Breaking Waves: Ocean News

Brexit, the cost of living and the climate crisis are all making farmers’ lives much more difficult. Taxing us is not the answer Tom Fairfax farms Mindrum Farm in Northumberland Last year, Keir Starmer looked farmers in the eye at the annual National Farmers’ Union (NFU) conference and said he knew what it meant to lose a farm. It is “not like losing any other business”, he said. “It can’t come back.” Since then, Labour has announced a number of new measures aimed at farmers, including dropping the inheritance tax exemption that many have enjoyed. This is a drastic shift for an already strained sector and has sparked heated debate among farmers I know. But one thing has been missing: an understanding of farming and the pressures it faces. The modern UK farming industry has been shaped by decades of government policy aimed at ensuring we have enough food to survive. While agriculture isn’t directly state controlled, the government’s influence is felt through regulation and incentives. If you are old enough, you may remember rationing, which marked an era when governments prioritised access to cheap calories, driving the shift toward intensive farming. This focus, backed by successive governments, led to farmers ramping up production by using new technology and infrastructure, and chemicals such as DDT and glyphosate. But cheap food had vast environmental and social costs, posing a drastic threat to the sector’s sustainability and resilience in the long term, as soils were depleted and biodiverse habitats gave way to monocultures. Tom Fairfax farms Mindrum Farm, a regenerative mixed farm in the Cheviot foothills in Northumberland Continue reading...

Oil and gas company had challenged 2021 ruling that it must reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 45% by 2030 Shell has won its appeal against a landmark climate judgment by a Dutch court, which in 2021 ordered the fossil fuel company to sharply reduce its greenhouse gas emissions. A court of appeal ruled on Tuesday that, while Shell does have a “special responsibility” to cut its emissions as a big oil company, this would not be achieved by imposing a specific legal goal. Continue reading...

Climate scientists and advisers back new UK commitment but warn that there is still work to be done In the halls of Cop29, activists from Oil Change International gathered around a computer to watch a Dutch court’s ruling on a major ruling. In this morning’s verdict, the Dutch appeals court struck down a 2021 ruling ordering oil and gas giant Shell to cut emissions by 45% by 2030 from 2019 levels. The activists were devastated. Continue reading...

The so-called corpse plant takes a decade to flower – and when it does, the blossom lasts just 24-48 hours and smells of rotting flesh. Guardian Australia's Henry Belot went along to take whiff ‘I can hear dry-retching from inside’: queuing for hours to smell Geelong’s corpse plant Continue reading...