"Food: What goes in our basket?" on Channel 4

[Archanejil]

I caught 15 minutes of that tripe. I couldn't bear it. I also shouted at the TV quite a bit.

Came home from work today. The TV is in bits on the living room floor, with the OH carefully tinkering and removing dead parts. Apparently, a resistor in the power board had a catastrophic failure of some description, which is fortunately fixable. Last thing I watched?

Oh, you bet I'm blaming it.

[Millymollymandy]

I've just watched the one from the week before and think that mostly it's a very good and entertaining and enlightening programme.

Although I totally disagree on the Scottish beef/Aberdeen Angus discussion about where things like cheddar cheese and cornish pasties are made. Aberdeen Angus is a breed of cattle which can live anywhere in the world. It's not the same thing as a cheese or wine etc from a specific area. Plus I used to be able to buy this beef in France when I lived near Geneva and now all we have is Breton boeuf which is awful uncookable stuff. Oh and EVERYONE in the universe knows that cheddar cheese is made all over the bloomin' world not just in Cheddar, Somerset so we can hardly be upset that it came from Ireland or Canada - you should be pleased as Irish cheddar is the best I've ever tasted. Oh and what about mentioning chickens that you can buy other than the £2 a kg ones.

Oh dear.

[oldjerry]

AFAIK, It's typical for dairy farms to bring their herds in during the winter because the pasture can't stand the trampling (at typical stocking rates) during wet weather (and the thing with British winters is that they do tend to be very wet, compared to the continent), especially when the grass isn't growing. It's a particular problem because most "improved" pasture comprises only one or two species of grass, which lack the physical resilience needed to withstand over-wintering cattle outside. There are some farms in the UK which manage to keep their herds outdoors all winter by having more diverse grasses in their pasture and using lower stocking rates.

Now that makes sense and the fact is, my parents never improved the grass land so it was full of much stronger grass that does not get easily trampled and anyway there were only 15 odd cows, so not a big herd...
Milly, I would also love to have that butcher's knife, actually, that butcher certainly knew what to do with it too! He made it look so easy!

It's too glib just to say 'well the French have all got it right' etc with out asking why this difference exists.Traditionally small french farmns have had huge amounts of support through the CAP and exist in a culture where cheap food isn't the B all and end all.Even a french dairyfarm would struggle with 15 cows! The cheif reason the cattle come inside is the climate.I dont know why I'm in the position here of defending UK dairy farmers,but I think it's a common fallacy to lump all farmers together as 'exploiters of the countryside' who dont give a toss about their livestocks' welfare,or the ecology of the land they farm,and that's just ignorance.

[123sologne]

It's too glib just to say 'well the French have all got it right' etc with out asking why this difference exists.Traditionally small french farmns have had huge amounts of support through the CAP and exist in a culture where cheap food isn't the B all and end all.Even a french dairyfarm would struggle with 15 cows! The cheif reason the cattle come inside is the climate.I dont know why I'm in the position here of defending UK dairy farmers,but I think it's a common fallacy to lump all farmers together as 'exploiters of the countryside' who dont give a toss about their livestocks' welfare,or the ecology of the land they farm,and that's just ignorance.

Well all I know about getting money to support farming, is that the little farms do not get very much when they get something and I am pretty sure my mum never got a penny of help from anybody with her 15 cows. But hey, if you want to see who gets the cash, I suggest you have a look at the following site: http://farmsubsidy.org/. It makes very interesting reading and made me seriously cross. Anyway, I think not a single farmer should get subsidies, that is one of the main thing that makes the all thing totally wrong. I feel like screaming to the idiots who buy all their cheap chicken and stuff: Yeah it is cheap but how much of your taxes was fed to the factory that produced it?! Saying that I have not finished digging in the site and I have not found the chicken farms yet.
PS: I did not mean to start a Franco/British war, yes, I am French, and my parents had a small farm (that is what we call it there), but I don't know how big farms work in France as in my part of France there are only smallish farms with about 50 odd cows and very rarely more. And MKG has said that not all farms in the UK keep their cows in shed for 6 months either.

[MKG]

I've just had another look at the reports. The venture will have up to 9000 cows and, according to the proposers of the scheme, they will be put out to pasture in good weather and will be allowed to roam within the sheds at milking time. Apart from the chaos I can envisage with 9000 cows roaming freely around an enclosed space, I have to wonder where the pasture is coming from. Using the traditional figure (1 cow needs 1 acre of pasture) that's 9000 acres. That can't lie to the east of Lincoln - that's old fenland and so very valuable arable fields. They probably wouldn't want it running north/south along the ridge, unless the cattle were fitted with mountaineering gear. That leaves the existing fields to the west, and a peek at Google Maps makes them look very arable too. That's hardly surprising because although the area is described as heath, it, too, is old fenland.

So, what's going to be sacrificed? A straight change of 9000 acres of arable land to 9000 acres of pasture doesn't make much sense to me - and I pity the last cow out of the shed, because it's going to have to walk an awfully long way for its breakfast.

Mike

EDIT: In case any of you, like me, have difficulty envisaging an acre, 9000 acres amounts to over 4000 football stadia.

[oldjerry]

Hold up here, I'm not having a go at French farmers,read it again.I'm PRO small farmers wherever they .The CAP didn't give susidies to farmers(which DOES happen now thru enviroment protection schemes throughout the EU) but gauranteed prices for milk wine etc etc.I was having a go at people who read a couple of self sufficiency books(written by people who by definition dont have to make a living from the land) then wade into small farmers.(OK,.before anyone sharpens their knives,I'm sure that doesn't include any one on here,but you must have met them)

[Millymollymandy]

I've just had another look at the reports. The venture will have up to 9000 cows and, according to the proposers of the scheme, they will be put out to pasture in good weather and will be allowed to roam within the sheds at milking time. Apart from the chaos I can envisage with 9000 cows roaming freely around an enclosed space, I have to wonder where the pasture is coming from. Using the traditional figure (1 cow needs 1 acre of pasture) that's 9000 acres. That can't lie to the east of Lincoln - that's old fenland and so very valuable arable fields. They probably wouldn't want it running north/south along the ridge, unless the cattle were fitted with mountaineering gear. That leaves the existing fields to the west, and a peek at Google Maps makes them look very arable too. That's hardly surprising because although the area is described as heath, it, too, is old fenland.

So, what's going to be sacrificed? A straight change of 9000 acres of arable land to 9000 acres of pasture doesn't make much sense to me - and I pity the last cow out of the shed, because it's going to have to walk an awfully long way for its breakfast.

Mike

EDIT: In case any of you, like me, have difficulty envisaging an acre, 9000 acres amounts to over 4000 football stadia.

From what I understand on this programme they said one month a year, but I don't suppose they mean all 9000 at the same time! In the meantime they will be free to walk around a concrete yard. I don't expect they will need an acre each as they are only out for a short time presumably to get some exercise and will probably be supplementary fed as there will probably not be enough grazing. Anyway what do I know .

[Green Aura]

I posted this link on another thread on this topic

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBlVGVAS ... r_embedded

This is how it works in the USA. This is what is being planned at Nocton (albeit not quite so big).

[Big Al]

I tape this programme because my wife doesn't like to see the animals on it. She's quite happy to eat the animals just not to see like the beef on the butchers table. Anyway I thought that there was nothingwrong with the programme. If people want to continue to buy milk from super markets at £2 for 2 x 4 pint poly cartons like i do then these super milking farms are the way things are going to go. I'd love to buy my milk on the doorstep delivery system but I can't afford 62 pence per pint. The diary farmer said he was getting 22 p per litre of milk last year and it was costing him 25 pence per litre to produce it.

On that point the prices paid to farmers have gone up THIS YEAR and if market forces dictate that it costs more to produce than the returns then get out of the market..... Oh and have you ever seen a poor farmer ??

When we all either stop drinking milk, buy our own cow / goat / sheep etc for milk or are willing to pay a "fair price" for a pint of milk then we can all moan about the super farms.....

[Susie]

I'm willing to pay a fair price for a pint of milk (I hardly use any so it's not going to break the food budget unless a fair price is £6 a pint or something - actually perhaps it might be ?). Where would be the most ishy place to get it from? They don't sell milk in our local butcher/ greengrocer (I've checked), or the local wholefood shop where I get lots of stuff. Also I can't get it delivered with the veg box. Are doorstep deliveries better? I'm trying to move my food shopping away from supermarkets but actually I've been having trouble with dairy, any ideas welcome!

[Millymollymandy]

I Oh and have you ever seen a poor farmer ??

I think most of them are poor - apart from the landed gentry type of farms/farmers, but anyway they are farm managers on those estates. And they work all hours god gives, 7 days a week including Christmas Day.

[123sologne]

I Oh and have you ever seen a poor farmer ??

I think most of them are poor - apart from the landed gentry type of farms/farmers, but anyway they are farm managers on those estates. And they work all hours god gives, 7 days a week including Christmas Day.

I am always amazed at the gentry type farmers. I have never seen those before I came to the UK, well you all know what we did to the gentry many long years ago.... Anyway, Sologne where I come from is not classified as prime farming land (but very good for woodland, hunting and fishing), so it is all small scale and hard work. I suppose what I would call the posh farmers come from Beauce, the small Texas of France, they are loaded. Is there actually a part of the UK that is better than the others for wheat production? And one more for cows (could that be Lincolnshire?) ?

[ina]

I Oh and have you ever seen a poor farmer ??

I think most of them are poor - apart from the landed gentry type of farms/farmers, but anyway they are farm managers on those estates. And they work all hours god gives, 7 days a week including Christmas Day.

I can only emphatically agree with MMM! Real farmers aren't rich; they may have a lot of machinery, and they work on a lot of land (which quite often they don't own - and if their name is on it, it's still the bank that owns it...).

[MKG]

But surely this argument is not about farmers - nor do "real" farmers argue for huge schemes which they could not possibly afford. The issue here is nothing to do with your cheery neighbourhood beef or dairy producer - this whole plan is driven by the desires of wholesale buyers (if I was the tiniest bit sceptical, I might think that a supermarket chain may be behind the whole thing).

This scheme does not fit comfortably in any way with the area in which the proposed plan will be executed. I'm sure that whatever final product is proposed will be efficiently produced, processed, bundled, and delivered to the consumer - cheaply.

There is, therefore, a big question - do you want cheap, do you want quality, or do you want neither of those (necessarily) but a fair chance of someone making a large profit and being able to quote the dreadful "business is business" crap at you?

In this day and age, that's the choice you have. Thank goodness I'm old enough to be able to say I'll be well gone long before the espousers of that philosophy take control. Oh - too late!!

Mike

[Susie]

But surely this argument is not about farmers - nor do "real" farmers argue for huge schemes which they could not possibly afford. The issue here is nothing to do with your cheery neighbourhood beef or dairy producer - this whole plan is driven by the desires of wholesale buyers (if I was the tiniest bit sceptical, I might think that a supermarket chain may be behind the whole thing).

Yes, bang on.