Agriculture comes off a poor second when states choose to back industrial access to land over food production. The UK government is actively encouraging fracking in the heart of the already parched south east. Over the weekend exploratory drilling started in Sussex, at a site just metres away from the London to Brighton railway and less than two kilometres from a major reservoir.
Anyone who doubts the catastrophic consequences of fracking should look at the distressing images from Pennsylvania, where one couple has to give bottled water to their horses and has been without useable groundwater for about two years now. While they can ignite the methane in their domestic water taps, the US Environmental Protection Agency is either unwilling or unable to point a finger at the drilling operations that installed a methane flare on their land.
The UK Government also continues to show support for the industry. Last week, UK chancellor George Osborne cheerfully announced the ‘most generous tax breaks in world‘ for fracking.
