Went to visit Mr Growing With Nature at Pilling last Saturday as he was to tell us how to grow our organic vegetables better, which seemed a bit of a contradiction as he sells them to us. A murky and cold day in the depths of the Fylde with country lanes as narrow as the car and a misty view of the fells. Turned into a very narrow lane and were confronted by a convoy of 4×4’s. A local shooting club who’d been out firing at geese. A bit of a mystery to me about what sort of enjoyment there is shooting at geese as they fly in their majestic formations slowly and at low altitude, while chatting to each other, over the Fylde. I do eat chicken and turkey, and maybe the wild geese get a better life, and perhaps hunting them is what humans have always done. Yet I know that if I deliberately killed another creature that wasn’t a threat I wouldn’t sleep peacefully ever again.
The show has had empty years before but today the Royal Lancashire Show committee put into place actions to put it on ice saying the costs of 2 flooded years have been too much. The Royal Lancashire Agricultural Society also say that Ribble Valley Borough Council put the final nail in the coffin by refusing to consider a revised traffic plan. It appears there is still scope for compromise as further discussions are expected and the announcement might be thought to put some pressure on the council.
It is surprising that in a county as big as Lancashire, including its larger Palatine boundary, a location, cash and support can’t be found for such a show. You would think that Lancashire County Council would feel strongly about it but it seems to be only local councils who are involved and they aren’t being helpful either.
On the other hand why does it have these problems. Is it the date, the location or bad planning. As they say one mistake is unfortunate, two mistakes look like carelessness but three mistakes look like ………..
Shock, horror, the newspapers are carrying headlines that say organic food is no more nutritional than non-organic food.
The reputable Food Standards Agency with the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine have conducted a study with 162 analyses and made the conclusion that organic food contains no additional nutritional value.
Whether there are exceptions I don’t know. Whether organic food produced by someone who cares gives more satisfaction than mass produced, chemically stimulated, processed and perfectly shaped food probably wasn’t in the equation.
I always thought organic farming was about having less in the food. Less chemicals that is. Less effect on our fellow creatures and less effect on our water supply etc. Less effect on the environment in general. I don’t think the study touched this.
I havn’t read the full report and it sounds lengthy but as a supporter in general of the theme of organic farming I think it’s limited scope misses the target. I’ve never bought organic food thinking it tasted better although I might think it does if it was bread baked in a bakery that cares and maybe makes the bread nice and full, not rubbery and light. I like my food to digest with a natural amount of roughage, why take out the roughage and then have to eat a pile of bran or take tablets to make your body work. Do I need the dye contained in some foods that a study last week shows is one of the few things that penetrates certain internal membranes so helping a new drug to cure nerve damage.
So please file the report under ‘blinkered studies’ and send the cheque from the taxpayer to the School of Tropical Medicine with a note of thanks. It’s not their fault they did what they were asked to do.
Schwan the American Pizza maker in Leyland has sold out to the German Pizza maker Dr Oetker. Reading newspaper reports this gives Dr Oetker 43% of the UK frozen pizza market and this might be too much. Dr Oetker previously had 12% so it has made a step increase. It isn’t clear to me if 30% of frozen pizzas are made in Leyland, but if so it sounds like the dominant factory so you might think would be able to take on work rather than lose it. At this time the market is growing though so if there is any spare capacity it must be filling. However I know nothing about it and that is only a guess.
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