When the National Farmers Union and the governments Chief Scientific Advisor stress the importance of safeguarding our agricultural land we cant help but notice the irony of landowners rushing to take land out of production! A couple of recent news items have highlighted the importance of agricultural land to the UK. From the BBC: The National Farmers Union (NFU) has condemned as ludicrous plans to flood farms on high ground to prevent homes and businesses in towns from being hit. Engineers have proposed creating ponds and bogs on high ground to prevent rainfall rushing down hills and causing flooding. However, NFU president Peter Kendall said farmland was far too valuable. He said: We have to put lives and human safety first but we have to put a higher priority on agricultural land. In yesterdays Guardian and also mentioned on the BBC Today programme the governments Chief Scientific Adviser who has stated that we need GM food because, amongst other things, we have limited farmland. We take it for granted that because our supermarket shelves are groaning with food, there are no problems with the food supply, but there are, said governments Chief Scientific Adviser, Professor Sir mark Walport, citing rising global population, limited farmland and climate change. Both of these examples highlight the need to maintain our agricultural land bank, not cover it in solar panels that could be sited more appropriately elsewhere. Surely this demonstrates that these sort of schemes are not in the national interest.
Posted on: Sat, 15 Mar 2014 10:56:38 +0000
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