War, farming and food supply

[Lifeinthepit]

With the recent incursions by Russia into NATO territory, it got me thinking about the increased danger of war. Bearing in mind we have nearly 70 million people squashed onto this island that's a lot of mouths to feed if the food supply lines are broken (which presumably would be a priority target by any enemy).

With that clear danger in mind, I wonder how the government is encouraging and supporting our farmers and what measures they are taking to ensure that farmers continue to farm the land to produce our food. And also how they are making sure there is enough proper farmland available (and not built on or sold to Blackrock to be covered in solar panels) to potentially support 70 million hungry people.

AIBU to think that the Government are doing the opposite of making sure our food supply will be secure in the time of any war.

We had nearly 900 ships and it was the biggest Navy in the world, now we have 63 which included HMS Victory which is probably of limited use, unless somehow we can lure all of the invaders there for a day trip.

Tbh I was thinking that as I didn’t get your last post.

Britains farmers haven’t been able to provide anywhere close to enough food to meet British needs for decades.

Centuries.

And it's worth researching why. Because amazingly it wasn't an accident. It was known about then, and accepted as the price of being an industrial nation. And that equation simply has not changed. So expecting anything that derives from it to change is simply ignoring reality.

The role of our navy has changed. Mainly to do with losing a fucking huge global empire.

Maybe to ensure people don’t ’attack Labour’?

I didn’t realise they were so fragile as a party. And mn does actually get the dial moved on stuff, maybe that’s why it makes some nervous.

The naughty Russians have been sending their drones into a NATO country. And Poland are stating that a response is required. This was hitherto seen as a potential tipping point which everybody had been trying to avoid.

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

’Influx’ what, new posters?

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

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.

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

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.

Yes agreed there is a lot more to worry about re War than during the last 40 years!

Even the.most unpopulated county is getting more and more housing built on it. On land that was previously farmland.

I was thinking about pies. Crumbles have become a bit unpopular in my house due to over production...

They do wreck the earth. I'm not sure why they would be woke or not? Do explain.

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.

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

I think they make the land look dead. Far better nuclear. That's my own personal view though.

I probably should have used the word soil not earth. They change the soil composition and also can leach heavy metals into it. The sun won't be able to shine on the soil so the microbes die. I think best to put solar panels on houses or that sort of thing.

Drilling in the North Sea should resume. There's no point in trying to decarbonise if the rest of the world isn't. So I agree with your friends although I don't agree it's a woke/non woke issue.

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

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

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?

Fair point

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

I could not disagree more.