I'm neither urban nor rural.
I'm a canal boater come in off the sea.
I may wake at the crack of dawn to catch the shipping forecast because that's what I have always done. I understand weather as farmers do. I understand farming too in the way that farmers understand forecasts. Sometimes I'll record the shipping forecast as I listen to it at 5.25am. Sometimes, if I can stay awake through the business news til 5.45am I'll record the farming too to absorb it properly later when my brain has been caffienated.
British farmers are taking a right pasting in the 'New Normal'. Brexit has not been kind to them. Nor it seems has the last government and the latest government has them out on the streets. They need shoppers to help positively not only in buying British Farm Produce but by paying for it. As a result of tuning in to 'Farming Today', I am tuned into the collective voice of those whose land I pass through. Wallowing in the ditches I commune closely with rural folk who are directly or indirectly intrinsic to rural life. Postmistresses, shopkeepers, teachers, Air-BNB-ers shall I stop listing?
Shoppers need to up the quality of food they eat. Witness the collective girth of the nation and the future diabetic disaster looming. Urban shoppers may not be aware that when they buy 100g of potatoes for 95p the farmer got 2p for the supermarket got 22p mark-up. Do urbanites realise that they and the farmers are being royally screwed by the shareholders of retail supermarkets?
I get 'bargain' spring onions yellow-labelled down to 17p from 90p and when I get home discover they are grown by the Nile.
I am careful about what I eat, but it is only as a result of persistently listening to Farming Today that I have begun to check supermarket food for origin information. I eat 'in-season' produce and try to buy local. Small local shops out in the sticks often source fresh food close by. But when I am cruising my boat through large urban areas I have to be circumspect.
As a result of listening to farming programmes I now have a plan when shopping.
400 words to here.+
I'm a canal boater come in off the sea.
I may wake at the crack of dawn to catch the shipping forecast because that's what I have always done. I understand weather as farmers do. I understand farming too in the way that farmers understand forecasts. Sometimes I'll record the shipping forecast as I listen to it at 5.25am. Sometimes, if I can stay awake through the business news til 5.45am I'll record the farming too to absorb it properly later when my brain has been caffienated.
British farmers are taking a right pasting in the 'New Normal'. Brexit has not been kind to them. Nor it seems has the last government and the latest government has them out on the streets. They need shoppers to help positively not only in buying British Farm Produce but by paying for it. As a result of tuning in to 'Farming Today', I am tuned into the collective voice of those whose land I pass through. Wallowing in the ditches I commune closely with rural folk who are directly or indirectly intrinsic to rural life. Postmistresses, shopkeepers, teachers, Air-BNB-ers shall I stop listing?
Shoppers need to up the quality of food they eat. Witness the collective girth of the nation and the future diabetic disaster looming. Urban shoppers may not be aware that when they buy 100g of potatoes for 95p the farmer got 2p for the supermarket got 22p mark-up. Do urbanites realise that they and the farmers are being royally screwed by the shareholders of retail supermarkets?
I get 'bargain' spring onions yellow-labelled down to 17p from 90p and when I get home discover they are grown by the Nile.
I am careful about what I eat, but it is only as a result of persistently listening to Farming Today that I have begun to check supermarket food for origin information. I eat 'in-season' produce and try to buy local. Small local shops out in the sticks often source fresh food close by. But when I am cruising my boat through large urban areas I have to be circumspect.
As a result of listening to farming programmes I now have a plan when shopping.
400 words to here.+
© MMXXiv
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e-mail the author
[email protected]
@poguemuhone.bsky.social
Publish at All Costs
Or at No Cost At All
