Food inc

[jezd]

Short and sweet comment here, I do think you are kidding yourself as you pin blame organisations, governments, industries - who runs them? who work for them? who steers them? who earns a living from them? in the end its people just like you and me - the blame (if it is to be made) is down to us all and the society that we have created. No magic answers here but you are falling into a trap when blaming these faceless entities as it holds nobody to account.

A poor analogy would be this, you don’t blame the actual car for having just killed someone in a road accident (it’s a product) and in the same way you are asking too much for many generations to change how they behave (they/we are product too, yes you will always find exceptions), we have to accept it’s a long game starting with education and asking individuals to account for their actions and take responsibility.

Lets blame the farmers? do me a favour.

 

[Brosville]

in a short and pithy way, you've put your finger on it! As the film illustrates, we DO have the power to change things, often by things as simple as what we do/don't buy - unfortunately, the Great British Public would seem not to give a flying fig as long as the soaps, stricly and football are on the goggle, and there's still "old wifebeater" available at an affordable price per can............
I grew up with the words "on principle" ringing in my ears, there were many things that one did/didn't do because of one's principles, but they died out circa 1975............

 

[hedgerow pete]

frisbee, i am sorry that i have offended you about my statement but no i will not retact the statement that 99% of all farmers are idiots slogging onwards with neolithic ideas and ways of working, if i was to work a 16 hour day that would last once before i would wake up and realise that there must be a better way of doing it, as for working on a farm, please,

from birth i lived in southwarwickshire where you where either a farmers son or a builders son, which ever one you where you lived at your mates place most of the time anyway, i was able to run a straight and i do mean straight plough by the time i was 13, i have sheared sheep , lambed, slaughtered animals and grown crops, the last farm that i worked on was in wales from 2000 till 2007, a mainly sheep farm where it was normal to only work a 10 hour day, apart from lambing time where you have to keep watch all night, i did the nights to allow the farmer micheal to carry on his normal days routine.

and just in case you were wondering micheal, inherited his family farm in 1998, it was £3.8M in debt from his father and grand father only breeding what is referred to a mules which are scabby sheep on the hills. with my ideas and the help of my family, his own family hates him because of what he has done, we have paided off the mortages yes several , removed the over draft and he now turns a very very big profit from his 3,000 acre farm, enough for him to have very nice holidays and to employ staff,

so again friss sorry to offend, but i dont think farmers are more intelligent that the animals they grow

 

[Frisbee]

frisbee, i am sorry that i have offended you about my statement but no i will not retact the statement that 99% of all farmers are idiots slogging onwards with neolithic ideas and ways of working, if i was to work a 16 hour day that would last once before i would wake up and realise that there must be a better way of doing it, as for working on a farm, please,

from birth i lived in southwarwickshire where you where either a farmers son or a builders son, which ever one you where you lived at your mates place most of the time anyway, i was able to run a straight and i do mean straight plough by the time i was 13, i have sheared sheep , lambed, slaughtered animals and grown crops, the last farm that i worked on was in wales from 2000 till 2007, a mainly sheep farm where it was normal to only work a 10 hour day, apart from lambing time where you have to keep watch all night, i did the nights to allow the farmer micheal to carry on his normal days routine.

and just in case you were wondering micheal, inherited his family farm in 1998, it was £3.8M in debt from his father and grand father only breeding what is referred to a mules which are scabby sheep on the hills. with my ideas and the help of my family, his own family hates him because of what he has done, we have paided off the mortages yes several , removed the over draft and he now turns a very very big profit from his 3,000 acre farm, enough for him to have very nice holidays and to employ staff,

so again friss sorry to offend, but i dont think farmers are more intelligent that the animals they grow

So you're basing your accusation that all farmers are stupid on what exactly? That your friend has turned a £3.8m debt into a profit because you helped...?

That you grew up on a farm and therefore must know exactly what is involved in farming today? And that farmers are therefore stupid because they put up with it? What is their alternative? I look round at my customers and no I'm not working on a Welsh hill farm, but I'm on different farms every day so I see a wider vaiety, most of them are in their 50's and 60's, if they pack up, who is to take over? who will take on the hours, the hard physical work. Non of them can get good staff because of the hours and working conditions, the influx of Eastern Europeans has dried up as even they realise they cannot comfortably live on the wages.

Sheep hill farmers are in worse dire straights than those on more conventional downland farms and I would seriously question your friends debt turning ability to be more like poetic licence for exaggerating the truth, or else how come he is the only one who can do it?

And I know exactly what a mule is thank-you, how it is bred and what it is bred for. Scab is a notifiable disease, if his sheep are scabby how come he can make so much money from them?

Farmers appear to have neolithic ideas because people like you portray them as that. Most of them are operating unbelievably high-tech equipment and successfully running what under any other circumstances would be a multi million pound business.

Frisbee

You call farmers stupid because what.............they farm?

 

[hedgerow pete]

IN ANY BUSINESS WHEN THERE IS CASH FLOW/CREDIT ISSUES MOST FIRMS EITHER GO BANKRUPT OR SELL UP OR GO OUT OF BUSINESS , BUT FOR SOME REASON A FARMER IS ALLOWED TO CARRY ON BLINDLY DRIVING HIMSELF IT THE WALL AND TAKING HIS FAMILY WITH THEM, simple laws of business

any farmer that cant make a profit or is unable to make a profit sshould sell up and allow a better person to do the work he cant, if they refuse the land should be romved from them and someone else should get it.. as for micheal he made money using these ideas,
1, kick father out of family house and put him in a small clean house rather than a massive dump.
2, never allow your father to have anything what so ever to do with the farm running systems, his old style of ideas are not wanted
3, collect every single piece of rotting machinery and fencing wire his fore fathers had dumped in hedges and barns, we sold it at a chiffins sale some of the equipment was old horse drawn equipment, this sale alone paid of his over draft of £300,000,
4, change of sheep breed to a rare breed which is more suited to hill style farms and can be sold at a premium price rather than a mule which are not suffering from SHEEP SCAB but are scabby looking, goes so show what you dont under stand friss read first rant after
5 with the new sheep breed started start a slow process of replacement allowing the profits to be reinvented
lambing it to be performs inside two massive poly shelters with proper lights and clean straw flooring and no wind.
and this idea was micheals and its fantastic, he advertised at a local veteranery college and has 2 or 4 trainee vets turn up for his lambing season which he has timed to run over the spring break, we feed them and they get to practise on his animals sheeep , cow, pig, dogetc etc, the vets bring there own equipment and are allowed free range just as long as they can help with the lambing, micheals father never had a death rate as low as it is now out of 2,000 ewes lambing we lost such a small amount evan the vets were shocked

last couple of jobs were the purchase of a weed wipe roller this is to kill the reeds that grow in the lower fields and to allow the grass to grow, but without the need to plough, seed, as the fields are very un evan and to stoney to safely plough, so in the end he has better quality sheep and better forage for them and better health care, all of which his father and grand father REFUSED TO DO, so evan though i love your point of view which sounds far more realistic than mine , sorry friss but i will never be swayed farms should be run as a business make money and profit or off

by the way friss sorry if i cause offence to you , pete

 

[Hombre]

Commercial break

Wow, flak jackets and hard hats on folks. Here comes the light relief:

in a short and pithy way, you've put your finger on it! <<Speaking about Jezd.>>

Jezd, Having met you, I would never seek to describe you as either "Short or Pithy", but as you have been described as having your finger on the pulse here, you must be right, as Brosville has so kindly said.

Hedgerow Pete, I just heard from Alan Sugar, he was asking for your telephone number, I think he is looking for a new anchor man to help with his finances.
I can't quite understand how with a £3.8 million deficit/debt (12.20pm un-numbereed para 3 refers) in 1998 that he only had an overdraft of £300,000 to clear (01.25pm para 3)

if i was to work a 16 hour day that would last once before i would wake up and realise that there must be a better way of doing it

I'm trying hard to remember what you said a while back about working the bees in Saudi.

Oh, I remember now and apologise, because that was only a 10 hour day in 43 degree heat. I did notice that you seem to have a four year discrepancy about living and working in Wales though:

the last farm that i worked on was in wales from 2000 till 2007, a mainly sheep farm where it was normal to only work a 10 hour day

17th April 2009, 04:11 PM
urban flower eco anarchist post #29
left there at 15 moved to london where i realy picked up the south cockny accent i can still do it when i want, i then lived every where from egypt to saudi to south africa for ten years came home to south warwickshire meet some one to start a breeding program with lived i wales for three years no work there so came to live in my families ancestral home of birmingham,

Apparently there is also an economy of truth as well as cash in the current economic climate.
I expect that Frisby and a few farmers out there might be more than happy to hear you to say something apologetic.
If you are going to play fast and loose with facts, or just to make them up, you will need to keep a database so that you don't frequently contradict yourself. Not regarding opinions, but plain hard facts.
Your pants are on fire Pete.
= = =
Commercial break over, back to the main program.

 

[hedgerow pete]

vey very good points hombre and i think i will take a massive step down off my soap box. as fopr the dayes try this small sumery of my cv

1984 moved to london to work as a partitioner/plasterer, as wellas london also worked in africa on building sites

left london in 1987 to join army, engineers. ended up doing explosive removal. poor mans bomb squad. mainly based in the middle east and europe, main role was defusing mines and ied's, which are the things killing most people in afgan at the moment ( the reason why we went from 12 to 3 men in 3 years)

left army in 1990, several more years in africa and the middle east on building sites, moved back to the uk in 1992, started breeding with wife, ended up being bankrupted in 1994, ( professional co man whilst trying to by a farm in wales, lived in several houses and areas mainly around mid wales/ builth wells area.
moved to birmingham in 2006, started the bee shed and allotments that year bean here ever since.

last part is new job starting in london areas in two weeks time, whilst my son is still at school we will stay here untill next spring when we willeither buy a house in birmingham as they are cheaper than london areas or i will build a canal boat and semi retire or a barge and keep working
i would love still to buy some land and live a happier life style than doing what i realy hate and carry on with london or any where else on the building sites

does that help?

 

[Frisbee]

IN ANY BUSINESS WHEN THERE IS CASH FLOW/CREDIT ISSUES MOST FIRMS EITHER GO BANKRUPT OR SELL UP OR GO OUT OF BUSINESS , BUT FOR SOME REASON A FARMER IS ALLOWED TO CARRY ON BLINDLY DRIVING HIMSELF IT THE WALL AND TAKING HIS FAMILY WITH THEM, simple laws of business

any farmer that cant make a profit or is unable to make a profit sshould sell up and allow a better person to do the work he cant, if they refuse the land should be romved from them and someone else should get it..

I haven't once said that farmers don't make a profit......of course they do. You seem keen to point out some things to me but fail to see the blindingly obvious. Farms are either owned or tenanted, either way they cannot go on for very long making a loss, no-one is going to bail them out, so market forces prevail and they do move on, farmers don't need to be "made to move out" if they are tenants and can't pay the rent, they are out, if they own the farm and can't turn enough money to live on what do you think they pay the electricity bill with??? Milk!

as for micheal he made money using these ideas,........

.......3, collect every single piece of rotting machinery and fencing wire his fore fathers had dumped in hedges and barns, we sold it at a chiffins sale some of the equipment was old horse drawn equipment, this sale alone paid of his over draft of £300,000,

is this part of the £3.8m debt?

4, change of sheep breed to a rare breed which is more suited to hill style farms and can be sold at a premium price rather than a mule which are not suffering from SHEEP SCAB but are scabby looking, goes so show what you dont under stand friss read first rant after

So sorry........but mules are a good sheep, bred specifically to be prolific breeders of quality finishing lambs and good mothers, part of their genetic make up is a hill breed so quite why they weren't suited to your Michaels hill farm I don't quite understand, maybe they weren't being looked after properly which is what made them scabby. The only sheep with any real value are Suffolks and Texels, neither of which are hill breeds, so selling rare breed sheep at enough profit to cover a £3.8m debt..........please give me a break. I remember in about the year 2000 when sheep were selling at 4 for a £1 in Melton market, how many million sheep does your friend own?

5 with the new sheep breed started start a slow process of replacement allowing the profits to be reinvented
lambing it to be performs inside two massive poly shelters with proper lights and clean straw flooring and no wind.
and this idea was micheals and its fantastic, he advertised at a local veteranery college and has 2 or 4 trainee vets turn up for his lambing season which he has timed to run over the spring break, we feed them and they get to practise on his animals sheeep , cow, pig, dogetc etc, the vets bring there own equipment and are allowed free range just as long as they can help with the lambing, micheals father never had a death rate as low as it is now out of 2,000 ewes lambing we lost such a small amount evan the vets were shocked

Another interesting point...........true hill sheep, lamb outside and are notoriusly difficult to house, it all sounds so wonderful I'm surprised no-one else has ever thought of it, especially as there are so many vet colleges around now, why farms could just set on vet students and not bother with paid staff...................Oh good grief I'm getting sarcastic now. I see vet students, I take vet students round with me, give them free range on a farm? Working over the spring break.............? how long off do vet colleges have then? Sorry but this is just more poetic licence.........

last couple of jobs were the purchase of a weed wipe roller this is to kill the reeds that grow in the lower fields and to allow the grass to grow, but without the need to plough, seed, as the fields are very un evan and to stoney to safely plough, so in the end he has better quality sheep and better forage for them and better health care, all of which his father and grand father REFUSED TO DO,

Whilst this is all very nice and well done Michael it still doesn't justify you calling 99% of farmers idiots, so far you've just discussed Michael's father's inability to move with the times.

so evan though i love your point of view which sounds far more realistic than mine , sorry friss but i will never be swayed farms should be run as a business make money and profit or off

I've covered this earlier and I agree, but your view of farms appears to be too limited to have a valid opinion

by the way friss sorry if i cause offence to you , pete

You haven't Pete, and I hope I haven't you

Frisbee

 

[hedgerow pete]

micheals debts were if i remeber rightly was £300k on an over draft and £3.3m on land sales farm rights and contract aggrements, there was some sort of tax bill and vat as well, but he did not tell me the details just the figures

 

[Frisbee]

micheals debts were if i remeber rightly was £300k on an over draft and £3.3m on land sales farm rights and contract aggrements, there was some sort of tax bill and vat as well, but he did not tell me the details just the figures

Hmmm, it's sombody else's argument you're fighting Pete and you will only have been told what they wanted you to know, and that will be liberally sprinkled with fiction.

Time to move on methinks



Frisbee