Momentum are getting stronger

How could you learn and expand your views if you don't hear any other than your own? Some are obsessed with their own beliefs, do not want to hear anything else and just repeat them over and over, which I sort of understand if that is all you can stretch to, but many people pull in information, facts and a broader discussion. The ones I really don't get are those trying to take the thread off topic. It's as if they are a four-year old shouting "but me, what about me, look at me, it's all about me". Why post on a politics thread when there are so many more where they can ask about and talk about themselves?

Here's the Guardian article
www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jul/17/uk-sleepwalking-into-food-insecurity-after-brexit-academics-say

jalima they are early!! We were looking at the wild ones yesterday and saw 1 black one, but they are still largely in flower

Thank you Primrose.

sorry, still off topic gg but just answering whitewave

They are in the garden, we have been picking for two or three weeks now.

Thanks, ww. You stick to the issue rather than getting personal. It makes a big difference. My skin thickening is a work in progress

Sorry gg

No, no, I didn't mean the natural drift off topic - all long threads will do that and I'm sure I will be as guilty as anyone . I meant the deliberate attempt to disrupt the thread - kittens and ducks come to mind.

Just found this about the British Sugar beet industry. Seems positive.

" . . . the British beet sugar industry currently supplies over half of the UK’s sugar demand." It certainly has never been publicised. I thought cane sugar had taken over completely.

"As of this October – prior to Brexit taking effect – British Sugar will be free from a quota system which has restricted the amount of sugar we can produce and sell.

Brexit offers a number of opportunities for the UK’s agriculture industry – it should mean in the long term that our food producers will be able to go out and sell their goods on a global stage competitively.

However, it’s not going to be simple. The sugar business, like all global agricultural markets, is complex and is prone to distortions. Britain needs to put trade agreements in place which counter distortions. We must seize the opportunity to design a policy which allows Britain’s beet sugar industry to prosper outside the EU. Let’s make sure we make the right decision for growers, jobs and communities, whilst continuing to provide choice for customers."

I had no idea Baggs. Live and learn.

It certainly does. except that it can hardly be said to contribute to the nation's nutrition.

So, GG, the excursion via ducks, lemonade and sugar did lead to a positive and interesting detail that might otherwise have not emerged.

I wonder how many other commodities have a similar story to tell?

The money brought into the country by trading beet sugar will contribute to the nation's nutrition.

Providing there is sufficient food to go round and at the right price for the poor

And don't forget elegran the appropriate trade negotiations have to be struck, which of course can't be started until Mch 19, each trade negotiation taking a minimum of 28months. If a single country objects who is also producing sugar than we will be in for a very rough ride. We don't have the clout of the EU behind us then.

Maybe we'll all have to join the local farming collective while living off the tins of baked beans we've been hoarding.
On the plus side, it might reduce the obesity problem in the UK.

Subsistence farming with no cash crops, Primrose.

It heartens me to see an industry which is clearly looking to the future with optimism, and planning their export strategy under whatever new conditions emerge, instead of weeping and wailing and gnashing their teeth with cries of "Woe woe, thrice woe" (pinched that from another poster) The can-do spirit will be needed more in the next few years than it has been for decades.

You would almost think that some posters are disappointed to hear that spirit.

So who will you choose to go without in the supply of food?

Can vegetarians and vegans be first in the queue for imported veg?

Perhaps if May does a bad deal for EU/UK citizens living elsewhere, all the British farmers who went to Spain to grow celery, tomatoes and peppers all year round will return.
With climate change, it might be easier here now.

Well said Elegran.

What about bread?

Subsistence farming is good, is it?
I assume lots of people are going back to the land, including your family, Ana.

Do people actually know what subsistence farming means?

Anyone live in a flat? No food for you then. Anyone live with a tiny garden No food for you then. Anyone disabled? No food for you then

We are subsistence farming!!! Nothing spare for anyone else.