Professor Neil Ward, who’s a climate scientist from the University of East Anglia, speaks out about the current problem of lack of food resilience as we face the likelihood of a changing climate that will throw up more extremes – more heat, more drought, more flood. He believes we can find solutions, but that this needs a concerted effort on the part of government, the farming community and all concerned in the U.K.’s food industry.
George Hosford and his family farm not far from Blandford, and climate change affects them directly of course, but George is also very concerned about the unfair competition British farmers face from cheaper imported foodstuffs, and he talks about imported meat, and concerns about conditions under which that meat is produced, just a few weeks after the ban by the EU and Northern Ireland of meat imported from Brazil. England, Wales and Scotland have not imposed a ban on Brazilian meat.
This year, the CPRE – the Campaign to Protect Rural England – celebrates its centenary. At a recent celebratory event held in Milton Abbey its President, Mary-Ann Ochoda, and Chair of the Dorset CPRE board of Trustees Jez Hughes, talk about the aims of the charity past and present, and some of the particular issues it deals with now.
Photo by Sam Carter on Unsplash