debate about the reef by hosting and promoting two lectures next month by the
  
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• Live exporter charged with animal cruelty over deadly Awassi shipment

  31-07-2019 09:54 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Emanuel Exports and two former directors charged after more than 2,400 sheep died of heat stress on voyage to Middle East, leading to federal crackdown Live export company Emanuel Exports has been charged with breaching animal welfare laws in a deadly shipment that was filmed by whistleblowers and led to a federal crackdown on the export of live sheep to the Middle East.More than 2,400 sheep died of heat stress on the Awassi Express voyage in August 2017, as temperatures on board soared to the m
  
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• Steve Bell on Boris Johnson's visit to Wales – cartoon

  30-07-2019 19:35 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Continue reading...
  
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• Imperfect science of intensive farming | Letters

  23-07-2019 18:51 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Intensive farming does not represent the best use of our agricultural land, says Sue PritchardThe Crop Protection Association (CPA) criticises the RSA Food, Farming and Countryside Commission report, Our Future in the Land, for its absence of science (Letters, 22 July). As much as they’d like us to believe it, they do not have the monopoly on the scientific arguments.Good science is a rigorous and critical process of inquiry: it is far from perfect, neutral and incontrovertible. It was sci
  
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• Putting pigs in the shade: the radical farming system banking on trees | John Vidal

  13-07-2019 10:01 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  A farm in Portugal is showing how the ancient art of silvopasture – combining livestock with productive trees – may offer some real answers to the climate crisisThe land to the north of the village of Foros de Vale Figueira in southern Portugal has been owned and farmed through the centuries by Romans, Moors, Christians, capitalists, far rightists, even the military. It has been part of a private fiefdom, worked by slaves as well as communists.Now this 100-hectare (247-acre) patch of
  
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• Meat infected by African swine fever found in UK for first time

  11-07-2019 19:02 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Highly contagious virus can live for months in processed meat and would have ‘devastating implications’ if passed to live pigsAfrican swine fever has been picked up in meat seized by port authorities in Northern Ireland, the first time the ASF virus has been detected in the UK.Officials confiscated more than 300kg of illegal meat and dairy products from airport passengers’ luggage in June. Samples tested by the Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute in Belfast confirmed traces of
  
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• It's time we stopped treating soil like dirt – video

  11-07-2019 13:12 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Soil is pretty remarkable stuff. It provides 95% of our food, helps regulate the Earth’s atmosphere and is a bigger carbon sink than all the world's forests combined. In fact, it basically enables all life on this planet to exist. So why do we treat it like dirt? The Guardian journalist Josh Toussaint-Strauss finds out how we are destroying it, but also discovers some of the progress made in the race to protect the Earth’s soils'It's a groundswell': the farmers fighting to save the E
  
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• The Great Yorkshire Show – in pictures

  10-07-2019 08:30 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Guardian photographer Christopher Thomond went to the opening events at the 161st Great Yorkshire Show in Harrogate, a three-day showcase of British farming and the countryside Continue reading...
  
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• Pharma's market: the man cleaning up Africa's meat

  10-07-2019 05:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  In Namibia a country of meat-lovers, vital expertise is needed to stop livestock spreading diseasesWreathed in barbecue smoke, Vetjaera Haakuria gestures at the men butchering meat and cooking it over hot coals behind his back. “What have you learned about the risks of eating this?” he asks his young audience, spotless in their white lab coats. “It might contain drug residues, right? And what about diseases?”It’s nearly noon in Windhoek, Namibia’s capital, and
  
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• America's corn belt farmers face uncertainty after rain … and more rain

  23-06-2019 07:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Cold, rainy weather has meant severe planting delays for farmers from Ohio to Nebraska – and next week’s acreage report takes on heightened importanceIn his 32 years of farming, Steve Fourez says he’s almost never been so late planting corn and soybean crops on the 500 acres he farms in east-central Illinois.Normally by the start of May he’s finished planting corn, and soybeans are seeded soon after. This year, Fourez said, he wrapped up planting on 6 June, as cold, grey
  
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• Ammonia pollution damaging more than 60% of UK land – report

  18-06-2019 15:17 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Study finds most sensitive plant and wildlife habitats are worst affected, yet government has no clear plans to monitor impactAmmonia and nitrogen pollution, mostly from farms, is harming more than 60% of the UK’s land area and hitting the most sensitive habitats for plants and wildlife hardest, a government report has found, despite there being no clear plans to monitor or reduce its impact.More than 85% of England’s total land area receives ammonia concentrations above the critical
  
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• The price of plenty: how beef changed America – podcast

  17-06-2019 13:00 via Agriculture | The Guardian
  Exploitation and predatory pricing drove the transformation of the US beef industry – and created the model for modern agribusiness• Read the text version here Continue reading...
  
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