State of Nature 2016: "the countryside" is broken
The latest State of Nature report is out and, predictably, it makes grim reading. There are some minor gains, but the overall picture is that habitat loss and climate change has meant that wildlife continues to decline. The UK is at least ahead of Hong Kong in terms of how damaged its nature is. Hurrah.
This report is a national scandal. 75% of the UK is managed for food production; this is by and large the bit of the UK people call "the countryside". It is extraordinary that we do not specifically connect our loss of biodiversity to what is going on here. It is extraordinary that we know so little about how intensive agriculture is harming our wildlife and how little we are doing about it. It is extraordinary that we seem to have so little political will to tackle this issue, as we are supposedly a nation of nature lovers.
As worrying is that we are becoming so removed from nature. "The countryside" is rapidly becoming the preserve of retirees from the suburbs, whose vision of bucolic bliss is living next to the 18th green of Liam Fox's favourite golf course. Over and over again I find myself arguing against different varieties of green desert. This is not rocket science, nor UK specific, of course. We were in Italy in the summer. Week one in the woods outside Perugia. All manner of buzzing flying things. Week two 50km down the road. Surrounded by picturesque vineyards and orchards, flying buzzing things nil.
Part of me hopes that Brexit will bring such horrendous problems for farmers that our preconceptions about food security and land use will be turned upside down. We cannot continue to pay absurdly low prices for food for which we are paying such a horrendous hidden cost in subsidy and environmental damage. We must change the way we use land or write off our environment completely.
This report is a national scandal. 75% of the UK is managed for food production; this is by and large the bit of the UK people call "the countryside". It is extraordinary that we do not specifically connect our loss of biodiversity to what is going on here. It is extraordinary that we know so little about how intensive agriculture is harming our wildlife and how little we are doing about it. It is extraordinary that we seem to have so little political will to tackle this issue, as we are supposedly a nation of nature lovers.
As worrying is that we are becoming so removed from nature. "The countryside" is rapidly becoming the preserve of retirees from the suburbs, whose vision of bucolic bliss is living next to the 18th green of Liam Fox's favourite golf course. Over and over again I find myself arguing against different varieties of green desert. This is not rocket science, nor UK specific, of course. We were in Italy in the summer. Week one in the woods outside Perugia. All manner of buzzing flying things. Week two 50km down the road. Surrounded by picturesque vineyards and orchards, flying buzzing things nil.
Part of me hopes that Brexit will bring such horrendous problems for farmers that our preconceptions about food security and land use will be turned upside down. We cannot continue to pay absurdly low prices for food for which we are paying such a horrendous hidden cost in subsidy and environmental damage. We must change the way we use land or write off our environment completely.