Yara says food crisis coming

Cowabunga

Member
Location
Ceredigion,Wales
If you think (and I do) that we are headed for a complete omnishambles that optimistically will be very bad and pessimistically will bring about significant damage to our current civil society the surely one must consider what to do to prepare. Take the maxim 'See, Judge, Act' and we are certainly seeing all sorts of breakdowns to normal service, then it seems equally obvious that most of what we are seeing can be judged to be injurious to what has until recently been normal service, there fore logically and if one has the courage of ones convictions one must act. I find myself thinking that any sort of blame or pointing fingers is now irrelevant, all that will count from here on is how and what we choose to do?
That all sounds like a lot of nothing to me.
In simple English, what are you trying to say?
 

Cowabunga

Member
Location
Ceredigion,Wales
"Somehow", pollution only occurs in Cities.

We don't see harmful pollution in the countryside - yet "Ammonia" "Somehow" combines with "Chemicals" in Cities and produces pollution.

I think they mean Cities are polluted and Ammonia - which is emitted by AdBlue vehicles - makes it "Worse".

Regardless, it's a cows fault.
Actually the exhaust from Adblue catalytically reduced diesel exhaust consists of C02, water vapour and nitrogen gas, not ammonia. Nitrogen makes up 78% of our air and I seriously doubt whether that emitted by 'clean' exhausts make even a tiny jot of difference.
If cities were polluted by ammonia you would smell it and stuff like sandstone buildings would be bleached, as opposed to the historic corrosion and blackness that used to be caused by a combination of sulphur, soot and acid rain. All of which has gone away in recent decades of course, along with ozone holes.

So we have actually made a difference since about 1990 and that's without even touching on lead fumes in the air when petrol was heavily fortified with it.
 

B'o'B

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Rutland
Is bagged fertiliser essential?
Yes and no. It depends what output you want /need.
I would say that in the UK 25-50% of N use is “not essential” and could be better used by the world elsewhere!

I am a lazy no-till arable farmer, but in my heart of hearts I know that a well integrated mixed farm, efficiently cycling nutrients would be much better environmentally.
But much harder work and I think in recent history less economically rewarding if family labour is costed in properly.
Cheap artificial inputs especially N allow arable to work as a standalone enterprise, limit them too much and you start to need lots of unproductive fertility building phases in your crop rotation.
 

MDL POWERUP

Member
I do mixed farming, but you still have to bring nutrients into the cycle somewhere, for as long as you are exporting it as agricultural output.

Even muck doesn’t come from nowhere, and contains less nutrients than what you put into it (unless your animals aren’t productive in any way).
Genuinely don't know the answer but before artificial fertiliser were farms soil health rapidly declining as they were always taking from the land?
 

Cowabunga

Member
Location
Ceredigion,Wales
Yes and no. It depends what output you want /need.
I would say that in the UK 25-50% of N use is “not essential” and could be better used by the world elsewhere!

I am a lazy no-till arable farmer, but in my heart of hearts I know that a well integrated mixed farm, efficiently cycling nutrients would be much better environmentally.
But much harder work and I think in recent history less economically rewarding if family labour is costed in properly.
Cheap artificial inputs especially N allow arable to work as a standalone enterprise, limit them too much and you start to need lots of unproductive fertility building phases in your crop rotation.
You surely don't want to go to the cost of enclosing arable fields, building and spending on the infrastructure needed for animals and the muck they produce and indeed the extra pollution that extra ruminants would produce for the sake of ever so slightly less factory total N application?
 

DRC

Member
Genuinely don't know the answer but before artificial fertiliser were farms soil health rapidly declining as they were always taking from the land?
Probably the opposite as they had to have livestock manures, grass rotation and often fallow with green manures such as clover.
As I posted pics on another thread, we just had a crop of beet that did 29t acre, that had only had pig slurry on the stubble pre ploughing . No bagged fertiliser at all.
 

Cowabunga

Member
Location
Ceredigion,Wales
Genuinely don't know the answer but before artificial fertiliser were farms soil health rapidly declining as they were always taking from the land?
On the whole yes. During and after the War, massive effort was put in to increase land's fertility and crop yields with EHF's [experimental husbandry farms] wholly paid for by the taxpayer, finding new ways to maximise production potential and educating farmers on all aspects of doing so. Massive increases were made in land fertility and crop breeding to efficiently utilise the increased fertility, along with mechanisation and chemical pest control to better farm efficiency and produce food cheaper.

All that is now being undone it seems to me.

There are still massive areas of farmland that are being farmed 'traditionally' or have regressed to being that way. These areas produce next to nothing in the grand scheme of things. Most of the food is produced by the proportion of farmers that are professional and manage their land rather intensively with relatively high input and high output of clean quality produce.
 
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B'o'B

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Rutland
You surely don't want to go to the cost of enclosing arable fields, building and spending on the infrastructure needed for animals and the muck they produce and indeed the extra pollution that extra ruminants would produce for the sake of ever so slightly less factory total N application?
If I wanted to do it, I would be doing it! So no, I would rather not. That doesn’t mean I can’t acknowledge that in pure agronomic terms, without significant artificial inputs it is a superior system.

We were a mixed(ish) farm up until about 25 years ago. (You could argue about how well the livestock and arable enterprises were integrated, but we were a mixed farm)
 
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tullah

Member
Location
Linconshire
On the whole yes. During and after the War, massive effort was put in to increase land's fertility and crop yields with EHF's [experimental husbandry farms] wholly paid for by the taxpayer, finding new ways to maximise production potential and educating farmers on all aspects of doing so. Massive increases were made in land fertility and crop breeding to efficiently utilise the increased fertility, along with mechanisation and chemical pest control to better farm efficiency and produce food cheaper.

All that is now being undone it seems to me.

There are still massive areas of farmland that are being farmed 'traditionally' or have regressed to being that way. These areas produce next to nothing in the grand scheme of things. Most of the food is produced by the proportion of farmers that are professional and manage their land rather intensively with relatively high input and high output of clean quality produce.
Farmers couldnt go wrong with Tom Williams as minister of ag then.
 

Cowabunga

Member
Location
Ceredigion,Wales
If I wanted to do it, I would be doing it! So no I would rather not, that doesn’t mean I can’t acknowledge that in pure agronomic terms, without significant artificial inputs it is a superior system.

We were a mixed(ish) farm up until about 25 years ago. (You could argue about how well the livestock and arable enterprises were integrated, but we were a mixed farm)
But 'they' are aiming to reduce or eliminate the livestock that we think are beneficial because they are apparently gross polluters of both the air and water and probably even the seas. Even their leather is no longer viewed as being 'sustainable' with 'vegan leather' or plastic as we used to call it, apparently being preferable. It's become a strange world indeed.
 

B'o'B

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Rutland
But 'they' are aiming to reduce or eliminate the livestock that we think are beneficial because they are apparently gross polluters of both the air and water and probably even the seas. Even their leather is no longer viewed as being 'sustainable' with 'vegan leather' or plastic as we used to call it, apparently being preferable. It's become a strange world indeed.
When (from another thread) their figures show that 211 portions of meat equals 1 car on the road for a year, and yet UK Ag in total is only responsible for ¼ of total emissions from UK transport, it is quite easy to see that simply “they” have got their accounting system wrong.
 

thesilentone

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Cumbria
Fattening cattle on grain has been the perfect relief-valve for the surplus produced. However, it then became main stream as the cattle lots developed.

In real terms, it makes no sense to give perfectly good human food to cattle, who by nature give a very poor return in the form of conversion ratio.
 

thesilentone

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Cumbria
Consider the amount of cereal straw, that is otherwise fertiliser for either the grower or a livestock farmer, that is currently going up in smoke along with all the maize that goes into digesters to create electricity rather than feed people [directly or indirectly].

It's a non issue, less than 2% of arable land is used for all types of biofuel.

And, for every ton of nutrient that goes into a digester, the same comes out the back and is returned to where it came from. Which is not the case with arable and vegetable crops.
 

B'o'B

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Rutland
It's a non issue, less than 2% of arable land is used for all types of biofuel.

And, for every ton of nutrient that goes into a digester, the same comes out the back and is returned to where it came from. Which is not the case with arable and vegetable crops.
You wouldn’t be implying the the biggest problem is nutrient loss through people, would you?

Is there an elephant in the room somewhere? Remind me, wasn’t their a vote in parliament on something like this not long ago and it turns out that pollution for people flushed into the rivers is fine, but losses from Ag isn’t?
 

som farmer

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
somerset
it's just a complete buggers muddle, mainly caused by green zealots, preaching what they don't fully understand, and idiotic mp's, agreeing, because they don't want to admit, they don't understand either.
They 'know' all the answers, but have no idea how those answers will impact on their lives, and could well be in for a big shock, when the penny finally drops.
The biggest polluter is fossil fuels, and there is a huge amount of research being done to reduce use. The hydrogen cell looks quite interesting. Scientists will sort out solutions, probably already have, or well on the way to. Plastic, terrible stuff, but oooh so useful, 75% is probably not needed, or could be replaced, jetting off to the sun, for holidays, very nice, but certainly not green.
Climate change is the current buzz word, and measures to contain it, are well known, but, if you are a holiday firm, or oil producer, maker of plastic, or many other industries reliant on fossil fuels, they all look to pass the buck, which is, modern farming, and farting cows, although we are the answer, to many of the causes, we seem to get the blame, for creating the problem, an 'easy touch'.
Yes, we probably use more 'chemical fixes' than are strictly necessary, and we should cut back, but we are only doing, what the guv really wants, cheap food. And, to be fair, if we cut back on all the imputs, fert etc, all that will happen, is less production, and none of us, should worry about that, quite the opposite, supply and demand, will dictate price, and with energy costs rising, and fuel use forced down, that's a lot of our foreign competitors, shafted.
The biggest problem with climate change, is nobody has thought about how the solutions, will actually pan out, and, food costs are quite rapidly rising, is that really a problem for us ? Covid, basically fudged all the carefully prepared, and costed out, global trade routes, and it will take years, to realign them, if ever it is possible. Chuck in all the 'greening ideas', as well, l suspect many of those zealots, may have a rethink.
The old saying from farmers, is, 'l can do without you, but you, cant do, without me.' Is quite apt, at this present time.

On N use, there are many ways to improve soil fertility, without it, or reduced use, we just have to relearn the basics, of a proper rotation, rather than simply rely on it, and, like it, or not, we will have to. Chemicals have allowed cheap food, the loss of them, will produce dearer food, from our point of view, what's the problem ?
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

  • 0 %

    Votes: 79 42.0%
  • Up to 25%

    Votes: 66 35.1%
  • 25-50%

    Votes: 30 16.0%
  • 50-75%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 75-100%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 100% I’ve had enough of farming!

    Votes: 7 3.7%

Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

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  • 1
As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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