Pushpinder Pal is one of tens of thousands of Indian farmers camped along nine miles (15km) of major roads outside Delhi, protesting about agricultural laws they claim will devastate their earnings. Based in Haryana, he collects food every day from his local gurdwara, a Sikhs' place of assembly, delivering spinach curry to huge numbers of protesters. The Indian prime minister, Narendra Modi, promised to increase farmers' incomes, but they claim his new policies are designed to favour rich corporations and not them. In one of the largest protests in history, farmers are pledging to stay put while they wait for their representatives to strike a deal with government
Continue reading...Category Archives: Farming
Brazilian beef farms ‘used workers kept in conditions similar to slavery’
Workers on farms supplying world’s biggest meat firms allegedly paid £8 a day and housed in shacks with no toilets or running water
Brazilian companies and slaughterhouses including the world’s largest meat producer, JBS, sourced cattle from supplier farms that made use of workers kept in slavery-like conditions, according to a new report.
Workers on cattle farms supplying slaughterhouses earned as little as £8 a day and lived in improvised shacks with no bathrooms, toilets, running water or kitchens, according to a report from Brazilian investigative agency Repórter Brasil.
Since 1995, the report said, 55,000 Brazilian workers have been rescued by government inspectors from “situations similar to slavery”. While the number of investigations has fallen in recent years – 118 workers were freed in 2018, compared with 1,045 a decade earlier – that does not mean the situation has improved, just that inspections have been reduced, it noted.
Continue reading...How a ‘tree mortgage’ scheme could turn an Indian town carbon neutral
Kerala villagers are reaping the benefits of a scheme that pays them to leave their trees rooted, reducing risk of deforestation
In the misty, hilly terrain of Wayanad, in the southern Indian state of Kerala, the people with any access to land in the quiet town of Meenangadi have been out counting their trees.
Sheeja CG, a 46-year-old farmer, has lived among coffee, coconut and pepper plantations all her life but last month she increased her income dramatically by mortgaging 53 of her trees at the local bank, in return for a sum of 2,650 rupees (£26.96), or 50 rupees each. She was one of the first beneficiaries of the state-sponsored scheme.
Continue reading...US FDA declares genetically modified pork ‘safe to eat’
Developer says it plans to focus on using pig organs for human transplant rather than selling for meat
Genetically modified (GM) pigs have been approved for food and medical use in the US, drawing mixed reactions. The pigs are only the second GM animal to be approved for food after GM salmon in 2015.
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) this week approved the GM pigs, which have been engineered to eliminate alpha-gal, a sugar found in pigs that can cause allergic reactions.
The FDA said it was the first time it had approved a GM animal for human food and medical use.
The Wolf Dividing Norway: the hunter v the environmentalist
With unique access to remote communities in the snow-capped landscape of Norway, this film follows characters on either side of a fierce debate on whether to cull the wolf population. For decades the topic has split political parties, families and communities across the country, with environmentalists world-wide criticising Norway for how it handles its tiny population of critically endangered wolves. Here, a group of hunters await news from the government on whether their yearly hunt will be permitted, while the environmentalists anticipate the worst. With angry threats on both sides, the film takes a deep dive into what’s at stake for both groups, as well as the wider world
Continue reading...Nationwide farmers’ strike shuts down large parts of India
Protests against new agriculture laws hits transport, shops and markets across the country
Farmers in India have shut down swathes of the country’s transport, shops and markets as they escalated their protests against new agriculture laws with the launch of a national strike.
Hundreds of thousands of farmers blocked all roads into the capital Delhi for most of the day, and across the country demonstrated on railway lines and highways and called for a shutdown of shops, in a effort to pressurise the government into repealing new agriculture laws they say will leave them poverty stricken and at the mercy of corporations.
Continue reading...Spice of life: how turmeric became the ‘new gold’ for Sri Lanka villagers
Turmeric is synonymous with Sri Lankan cuisine and an import ban is helping boost production after the ravages of civil war
In Sri Lankan cuisine, a pinch of turmeric brings the gold colour to sodhi, the mildly spiced coconut soup eaten with the island’s carbohydrate-rich foods.
Turmeric is valued in every Sri Lankan kitchen for its subtle flavour, distinct yellow colour and powerful aroma. In ayurvedic medicine, this humble spice is hailed for its values as an anti-inflammatory.
Continue reading...Lab-grown chicken tastes like chicken – but the feeling when eating it is more complicated
Naima Brown’s encounter with a lab-grown chicken nugget reminded her of a Happy Meal – but she’s less certain about what it means for the future of food
“Clean”, “cultured”, “no-kill” – these are just a few of the monikers that have been applied to San Francisco-based food start up Just Inc’s lab-grown chicken nuggets.
The product has just been approved for sale to consumers in Singapore – a world first. But the company’s CEO Josh Tetrick would prefer it if everyone dropped the additional descriptors and just called his company’s product “meat”.
Continue reading...Global soils underpin life but future looks ‘bleak’, warns UN report
It takes thousands of years for soils to form, meaning protection is needed urgently, say scientists
Global soils are the source of all life on land but their future looks “bleak” without action to halt degradation, according to the authors of a UN report.
A quarter of all the animal species on Earth live beneath our feet and provide the nutrients for all food. Soils also store as much carbon as all plants above ground and are therefore critical in tackling the climate emergency. But there also are major gaps in knowledge, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) report, which is the first on the global state of biodiversity in soils.
Continue reading...Covid and California’s farmworkers: study lays bare disproportionate risks
Primarily Latino workforce has contracted Covid-19 at nearly three times the rate of other residents
California’s agricultural workers have contracted Covid-19 at nearly three times the rate of other residents in the state, a new study has found, laying bare the risks facing those who keep a $50bn industry afloat.
Continue reading...No-kill, lab-grown meat to go on sale for first time
Singapore’s approval of chicken cells grown in bioreactors is seen as landmark moment across industry
Cultured meat, produced in bioreactors without the slaughter of an animal, has been approved for sale by a regulatory authority for the first time. The development has been hailed as a landmark moment across the meat industry.
The “chicken bites”, produced by the US company Eat Just, have passed a safety review by the Singapore Food Agency and the approval could open the door to a future when all meat is produced without the killing of livestock, the company said.
Continue reading...‘Grain to glass’ distiller hopes to put Wales on world’s whisky map
In The Welsh Wind distillery already taking orders for 30-litre casks of ultra-local spirit
The barley has been grown in fields with spectacular views over Cardigan Bay and malted on a local farm. The all-important water comes from springs deep beneath the Welsh countryside.
A small distillery in west Wales is at the centre of what it hopes may turn out to be a quiet whisky revolution.
Continue reading...Fists and pig guts fly in Taiwan’s parliament debate on US pork imports – video
Legislators from Taiwan's main opposition Kuomintang (KMT) party threw pig guts and exchanged punches with other lawmakers in parliament on Friday as they tried to stop the premier, Su Tseng-chang, from taking questions, in a bitter dispute over easing US pork imports.
President Tsai Ing-wen announced in August that the government would, from 1 January, allow imports of US pork containing ractopamine, an additive that enhances leanness but is banned in the EU and China, as well as US beef more than 30 months old
Continue reading...Taiwan politicians throw pig guts at each other in row over US meat imports
Opposition party’s ‘disgusting’ offal protest prompts scuffle in Taipei legislative yuan
Parliamentarians in Taiwan have thrown pig guts at each other before coming to blows over plans to allow US meat imports.
Members of the opposition Chinese nationalist party (KMT) brought the offal to the legislative yuan on Friday in the latest of daily protests during parliamentary sittings.
Continue reading...Romania accused of ‘silence’ over ship that capsized killing 14,000 sheep
An investigation into the Queen Hind sinking a year ago is yet to be published and the live export trade continues to boom
Romania has been accused of “complete silence” over its investigation into the sinking of the Queen Hind last November, which resulted in the deaths of more than 14,000 sheep.
Rescuers who rushed to the sinking Queen Hind vessel, which left Romania’s Black Sea port of Midia a year ago, managed to save just 228 sheep out of a total 14,600, but only 180 ultimately survived the ordeal.
Romania’s prime minister Ludovic Orban vowed on television last year to end live exports in the “medium-term”. However, since the Queen Hind disaster more than 2 million live animals have been exported from Romania – mostly to north Africa and the Middle East.
Romanian authorities have claimed the vessel was 10% below capacity and that the animals were “clinically healthy and fit for transport”. But campaigners say the vessel was overloaded and this ultimately led to the thousands of sheep drowning in the Black Sea.
The only information to emerge since the sinking has been the discovery of secret compartments onboard with dead animals inside, by the company hired to remove the ship from the water.
Romania’s transport ministry told the Guardian this week that investigations are concluded and said a summary of the report will be published on the ministry’s website. They also said that the purpose of the technical investigation was to establish maritime safety issues and to prevent future accidents, and “not to establish guilt in people involved”.
EU law stipulates that investigations into maritime accidents should be reported in full within 12 months, but that if a final report is not possible in that timeframe, then “an interim report shall be published within 12 months of the date” of the event.
Revealed: UK supermarket and fast food chicken linked to deforestation in Brazil
Tesco, Lidl, Asda, McDonald’s and Nando’s all source chicken fed on soya from Cerrado tropical biome region
- How can we stop using soya linked to deforestation?
- The Cerrado: how Brazil’s vital ‘water tank’ went from forest to fields for soya
Supermarkets and fast food outlets are selling chicken fed on imported soya linked to thousands of forest fires and at least 300 sq miles (800 sq km) of tree clearance in the Brazilian Cerrado, a joint cross-border investigation has revealed.
Tesco, Lidl, Asda, McDonald’s, Nando’s and other high street retailers all source chicken fed on soya supplied by trading behemoth Cargill, the US’s second largest private company. The combination of minimal protection for the Cerrado – a globally important carbon sink and wildlife habitat – with an opaque supply chain and confusing labelling systems, means that shoppers may be inadvertently contributing to its destruction.
Continue reading...Meet the South Poll cow: the healthier, naturally raised cattle of the future?
Most US cattle are bred to be require grain rations and antibiotics but the small-framed red cow thrives on a grass-only diet – with benefits to the environment
Missouri rancher Greg Judy spots a six-month-old South Poll heifer calf in his herd that is a prime example of what he calls a “good doing cow”. A cow that will “do good” on grass alone.
Related: 'In the sun they'd cook': is the US south-west getting too hot for farm animals?
Continue reading...Northern Ireland businesses call for Brexit transition extension
MPs are told region ‘simply will not be ready’ for mandatory border checks on 1 January
Northern Ireland businesses have called for an extension of the Brexit transition period in the region, warning they “simply will not be ready” for the mandatory border checks on 1 January.
They say they are the “rope in a tug of war” between the UK and the EU and warned of a “huge black hole” in information and a “disconnect” with Westminster and Brussels over the reality of Brexit checks kicking in 43 days’ time.
Continue reading...Covid-19 mink variants discovered in humans in seven countries
Denmark has already launched a nationwide cull of its farmed mink herd after concerns for vaccine efficacy
Seven countries are now reporting mink-related Sars-CoV-2 mutations in humans, according to new scientific analysis.
The mutations are identified as Covid-19 mink variants as they have repeatedly been found in mink and now in humans as well.
Uncertainty around the implications of the discovery of a Covid-19 mink variant in humans led Denmark, the world’s largest mink fur producer, to launch a nationwide cull earlier this month.
The cull was sparked by research from Denmark’s public health body, the Statens Serum Institut (SSI), which showed that a mink variant called C5 was harder for antibodies to neutralise and posed a potential threat to vaccine efficacy.
Shocking footage of ‘severely injured’ pigs on Spanish farms released
Calls for EU animal welfare rules to be enforced as country set to overtake Germany as Europe’s biggest pork producer
Footage that appears to show newborn piglets lying in faeces, pigs with pus-covered wounds and pig carcasses in varying states of decomposition has been published by animal welfare campaigners in Spain.
Spain is expected to overtake Germany this year as the EU’s biggest pork producer. In 2019, a record 53 million pigs were slaughtered across the country, fuelling demand for products such as chorizo, tenderloin and lard across the EU and around the world.
The photos and videos, recorded during undercover visits in 2019 and 2020 to more than 30 pigs farms across Spain, were published by Tras los Muros, which translates as Behind the Walls, a personal project launched by Spanish photojournalist Aitor Garmendia. Tras los Muros said the farms were in the Spanish regions of Aragón, Castilla-La Mancha and Castilla y León, home to around 17% of the country’s more than 86,000 pig farms.
Some of the pigs they found appeared to be “severely injured”, said Garmendia, who led the undercover team, and were thought to be showing signs of issues such as “hernias, abscesses, prolapses, arthritis or necrotic tissue”.