Here Frank Armstrong ponders how different the rural west of Ireland was – and can be again – through the medium of food production. Family excursions, a mid century self-help co-op movement, which used horticulture as a vehicle for change, and the future of food production all feature. […]
Interested in European food, farming and rural policy matters? Do you have great writing skills and an ability to deliver content accurately and on time? Then you could be just what we’re looking for! Find out more here.
what amounts to a mini CAP reform has just passed a crucial stage towards becoming law. There is but a single plenary (all MEPs) vote in the Parliament left, most likely in December. So what was agreed and what does it mean?
[…]
Big Meat & Dairy’s Supersized Climate Footprint and an intro to what we can do about it. In infographics via IATP, Grain and Boell. […]
As part of our RETHINK Modernisation series, we present an article on governance mechanisms. This article explores new organisational forms, roles and partners, while presenting six vital conditions for success. […]
In September, most of the EU-Canadian free trade agreement known as CETA (Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement) provisionally came into force. It’s provisional because should even one of the 28 EU member states refuse to ratify it—the deal could collapse. […]
Mainstream UK media have presented Brexit minister David Davis (left, without negotiating papers) as the public face of the country’s progress with Brexit talks. However, the press has studiously overlooked the back-room activities of the international trade minister Liam Fox, who has been rolling up his sleeves and starting to size up Tariff Rate Quotas (TRQs) held by the European Union at the World Trade Organisation (WTO). In an extraordinarily wide-reaching plan described as a “Technical Rectification”, Fox is planning to unilaterally carve out what he judges to be the UK’s share of TRQ tonnages for third country imports such as New Zealand sheepmeat and register the results with the WTO. The story emerged thanks to Sky News journalist Faisal Islam, but only because the TV chain was filming Fox in action at the WTO headquarters in Geneva. In the past, technical rectifications have been more limited in scope, but this editing is on an industrial scale: Fox is not waiting for Davis to get round to discussing trade with the European Commission before trying […]
A preliminary agreement has been reached after 20 months of trilogue negotiations between EU Commission, Council of Ministers and European Parliament for a new organic regulation. The main outstanding issues, which delayed agreement for so long have either been settled or deferred. Here’s what this means. […]
On Wednesday, the European Parliament agreed with the European Commission that agricultural land designated for the preservation of biodiversity must not be treated with pesticides. […]
Catch crops (68%), fallow land (16.2%) and nitrogen fixing crops (11.8%) dominated ecological focus areas (EFAs) in Germany in 2015. Why is this? What influences farmers’ decisions on EFAs? One of the authors of a new peer reviewed publication on this topic, ARC2020 regular Sebastian Lackner, summarises the paper, in which he and colleagues interviewed a range of experts on the matter. […]
Large-scale urban agriculture is on the rise globally, with more and more farms appearing in our cities. A far cry from allotments and community gardens, urban farms occupy much bigger spaces; they can employ people, regenerate huge neighbourhoods and give residents access to fresh produce on their doorsteps. […]
Despite opposition from 18 EU Member States* a ban on pesticides from Ecological Focus Areas (EFAs) remains a distinct possibility for 2017. […]
After the “We Are Fed Up!” demonstration is before the action! At the Soup&Talk event Farmers, organisers and activists from Germany, Europe and overseas reported on their campaigns, successes, their resistance and innovations in food and farming. […]
Food waste is a scandal – in more ways than one. We have somehow allowed a food system to develop that lets supermarkets off the hook – it’s their policies and practices that generate food waste in the first place. […]
Agriculture is losing its farmers. There is a gradual process of land concentration undermining small-scale farming, and consequently the future of a diverse and sustainable cultivation of our land. Farmers are increasingly losing the ground they are working on. […]
Agricultural and Rural Convention