I do not however accept sermonising and “Direct Action” from “Influencers” who insist I conform with their beliefs and opinions. That includes the very vocal minorities of Radical Vegans and Extinction Rebellion supporters. . obviously I agree with this, (fillet steak is all my gums can handle, and ferk me, do I love it) but lets not forget, vocal minorities have often brought in good legislation too. I only say this as there appears to be a push to put many of these protest groups onto a "watch list" labelled terrorists even.
I’ve always thought it as simple as this. When I cook meat the smell makes me hungry, so there’s something programmed In me that’s attracted to it. Never felt the urge to eat the leaves of a bonfire though...
Chances are you're programmed to like crunchy vegatables and fruits. Its supposed to be one of the major factors in the sucess of crisps.
Our nearest ancestors, Chimpanzees, are also omnivores, which tends to suggest our hominid and then human ancestors were also. I’ve also read that eating meat, particularly cooked meat (takes a lot less energy to digest), may well have been a decisive factor in our evolution as it supplied protein and fat in large enough quantities to mean our hominid ancestors didn’t need to spend all day every day searching for food, which freed up their time and brain power for other more interesting stuff.
Two things are getting mixed up here. Processed food productions and how most farmers produce their product. So lets forget processed food and stick to the point about farmers behaviour and human health/environment. Farmers fed cows to cows. That's how we got BSE. They fed a herbivore back to cows for the sake of profit. Maybe you did not. But most did. Farmers were responsible for salmonella in eggs. No one else. The shops didn't put it there. There is nothing natural about drinking the milk of another mammal. Does not happen anywhere else on nature on a regular basis. If the NHS and other scientists say farmers are using too many anti biotics then I believe them. On Neonicitinoids and bee health: Chris Hartfield, the National Farmers Union’s acting chief science adviser, said: “Farmers are acutely aware that bees play a crucial role in food production and have done an enormous amount to help them.” But he said the committee’s finding of “unacceptable effects” came despite their acknowledgement of a gap in understanding in whether neonicotinoids damage overall ecosystem services: “In our view, the ECP has leapt beyond its brief.” So farmers did not want them banned. I thoroughly enjoy a steak, lamb, venison, but I try and buy organic / grass fed to avoid all the crap they get given. It was much easier when I lived in Scotland where I could nip a mile down the road to the farm shop and pick up some beef that had been feed on kale through the winter. Here is a paper on the use of antibiotics in fish farming https://cen.acs.org/articles/95/web/2017/09/Antibiotic-resistance-spread-through-feed.html Farmers need watching.
What we get paid is about 10% of our turnover, but it’s a significant percentage. Over the years supermarkets have wound down the prices until that 10% is the difference between us making a small profit or a loss. To put it into perspective back in 1995 we were paid 24p per litre for our milk. Our main expenses were electric at 4-5p kw/h, fuel (red diesel) 10ppl and animal feed at £120/ton. We also claimed no subsidies and were allowed a fair share of the profit which we were able to use to reinvest and offer more jobs opportunities. Today 25 years later we are being paid 25.5p per litre for milk with no signs of it increasing more than about 2ppl. Electric is 14pkw/h, red diesel is 65ppl and feed 240/ton. As you can see the margin has been squeezed to the point of strangulation. Without the Single farm payment or a replacement we will at best break even, but you can’t run a business that just breaks even or in worse years runs at a loss. We are luckier than others though. Almost all upland sheep and beef farms rely on that money and can’t survive without it.
That seems pretty bloody grim. It doesn’t surprise me that the supermarkets act in such a cynical way when, what, 6 of them totally dominate the market. I imagine it’s probably not far off a cartel. I presume you wanted to stay in the EU to avoid the upheaval and risk to your business?
I’m not going to disagree with everything you say but it lacks context and understanding. The cause of BSE was bad practice nearly 40 years ago, but it was not the farmer feeding cows to cows, it was feed companies seeing meat and bone meal as a cheap protein source to increase their profit. It was never directly fed to cows it was included as a small percentage in a compound feed pellet. It wasn’t any cheaper for the farmer to buy it was just seen as an alternative protein source. We all know the rest. I’ve made comment as a dairy farmer regarding antibiotics and I stand by what I say. It’s illegal to include blanket antibiotic inclusion in a dairy cows feed and I’d lose my producers license if I did. I’m not going to get into the rest of it as I’m not qualified and I’m not going to spout for the sake of an argument or to try and prove a point about something I don’t know about. However I will comment on pesticide use. If all the vegans have their way the usage of pesticides and herbicides will snowball. After all only 30% of the land in the UK is suitable for plant based crop production so the only way to increase productivity is to kill everything in the field except the crop. Vegans won’t tell you that bit.
No more Porsches or Ducatis then? We will all have to wait forever until our Norton arrives, eating fish & chips! LOL
Already there. I can get a week’s shopping in the panniers, on the rack and in a backpack. Unfortunately, although I shop local it’s at my local Tesco, which kind of defeats the object. The girlf has been talking about scoping out the farmers’ markets though, so that might change soon.
It’s a Vintage Electric Tracker. However, the rigid forks made the ride dreadful so I had them upgraded to S spec telescopics, then the electrics kept failing so the retailer replaced everything with S spec kit FOC. Therefore it’s effectively a Tracker S, but looking at their website they seem to have now reintroduced the base model Tracker and have renamed the S version as the Roadster. https://www.vintageelectricbikes.com/collections/frontpage/products/roadster?variant=29668792107083
it is nice but you couldn't let it out of your sight when parking up other than home/secure place. Even if they couldn't nick it, some tuesday would damage it.
