"Howard Neil" wrote in message
...
For instance, in livestock farming UK farmers have to comply with
welfare standards (quite right too) and have to abide by identification
rules (every cow and bull has to have an individual passport so the meat
on your table is traceable back to an individual animal. This ensures a
high quality product but the costs are massive. There are many countries
in the world where animal welfare is virtually non existent (and where
BSE or poultry diseases, for instance, are rampant) and where the
farmers receive very large subsidies from their government. This allows
them to flood our market with sub standard food.

Sorry to intrude but you cannot get away with that one.
It is funny how I recall British farmers (and feed manufacturers) happily
feeding ground up sheep to cattle (even though cattle are vegetarian but who
cares as long as they get fat quickly) which started off the BSE thing in
the first place. I also recall British scientists saying there was no risk
to humans as the disease could not jump the species divide, even though it
had just done exactly that (from sheep to cows).

So, to rephrase .... this allows *us* to flood *our* market with toxic
foodstuffs .....

I am glad UK farmers have to comply with welfare standards, and some
certainly do ... perhaps the rest would like to catch up sometime.

I buy my food on quality, preferably 'organic' although that is no guarantee
of quality.

(:

Gianna

"Col" wrote in message
...


I agree, most farmers aren't rich, but this is in spite of getting the
subsidies/compensation! There's something wrong here.
ISTM there are too many farmers chasing too little market.

Actually no, the last ten or more years have seen under production, stocks
of grains and other food stuffs are being run down, the Chinese etc have
much higher standards of living, are much wealthier and are now a major food
importer.


And in
a properly competitive market that means some farmers should
go to the wall.

True, but unfortunately we do not have a properly competitive market,
because one of them would mean that you could go hungry. So we have a
situation where European farmers have been banned from selling grain outside
the EU last year (and again a couple of years ago) so that they didn't get
the higher world price. But then you did get the option of cheap bread.

Unpleasant, but that's harsh economics for you.
I do not see why imported food should drive the price up.

It depends on whether there is any sloshing about spare. At the moment there
isn't, all grain and beef produced has a market. To get them to sell it to
you rather than someone else, you have to bid more than that someone else.

Also I suggest you read
http://www.defra.gov.uk/farm/caprefo...bnoterev16.pdf

This discusses the effects of a drop in UK food product as is expected over
the next few years and postulates price rises for meat of up to 25%


In a
truly competitive market the cheapest/best product should prevail,
whether that comes from here or abroad.

Yep, produce something with coolie labour paid a pittance, and with no H&SE
or working hours directive and see just how cheap we can get it.



I work in manufacturing industry, remember that? It's that quaint old
thing that made this country great. I'm sick to bloody death about
hearing how farmers are treated as a 'special case' and given
handouts whilst nobody gives a flying **** about manufacturing
industry.

Of course not, they all believe that in a truly competitive market the
cheapest/best product should prevail, whether that comes from here or
abroad.
But then load our industry with bizarre regulation that sticks costs up and
makes it uncompetitive.


Foot & Mouth disease? Tough ****, that's one of the risks
of the trade they are in. They should have taken out insurance.

No Insurance company will offer it, as the control of the disease is in
Government hands and whether we get it or not is effectively a government
decision based on how much they want to spend on the frontier controls. If
we did the job properly like civilised countries such as the USA, Canada or
Aus or NZ do then there is little risk.
The only policy available is from the NFU which paid out a sum which enabled
the farmer to actually live for the 6 months to a year when he had no income
but still got the bills coming in


If a factory burns down you are expected to be insured against it.
I don't see why the government should come and bail you out!

You know, since 1999 I have been through 4 periods of redundancy
at the company I work for. Who cares about that, where's the
compensation to help us through difficult trading conditions?

Hey, redundancy, now there is a concept, I bet you got unemployment benefit
as well. Try being self employed and see what you get.


I would quite happily see most of the British countryside returned
to it's natural wilderness state of forest if farming was no longer
viable here. it would be great for wildlife if nothing else, given that
intensive farming since the war has done so much to destroy
natural habitats.

Actually it reverts to pony paddocks, second homes and tyre dumps

Jim Webster

"Gianna Stefani" wrote in message
...
"Howard Neil" wrote in message
...
For instance, in livestock farming UK farmers have to comply with
welfare standards (quite right too) and have to abide by identification
rules (every cow and bull has to have an individual passport so the meat
on your table is traceable back to an individual animal. This ensures a
high quality product but the costs are massive. There are many countries
in the world where animal welfare is virtually non existent (and where
BSE or poultry diseases, for instance, are rampant) and where the
farmers receive very large subsidies from their government. This allows
them to flood our market with sub standard food.

Sorry to intrude but you cannot get away with that one.
It is funny how I recall British farmers (and feed manufacturers) happily
feeding ground up sheep to cattle (even though cattle are vegetarian but
who
cares as long as they get fat quickly) which started off the BSE thing in
the first place.

First done by Germans before the American civil war, standard procedure in
virtually all the world, actually compulsory in the UK during WW1 and WW2
and still done in much of the Americas, the EU is about the only place not
doing it and even here there are discussions about going back to it for pigs
because it is both environmentally sensible recycling and pigs do eat meat


I also recall British scientists saying there was no risk
to humans as the disease could not jump the species divide, even though it
had just done exactly that (from sheep to cows)

Actually that isn't shown in any way shape or form, there is no evidence for
it, and the consensus seems to be developing around it being a bovine TSE
just like virtually every other mammal has their own TSE
..
Jim Webster

"Howard Neil" wrote in message
...

You say the "cheapest/best product should prevail" as if they are the
same thing. They are not.

OK, 'best value for money'. Whatever.

For instance, in livestock farming UK farmers have to comply with
welfare standards (quite right too) and have to abide by identification
rules (every cow and bull has to have an individual passport so the meat
on your table is traceable back to an individual animal. This ensures a
high quality product but the costs are massive. There are many countries
in the world where animal welfare is virtually non existent (and where
BSE or poultry diseases, for instance, are rampant) and where the
farmers receive very large subsidies from their government. This allows
them to flood our market with sub standard food.

No it doesn't.
We won't allow just any old disease ridden food into the country.

This is not true competition. Farmers in the UK are being hit from two
sides. There is the consumer who will only shop on price, irrespective
of the quality or risks, on one side and a government that seems intent
on destroying farming on the other.

And to return to my original point, why are farmers being protected
against this anyway?
Cheap imports and lower standards in certain countries are a fact of
life. As I have already said, I work in manufacturing industry. Where
is *my* government protection against competition from low wage
third world countries?

Col
--
Bolton, Lancashire.
160m asl.
http://www.reddwarfer.btinternet.co.uk

"Col" wrote in message
...

"Howard Neil" wrote in message
...

You say the "cheapest/best product should prevail" as if they are the
same thing. They are not.

OK, 'best value for money'. Whatever.

So you are happy to import stuff which has been produced by people working
under appalling conditions (I forget the level of birth defects due to
improper use of herbicides in Central America)


For instance, in livestock farming UK farmers have to comply with
welfare standards (quite right too) and have to abide by identification
rules (every cow and bull has to have an individual passport so the meat
on your table is traceable back to an individual animal. This ensures a
high quality product but the costs are massive. There are many countries
in the world where animal welfare is virtually non existent (and where
BSE or poultry diseases, for instance, are rampant) and where the
farmers receive very large subsidies from their government. This allows
them to flood our market with sub standard food.

No it doesn't.
We won't allow just any old disease ridden food into the country.

Except we do, it is only in the last two years that the Customs and Excise
actually bothered looking for it


This is not true competition. Farmers in the UK are being hit from two
sides. There is the consumer who will only shop on price, irrespective
of the quality or risks, on one side and a government that seems intent
on destroying farming on the other.

And to return to my original point, why are farmers being protected
against this anyway?

Because of Bread and circuses. A hungry urban population is a danger. And we
are not all that far from shortage. Remember how fast we had panic buying
during the oil dispute

If they don't get their cheap widgets they moan, if they suddenly don't have
guaranteed food supply they panic

Jim Webster

"Jim Webster" wrote in message
...

"Col" wrote in message
...


I agree, most farmers aren't rich, but this is in spite of getting the
subsidies/compensation! There's something wrong here.
ISTM there are too many farmers chasing too little market.

Actually no, the last ten or more years have seen under production, stocks
of grains and other food stuffs are being run down, the Chinese etc have
much higher standards of living, are much wealthier and are now a major food
importer.

So why are our farmers still struggling then?


And in
a properly competitive market that means some farmers should
go to the wall.

True, but unfortunately we do not have a properly competitive market,
because one of them would mean that you could go hungry. So we have a
situation where European farmers have been banned from selling grain outside
the EU last year (and again a couple of years ago) so that they didn't get
the higher world price. But then you did get the option of cheap bread.

Unpleasant, but that's harsh economics for you.
I do not see why imported food should drive the price up.

It depends on whether there is any sloshing about spare. At the moment there
isn't, all grain and beef produced has a market. To get them to sell it to
you rather than someone else, you have to bid more than that someone else.

Also I suggest you read
http://www.defra.gov.uk/farm/caprefo...bnoterev16.pdf

Gordon Bennett, all 68 pages of it??

This discusses the effects of a drop in UK food product as is expected over
the next few years and postulates price rises for meat of up to 25%


In a
truly competitive market the cheapest/best product should prevail,
whether that comes from here or abroad.

Yep, produce something with coolie labour paid a pittance, and with no H&SE
or working hours directive and see just how cheap we can get it.

Well this is a decision the UK consumer will have to take.
Will they take cheap food from countries where labour and animal welfare
standards are not as high as back home or will they be prepared to pay
that bit extra to buy British to ensure that higher standards are met?

We make these decisions all the time. We are quite prepared to buy shoes
or football shirts from Thailand or wherever, possibly from child labourers
and certainly manufactured under conditions that would never be allowed
in the West.

The choice is ours.........



I work in manufacturing industry, remember that? It's that quaint old
thing that made this country great. I'm sick to bloody death about
hearing how farmers are treated as a 'special case' and given
handouts whilst nobody gives a flying **** about manufacturing
industry.

Of course not, they all believe that in a truly competitive market the
cheapest/best product should prevail, whether that comes from here or
abroad.
But then load our industry with bizarre regulation that sticks costs up and
makes it uncompetitive.

Indeed yes.
My company, an industrial paint manufacturer has just been hit with yet
another EU directive as to how to dispose of hazardous waste.
More costs racked up and profits eaten away.
I don't see any government help for us to comply with these new regulations.


Foot & Mouth disease? Tough ****, that's one of the risks
of the trade they are in. They should have taken out insurance.

No Insurance company will offer it, as the control of the disease is in
Government hands and whether we get it or not is effectively a government
decision based on how much they want to spend on the frontier controls. If
we did the job properly like civilised countries such as the USA, Canada or
Aus or NZ do then there is little risk.
The only policy available is from the NFU which paid out a sum which enabled
the farmer to actually live for the 6 months to a year when he had no income
but still got the bills coming in

Well of course no insurance company will offer it, they know the government
will step in.


If a factory burns down you are expected to be insured against it.
I don't see why the government should come and bail you out!

You know, since 1999 I have been through 4 periods of redundancy
at the company I work for. Who cares about that, where's the
compensation to help us through difficult trading conditions?

Hey, redundancy, now there is a concept, I bet you got unemployment benefit
as well. Try being self employed and see what you get.

No I didn't. I wasn't made redundant.
I'm damn good at my job and they know it.


I would quite happily see most of the British countryside returned
to it's natural wilderness state of forest if farming was no longer
viable here. it would be great for wildlife if nothing else, given that
intensive farming since the war has done so much to destroy
natural habitats.

Actually it reverts to pony paddocks, second homes and tyre dumps

No it doesn't.
If you left the British countryside alone for 100 years, you'd have one massive
forest.

Col
--
Bolton, Lancashire.
160m asl.
http://www.reddwarfer.btinternet.co.uk

"Col" wrote in message
...

Actually no, the last ten or more years have seen under production,
stocks
of grains and other food stuffs are being run down, the Chinese etc have
much higher standards of living, are much wealthier and are now a major
food
importer.

So why are our farmers still struggling then?

Simple, A level playing field would be nice. As examples
1) there are 14,000 dairy farmers and most milk is sold by 5 supermarkets.
When farmers formed a co-op to give themselves a bit of muscle, the
government broke it up.
2) Last year world wheat prices were higher than EU prices because of the
shortage. But EU farmers were not allowed to sell on the world market, they
had to take a cheaper price.
3) Like teachers, police, nurses etc we have more paperwork than we know
what to do with along with meaningless regulation and similar that our
competitors are unburdened with.



And in
a properly competitive market that means some farmers should
go to the wall.

True, but unfortunately we do not have a properly competitive market,
because one of them would mean that you could go hungry. So we have a
situation where European farmers have been banned from selling grain
outside
the EU last year (and again a couple of years ago) so that they didn't
get
the higher world price. But then you did get the option of cheap bread.

Unpleasant, but that's harsh economics for you.
I do not see why imported food should drive the price up.

It depends on whether there is any sloshing about spare. At the moment
there
isn't, all grain and beef produced has a market. To get them to sell it
to
you rather than someone else, you have to bid more than that someone
else.

Also I suggest you read

http://www.defra.gov.uk/farm/caprefo...bnoterev16.pdf

Gordon Bennett, all 68 pages of it??

This is merely a tenth of the documentation the EU produced about the Mid
Term Review.
I told you we had endless paperwork didn't I :-((
If you read the arable section (2.4 from memory) and the following beef and
sheep sections it gives you some idea of the level of production drop they
expect and also the price rises they are predicting.


This discusses the effects of a drop in UK food product as is expected
over
the next few years and postulates price rises for meat of up to 25%


In a
truly competitive market the cheapest/best product should prevail,
whether that comes from here or abroad.

Yep, produce something with coolie labour paid a pittance, and with no
H&SE
or working hours directive and see just how cheap we can get it.

Well this is a decision the UK consumer will have to take.
Will they take cheap food from countries where labour and animal welfare
standards are not as high as back home or will they be prepared to pay
that bit extra to buy British to ensure that higher standards are met?

Well actually they aren't going to have a choice. Basically production is
about to fall sharply because it is uneconomic to produce at current price
levels. Because of the withdrawal of production subsidies and the
replacement of them with payments for environmental work it is estimated
that, for example, beef production might fall between 30 and 60%


We make these decisions all the time. We are quite prepared to buy shoes
or football shirts from Thailand or wherever, possibly from child
labourers
and certainly manufactured under conditions that would never be allowed
in the West.

The choice is ours.........

No, you can not coerce someone into producing the high quality stuff. So in
the end all you end up with is the cheap rubbish




I work in manufacturing industry, remember that? It's that quaint old
thing that made this country great. I'm sick to bloody death about
hearing how farmers are treated as a 'special case' and given
handouts whilst nobody gives a flying **** about manufacturing
industry.

Of course not, they all believe that in a truly competitive market the
cheapest/best product should prevail, whether that comes from here or
abroad.
But then load our industry with bizarre regulation that sticks costs up
and
makes it uncompetitive.

Indeed yes.
My company, an industrial paint manufacturer has just been hit with yet
another EU directive as to how to dispose of hazardous waste.
More costs racked up and profits eaten away.
I don't see any government help for us to comply with these new
regulations.

Tell you what. I'll do without paint, you do without food. And just check
the capacity at the docks. We literally cannot import enough grain to feed
us through the docks.


Foot & Mouth disease? Tough ****, that's one of the risks
of the trade they are in. They should have taken out insurance.

No Insurance company will offer it, as the control of the disease is in
Government hands and whether we get it or not is effectively a
government
decision based on how much they want to spend on the frontier controls.
If
we did the job properly like civilised countries such as the USA, Canada
or
Aus or NZ do then there is little risk.
The only policy available is from the NFU which paid out a sum which
enabled
the farmer to actually live for the 6 months to a year when he had no
income
but still got the bills coming in

Well of course no insurance company will offer it, they know the
government
will step in.

No, no insurance company will offer insurance when the government is
actually the biggest element of the risk.


If a factory burns down you are expected to be insured against it.
I don't see why the government should come and bail you out!

You know, since 1999 I have been through 4 periods of redundancy
at the company I work for. Who cares about that, where's the
compensation to help us through difficult trading conditions?

Hey, redundancy, now there is a concept, I bet you got unemployment
benefit
as well. Try being self employed and see what you get.

No I didn't. I wasn't made redundant.
I'm damn good at my job and they know it.

So what are you moaning about then? You went through four periods of
redundancy as a spectator. When I left school there were about 150,000 UK
dairy farmers, now there are about 20,000 (depends whether you count NI etc.
What percentage of labour did your industry shed?



I would quite happily see most of the British countryside returned
to it's natural wilderness state of forest if farming was no longer
viable here. it would be great for wildlife if nothing else, given
that
intensive farming since the war has done so much to destroy
natural habitats.

Actually it reverts to pony paddocks, second homes and tyre dumps

No it doesn't.
If you left the British countryside alone for 100 years, you'd have one
massive
forest.

We have one of the most densely populated countries in the world. There is
not a cat in hells chance that it will end up as forest. In the SE something
like 60% of farms are bought as residential by non-farmers who regard the
land as something to keep the oiks at bay

Jim Webster

Jim Webster wrote:
"Gianna Stefani" wrote in message
...

"Howard Neil" wrote in message
...

For instance, in livestock farming UK farmers have to comply with
welfare standards (quite right too) and have to abide by identification
rules (every cow and bull has to have an individual passport so the meat
on your table is traceable back to an individual animal. This ensures a
high quality product but the costs are massive. There are many countries
in the world where animal welfare is virtually non existent (and where
BSE or poultry diseases, for instance, are rampant) and where the
farmers receive very large subsidies from their government. This allows
them to flood our market with sub standard food.

Sorry to intrude but you cannot get away with that one.
It is funny how I recall British farmers (and feed manufacturers) happily
feeding ground up sheep to cattle (even though cattle are vegetarian but

who

cares as long as they get fat quickly) which started off the BSE thing in
the first place.


First done by Germans before the American civil war, standard procedure in
virtually all the world, actually compulsory in the UK during WW1 and WW2
and still done in much of the Americas, the EU is about the only place not
doing it and even here there are discussions about going back to it for pigs
because it is both environmentally sensible recycling and pigs do eat meat



The problem was due to a change in processing standards for bone-meal.
Producers of cattle-feed persuaded the government that the waste meat
products could be safely processed at lower temperatures. Oops!

I believe bone-meal was used to supply essential calcium for dairy
cattle to replace that lost in milk production. Without this calcium the
cattle would suffer from milk fever which, oddly enough, displayed some
symptoms not unlike mad-cow disease.

Not only cattle were fed on these products. Vegetables have been fed on
blood and bone-meal for many years.


--
Graham Davis
Bracknell

"Graham Davis" wrote in message
...

Not only cattle were fed on these products. Vegetables have been fed on
blood and bone-meal for many years.

(: I do like that one ..... I think vegetables are not classified as
vegetarian though ... strange but true ... the decayed remains of sundry
life forms have *always* been absorbed by assorted flora.
There may be a case for deciduous trees being considered cannibals ..... but
that is for another ng which hopefully doesn't even exist (:

Best wishes

Gianna

"Graham Davis" wrote in message
...
Jim Webster wrote:
"Gianna Stefani" wrote in message
...

"Howard Neil" wrote in message
...

For instance, in livestock farming UK farmers have to comply with
welfare standards (quite right too) and have to abide by identification
rules (every cow and bull has to have an individual passport so the
meat
on your table is traceable back to an individual animal. This ensures a
high quality product but the costs are massive. There are many
countries
in the world where animal welfare is virtually non existent (and where
BSE or poultry diseases, for instance, are rampant) and where the
farmers receive very large subsidies from their government. This allows
them to flood our market with sub standard food.

Sorry to intrude but you cannot get away with that one.
It is funny how I recall British farmers (and feed manufacturers)
happily
feeding ground up sheep to cattle (even though cattle are vegetarian but

who

cares as long as they get fat quickly) which started off the BSE thing
in
the first place.


First done by Germans before the American civil war, standard procedure
in
virtually all the world, actually compulsory in the UK during WW1 and
WW2
and still done in much of the Americas, the EU is about the only place
not
doing it and even here there are discussions about going back to it for
pigs
because it is both environmentally sensible recycling and pigs do eat
meat



The problem was due to a change in processing standards for bone-meal.
Producers of cattle-feed persuaded the government that the waste meat
products could be safely processed at lower temperatures. Oops!

This is one of the causes that was flagged but but is now discounted, what
happened was that the H&SE pointed out that it was safer to use lower rather
than high temperature. The same decision was taken pretty well every where
else in the world and no one else has had problems.


I believe bone-meal was used to supply essential calcium for dairy
cattle to replace that lost in milk production. Without this calcium the
cattle would suffer from milk fever which, oddly enough, displayed some
symptoms not unlike mad-cow disease.

Yes and no, calcium deficiency is something which strikes because, normally
at calving, the animal cannot metabolise calcium rapidly enough. Actually
adding calcium to the diet is counter productive as it makes the system
'lazy' and can even cause trouble. So low calcium diets are often fed in the
run up to calcium so that the animal is metabolising the mineral
efficiently, and then higher levels are fed after calving.
Calcium is cheap to add to a diet, you don't need the MBM for this.
Milk fever and BSE are very similar for symptoms, indeed talk to any older
vet and many of them will tell you of odd cases of milk fever that were
never cured back in the 40s and 50s which is one reason for assuming that
cows have always had their own low level TSE. There are mentions of 'Ox
scrapie' back in the 19th century


Not only cattle were fed on these products. Vegetables have been fed on
blood and bone-meal for many years.

of course, many centuries in fact. Indeed if you include ploughing in the
corn king, many millennia.

Jim Webster