War, farming and food supply

I mean exactly what I wrote.

One of the reasons we are able to sit here in relative comfort, in an industrial (arguably post industrial) nation state is because as our industrial revolution (which being the first in history had no precedents) started to really ramp up, it became clear that as a nation we had a choice to either carry on feeding ourselves with relatively inefficient farming, or transfer our labour resources to the factories. mills and other key industrial processes that meant we could sell railway locomotives (for example) and buy grain with money left over.

All of which should have been taught in history in reception, really.

However above and beyond that - and the bit many really don't like hearing - is that Britains wealth was mainly generated not by making stuff, but by trading stuff. That's what you can do when you develop the worlds most sophisticated insurance and trading machine backed with the power of a navy that means you can either trade yourself or (more crucially) allow others to trade while you cream of a nice %age.

Most of the UKs problems stem from the fact that the very very very very very very very few that accumulated wealth this way made damn sure us peasants would never see any of it. However that is a different thread.

The lacks almost everything needed to become self sufficient in food in an industrial world. Land. Labour. Economics. And most importantly, culture. Despite valiant efforts by young farmers in a TikTok generation, you won't get many people signing up to work the land.

Not sure what you mean here. Do you mean are we buying weapons instead of going for food security?

Rn we are managing to damage businesses so they result in lower tax receipts so probably not.

Possibly.

If we are reducing food security (and I don't assume less farming in the UK axiomatically makes that change) then ware we buying anything with that cost ? Bearing in mind cabbages don't really make great missiles ?

It’s still silly to put in policies that reduce food security.

Trying to turn the UK towards 100% food self sufficiency is not a good use of resources if your aim is to protect as many citizens as possible

Much better to get those citizens to do what they are best at - putting up flags and having protest marches - and buy the food elsewhere at a realistic price.

It would take about 25 years to make the UK self sufficient in food at a cost that absolutely no one is willing to pay.

I could not agree more.

I could not disagree more.

The next great ‘revolution’ is technical : chips, AI etc - China are winning it with the US close. Lord knows where we’ll be

Fair point

I am certainly not pushing an agenda as you suggest. And I am not naive either. But a country and government that doesn’t support producing as much food as is possible makes no sense to me, and doesn’t seem to be working to protect its citizens.
Your post sounds utterly defeatist to me, maybe it’s you with an agenda?

What would we sell? It seems the Chinese are doing well selling to us for that

The point in decarbonising before the rest of the world is to develop the technology so we can sell it to everyone else.

I agree with your point about nuclear though, it should be an important part of our energy security

The people who I've spoken to about net zero and solar panels all seem to think it's woke nonsense and we should keep our reliance on fossil fuels. I think that's a nonsense of a position.

Would you mind explaining about how they wreck the earth? Is this to do with rare metal extraction in Africa or something else

Solar panels on fields look a lot better than a massive nuclear/oil/gas power plant. Plus you can keep sheep on the same field. We need a source of energy that doesn’t come from abroad.

It's an incorrect assumption that we're all squashed onto this island.

Have you ever been on a train? I travelled up to Birmingham from my hometown last Saturday, and have to say, the VAST majority of the landscape is unpopulated farm/scrubland as far as the eye can see.

I agree with what your DH says about the freezer though. Filling it with low-value, low-calorie foods like apples is a waste of space. You are better off filling it with high-value, calorie-dense foods like meat and carbs. Those are the things that will keep you alive if the worst came to the worst. Not apples.
If you must, you're better off processing said apples into things like pies, juice or purees. Then you're either increasing the calories, or reducing the volume but keeping the nutrients.

Do you mean solar panels? Are they bad now? Too woke perhaps?

Subtract all rivers. gardens, national parks, farmland, reservoirs, wetlands, mountains and on and on it goes. That's why we have little building land available.
Still Red Ed can find some for black glass.

Well part of being able to deter will be a sense of resilience so it’s important that the government do start to make plans and think about this with the hope that nothing ever has to be actioned

’Influx’ what, new posters?

Well the influx of people suddenly worrying about things they have spent the last 4 decades ignoring does rather support the latter ....