The government are reportedly trying to push through a free trade deal with Australia. I wonder why. Some Australian beef farms are industrialised factories with over 400,000 cows fed on grain. Welfare standards are lower that the U.K. ( which aren’t actually that high), even with the cost ( the environmental cost not mentioned) of long distance transportation, our much smaller family run farms will not be able to compete, apart from supplying the smaller niche organic, and much more expensive, market. Farmers are worried this will be the thin end of the wedge that will finally kill them off, especially the smaller farms in Scotland and Wales. Is this just a cynical exercise to show that we don’t need the EU that will actually further damage our economy and come at a great environmental and animal welfare cost?
I will not buy it when it appears on the shelves. I prefer organic grass fed meat, more expensive but I would rather have less of it than buy more cheap meat that has been raised as part of mass production and fattened up with grain, not for me. British farmers all the way I have a sticker on my car too, supporting our farmers. We have the best standards in the UK let’s keep it that way.
Mawbe, He doesn't give a name, or even a number, Just standard beef cattle photograph and the farmer and farm.
City dwellers do not have to buy from supermarkets, there are a lot of farmshops and producers who do mail order.
25 years ago, the last time I lived in a town, I found a butcher in one of the neighbourhood precincts that litter most towns and bought my meat from him. In fact I have not bought meat in a supermarket, more than very occasionally, since I bought my first freezer in 1973, about the time DD was born.
Katie59
GrannyGravy13
Have you got a link to UK farmers shooting male calves in front of their mothers please Kali2 ?
Male calves now have to be reared until they can be sold, whatever the cost, wether it is economic or not. Its one of the conditions in the milk supply contracts, there are lots of other health and welfare rules that have to be followed.
Farmers have until the end of the year to comply with the new welfare rules. One of the problems is that not enough people are eating rose veal so farmers don’t want or can’t afford the cost of keeping them and were killing them soon after birth as a consequence. Not sure they were shot in front of their mothers.
The new welfare rules should improve the situation as should the use of sexed semen where AI is used. It costs a bit more but it means the semen will mostly only produce female calves. The wonders of modern science eh!
Where I live now the sheep belonging to the local butcher are so free range they're often exploring the road verges and the beach.
MawBe
M0nica
Our butcher in France (I have vague memories that we have a house there) only sells local meat. He will have a photo of the animal currently being sold in a shop and the name of the farmer and farm name where it was reared.
I think that would be taking it too far for me!
They always say, never give a name to something you are going to eat and a picture of Daisy Bell with her mum -however happy- would send me off to the Nut Roasts!
(What was it used to be from “contented cows” ? Was it Carnation milk? )
The butcher my mum patronised (! ?) in the small Lancashire town I grew up in was similar to M0nica's French one. Mum once asked him about the freshness of some meat she was interested in. He assured her it had been running about healthily in a field until he bought it and butchered it himself.
Butchers like this are few and far between nowadays and most people, possibly perforce, buy their meat at supermarkets.
M0nica
Our butcher in France (I have vague memories that we have a house there) only sells local meat. He will have a photo of the animal currently being sold in a shop and the name of the farmer and farm name where it was reared.
I think that would be taking it too far for me!
They always say, never give a name to something you are going to eat and a picture of Daisy Bell with her mum -however happy- would send me off to the Nut Roasts!
(What was it used to be from “contented cows” ? Was it Carnation milk? )
Gannygangan
Plenty in the Dales as well
www.dalesdiscoveries.com/more-inspiration/67-highland-cattle
Sad story from The Dales
www.cravenherald.co.uk/news/18490162.farmers-wife-plea-dog-walkers-cows-kill-man-yorkshire-dales/
Got to be careful in the Dales
www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/crime/couple-injured-after-being-attacked-cow-yorkshire-dales-2927831
Beef suckler cows with calves are notoriously protective, do not walk your dog in a field where cows and calves are grazing, if you do find yourself in a field with previously unseen cows let the dog go.
Young cattle and horses can get excited as well when they see a dog so be very careful where you walk your dog
Our butcher in France (I have vague memories that we have a house there) only sells local meat. He will have a photo of the animal currently being sold in a shop and the name of the farmer and farm name where it was reared.
www.peta.org/features/dairy-industry-cruelty/
you could have a look at this
UK banned the use of veal crates in 1990, the EU finally got around to it, despite fierce opposition from France and, to a lesser degree, Italy in 2006. Britain led the way in making rose veal acceptable.
Plenty in the Dales as well
www.dalesdiscoveries.com/more-inspiration/67-highland-cattle
Sad story from The Dales
www.cravenherald.co.uk/news/18490162.farmers-wife-plea-dog-walkers-cows-kill-man-yorkshire-dales/
Got to be careful in the Dales
www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/crime/couple-injured-after-being-attacked-cow-yorkshire-dales-2927831
We go to France regularly (ah well, used to ..Covid and all that) and we see cows crazing in green fields, on meadow flowers, and same for lambs, and yes, horses.
?
By golly, we're old-fashioned like that too in the UK.
??????
I can hear them munching away if I step outside a few yards.
There are numerous cows with calves in fields here!
Not sure why one needs to go to France to see them.
GrannyGravy13
Have you got a link to UK farmers shooting male calves in front of their mothers please Kali2 ?
Male calves now have to be reared until they can be sold, whatever the cost, wether it is economic or not. Its one of the conditions in the milk supply contracts, there are lots of other health and welfare rules that have to be followed.
Yes, also round here.
After my last visit I have just googled it Kali2
Cows and calves can be seen in U.K. fields near me, along with pigs and piglets and sheep.
Law 2014.
GG13. strangely enough, farmers don't usually film this!
Plenty of awful videos available about terrible cruelty to male calves and what happens to them too often, as in the UK milk industry' they have no value whatsoever. I have personally witnessed an awful scene- which still upsets me years later. But I know this is the thin edge of...
So when I see cows with their calves when on holiday in France, I have to smile and think- yes, veal at the end of the day- but probably much better.
Kali2 not all restaurants in Switzerland have the origins of their meat products on menus, at least they didn’t on my last visit which I think was 11/12 years ago.
Have you got a link to UK farmers shooting male calves in front of their mothers please Kali2 ?
GrannyGravy13
No I have not missed the point Kali2 !!!!
I just cannot get worked up about beef imports amounting to between 1.5 and 3.0% of total UK. consumption from Australia.
I respectfully suggest you look into meat farming and production in the sainted EU, before berating Australian Farmers it’s not all rosy over the channel.
Who said it was all rosy in the EU? Not me for a fact. But you can't say that we should not import meat from just across a bit of water, from our European partners, just down the road- so we can protect our local produce and farmers- then say 'OK, let's import from right over side of the globe'. Makes NO SENSE whatsoever.
We go to France regularly (ah well, used to ..Covid and all that) and we see cows crazing in green fields, on meadow flowers, and same for lambs, and yes, horses. Horses feel no more or no less pain than cattle or lambs btw. As for Foie gras, it has an exception due to 'tradition'- and it is disgusting and I will never eat any, for animal welfare reasons. There was a disgusting trade re horses between UK and EU. Horses exported to Italy in terrible conditions, to feed up. As long as it was there just long enough- could be called EU. Not sure what happened to this since Brexit. As for veal, at the farm where we stayed in Central France, they raised calves in small covered huts with access to enough space to move around- and also 'under the mother' in green fields. I don't eat veal either- but they are raised well currently. The treatment of male calves in the UK is dreadful, and at times, truly disgusting. Shot in front of the mother, or worse.
Interesting comment MerylStreep, about that little country in the middle of Europe. Not enough space to raise enough. But I have checked, and there is a huge difference- all packaging, butchers' shelves and restaurants, + prepared meals (like bought lasagna, etc) HAVE TO, BY LAW, have the provenance clear, be it on the label, the shelf or on the restaurant menu. This is NOT proposed for the UK.
Although we have origin labeling for retail products that is often omitted on catering or manufacturing products. Imports are quite likely to be not retail products so the consumer may not be able to find out at point of purchase
You miss the point totally. It will be magic, because it will disappear without trace, and without provenance labelling- and we won't be able to make a choice.
Do you know that for a fact?
I suppose, of course, it could be possible because horsemeat from the EU disappeared without trace, without provenance labelling (labelled as beef) and appeared by magic on supermarket shelves in the UK.
Anything is possible, we could soon be eating unicorns without realising.
I was interested to read that Switzerland imports Meat of Bovine Animals From.
Uruguay.
Australia.
USA.
Paraguay.
Argentina.
Its the thin end of the wedge though, UK farmers believe that this will open the door to massive imports from far eastern countries and destroy their livelihoods. Do we believe Liz Truss? She isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer.
Urmstongran
Probably not MaizieD just as I didn’t bother with the myriad Project Fear denunciations about the economy about to tank, sterling having parity of 1:1 with the Euro.
?
When it's a choice between Rees Mogg, who is not a trade wonk, and experts in the ways of international trade and tariffs, then I'm afraid I go for the experts every time, Ug
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