Modern agricultural systems have achieved astounding gains in productivity in the past 50 years, but they have come at an enormous cost to nature. Farming is responsible for around a quarter of emissions warping the climate. It’s also one of the primary drivers of biodiversity loss, responsible for threats to 80% of at-risk species.

Crop and livestock farming is estimated to occupy some 50% of the world’s habitable land. While ecosystems such as the Amazon, where cattle farmers are clearing rainforest, usually dominate the headlines, important native grasslands in countries like the US are also being plowed up for crops such as wheat. Intensive livestock farming has the greatest impact on species loss, because of its high emissions, water pollution and the amount of food needed to feed the animals.

Since the 1940s, giant monocultures have dominated farming, largely replacing small farms that grow multiple crops. The effects on biodiversity have been devastating, said pollination ecologist Barbara Gemmill-Herren.

“With large-scale monoculture, after a while, it just becomes a sort of a desert for biodiversity,” said Gemmill-Herren, who is a senior associate at the World Agroforestry Center, an international institute in Nairobi, Kenya. “Intensive farming of any sort, it’s just inimical to the insects that really need to thrive, and along with insects comes everything else,” said Gemmill-Herren.

Bees and other pollinators — a key indicator of broader biodiversity — struggle to service such vast areas of monoculture. These single-crop farms lack other animal and plant species that combat the spread of diseases and pests. That in turn intensifies use of pesticide, herbicide and fertilizer, which can pollute rivers and streams, and damage the soil, as well as the insects and worms that birds feed on.

Pesticides are a heavy fist that are overused and poorly targeted, according to Gemmill-Herren. Fertilizer overuse is damaging biodiversity. Run-off into water systems leads to excess nutrient content that causes bursts of algae growth, which then block sunlight and suck oxygen out of the water as they decay, killing aquatic life.

A classic example of this in the US is the Mississippi Delta where a dead zone threatens one of the country’s most important fisheries.

“For many biodiversity challenges it’s pretty clear what the solutions are,” Stephen Wood, an agricultural and food systems scientist with The Nature Conservancy and Yale University in the United States, said. “If we want to restore ground nesting birds, we need to create habitats for ground nesting birds or if we want to create habitats for migrating sandhill cranes in in the US, we need to maintain flooded fields and make sure that there is adequate corn or rice grain left on the ground for them to use as a food source.”

It’s just a matter of building a system that encourages these practises, added Wood. 

Bairnfather’s Old Bill responded to a fellow Tommy who was uttering critical remarks about the trench accommodation they were in, “Well, If you knows of a better ‘ole, go to it.”

We do Bill, we do, but it needs a majority of the working class to help facilitate the arrival at a safer, better ‘ole.’.

It’s not impossible, but it’s very hard to concentrate on the Labour Theory of Value when you’re worrying over the basic necessities of life.

“A quarter of British adults are struggling to keep warm in their homes as they cut back on energy use in the face of soaring costs, according to a new survey by the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

The report, which was published on Thursday, shows that 23% of adults were occasionally, hardly ever, or never able to keep comfortably warm in their living room over the past two weeks.

The ONS data indicated that 63% of adults were using less gas and electricity because of increases in the cost of living, and 96% of those adults were using less heating.

When asked about the measures they were taking to keep warm this winter, 82% of respondents said they were using more clothing or blankets, 46% were only heating rooms they use, 31% were using hot-water bottles or microwave warmers, while 27% were going to bed earlier.

Other measures included cutting back on the use of tumble dryers and washing machines, as well as bathing or showering less.

According to the ONS, many households have already cut back on their energy usage, with 34% of the polled adults saying that reducing heating has negatively affected their health or wellbeing as a result.

The ONS research on the “impact of winter pressures” also found that 16% of adults are worried their food will run out before they have money to buy more, and 19% have cut back on their portion size. The study showed 17% are eating food which is past its use-by date.

The survey of nearly 5,000 British households comes as the nation’s inflation hit 10.7% in November, which is slightly down from the 11.1% in the previous month but still well above the 2% rate targeted by the Bank of England.”

RT 17\12\22

Dave C

 “The British energy industry risks seeing more suppliers collapsing on the back of so-called “bad debts” arising from consumer bills, according to a study by energy consultants Cornwall Insight and Complete Strategy.

Their joint report showed on Tuesday that household energy suppliers in the UK could be exposed to as much as £1.9 billion ($2.4 billion) of debt, a significant portion of which could be unrecoverable.

That debt could lead to more supplier failures, with the costs then added to consumer bills, which would further exacerbate the situation with fuel poverty in the country, the report warns.

The so-called bad debt will likely only grow, with the support provided by the government’s energy price freeze package rising from £2,500 to £3,000 for an average household, according to the consultancy firms.

“There needs to be a clear path for suppliers to recover the increasing levels of bad debt they are incurring,” said Matthew Chadwick, lead research analyst at Cornwall Insight. “In practice, this means that the costs of bad debt will either need to be carried by the suppliers or by customers who are in a position to pay,” he added.

The Public Accounts Committee reported recently that nearly 30 energy providers have failed since the summer of 2021, with the costs recovered through a charge on customers’ bills. British energy regulator Ofgem’s failure to properly regulate the supplier market has reportedly cost households an estimated £2.7 billion. Moreover, supplier Bulb Energy’s collapse is expected to add around £6.5 billion in costs to struggling Britons.

 RT 15\12\22

Dave C

 Britain’s economy shrank in the three months through October, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) confirmed on Monday, reflecting concerns over a lengthy recession.

Data showed that gross domestic product (GDP) declined by 0.3% in the period when compared with the three months through July.

The decline came even as estimates showed that GDP increased by 0.5% in the month of October after a 0.6% drop in September.

Despite the rebound in October, there is still a good chance that the British economy will shrink for a second consecutive quarter in the last three months of this year, chief economic adviser to the EY Item Club Martin Beck was cited as saying by the Associated Press. Two consecutive quarters of declining output is the technical definition of a recession.

“The near-term outlook remains gloomy, as consumers continue to struggle under the weight of high inflation and with much of the impact of this year’s interest rate rises still to be realized,” Beck reportedly said.

The ONS statistics showed that output by productive industries, which range from manufacturing to mining and energy production, dipped 1.7% in the three months through October. Service industries, which account for about four-fifths of the British economy, tumbled 0.1% during that period.

Meanwhile, consumer price inflation accelerated to a 41-year high of 11.1% in October, fueled by skyrocketing costs for food and energy.

The Bank of England said last month the economy was probably already in a recession that could last until the end of 2023. The regulator has approved eight consecutive interest rate increases as it struggles to rein in spiraling inflation. That pushed the bank’s key rate to 3% from 0.1% a year ago.

“[I] doubt that the economy will grow again until early 2024, resulting in a deeper and longer recession than we envisage for all other G7 economies,” Samuel Tombs, the chief UK economist at the consultancy Pantheon Macroeconomics told the Guardian, commenting on the ONS data.

The British economy is on course to shrink 0.4% next year as inflation remains high and companies put investment on hold, the Confederation of Business Industry (CBI) warned on Monday.

According to the report, the UK has already fallen into a “short and shallow” recession that will leave business investment 9% below 2019 levels and productivity 2% below its pre-pandemic trend at the end of 2024. Persistent weak productivity and business investment “doesn’t bode well for the country’s potential to grow,” it said.

Inflation in the country, which hit a 41-year high of 11.1% in October, was forecast to average 6.7% next year and 2.9% in 2024.

The CBI expects the UK to suffer the second worst recession among major economies, after Germany.

“Britain is in stagflation – with rocketing inflation, negative growth, falling productivity and business investment,” CBI Director-General Tony Danker said. “Firms see potential growth opportunities but a lack of ‘reasons to believe’ in the face of headwinds are causing them to pause investing in 2023,” he explained.

The CBI called on the government to make Britain’s post-Brexit work visa system more flexible, end what it sees as an effective ban on constructing onshore wind turbines, and give greater tax incentives for investment.

According to the lobby group, the government’s plan needs to be built around boosting productivity and increasing labor supply as the UK is the only major advanced economy with fewer people working than before the pandemic.

“We will see a lost decade of growth if action isn’t taken. GDP is a simple multiplier of two factors: people and their productivity. But we don’t have people we need, nor the productivity,” Danker stressed.

RT 13\12\22

Dave C

 “The way things are organised is neither natural nor inevitable, but created by people. People have a wealth of skill, intelligence, creativity and wisdom. We could be devising ways of using and distributing the earth’s vast resources so that no one starves or lives in abject poverty, making socially useful things that people need — a society which is life-affirming in all its aspects” (Alice Cook and Gwyn Kirk, Greenham Women Everywhere, South End Press, 1983).

‘What they say they want is also what socialists want; and when enough of us want it we will be able to combine those two remarkable human capacities, the emotional and the rational, in order to take things into our own hands and run our own society, our own world, in the interest of all people. Only then will ’peace and life’ be possible.’

 ‘To be radical is to grasp things by the root’

From The Bird’s Eye View Column, Socialist Standard, July 2022.

 https://socialiststandardmyspace.blogspot.com/2022/07/birds-eye-view-to-be-radical-is-to.html

DC

UNDERSHAFT. (Arms manufacturer) “Not at all. The more destructive war becomes the more fascinating we find it. No, Mr Lomax, I am obliged to you for making the usual excuse for my trade; but I am not ashamed of it. I am not one of those men who keep their morals and their business in watertight compartments. All the spare money my trade rivals spend on hospitals, cathedrals and other receptacles for conscience money, I devote to experiments and researches in improved methods of destroying life and property. I have always done so; and I always shall. Therefore your Christmas card moralities of peace on earth and goodwill among men are of no use to me. Your Christianity, which enjoins you to resist not evil, and to turn the other cheek, would make me a bankrupt. My morality—my religion—must have a place for cannons and torpedoes in it.”

George Bernard Shaw ‘Major Barbara’

 A senior U.S. State Department official said Thursday that a massive Ukraine aid package ― which contains $4 billion in grants for allies to buy American-made military hardware ― is partly aimed at eroding Russia’s share of the global defense market.

“There is an opportunity here for us to work on helping other countries divest from Russian equipment moving forward,” Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs Jessica Lewis told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

https://www.defensenews.com/congress/2022/05/13/us-poised-to-bite-into-russias-global-defense-market-share/

13\5\22

“They shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”

An admirable aspiration. Let’s do it. How? Abolish War. Abolish States. Abolish Capitalism.

Dave C.

 There aint half been some lairy leaders

Shady scoundrels, stupid scumbags

There aint half been some lousy leaders

Rotten rascals, vicious villains

Are you a blockhead?

No?

Then why let yourself be led by the nose

and suppose that those who smirk and lie

and narcissism personify

know what’s best for thee and me?

A leader’s decree might suit

the cowardly petty bourgeoisie

but dialectic materialism

should teach us that

we do not bend the knee

for any Tom, Dick or Henri

calling themselves leaders

but who are really silly bleeders.

So keep your chauvinism, dogmatism,

Your elitism, extremism,

Take your fascism and totalitarianism,

And  put it you know where

For we’re for Socialism!

When O When their Waterloo?

“Ye are many -they are few!”

DC

Winston Churchill once responded to a grammatical criticism, up with it I will not put. Party members of the World Socialist Movement are constantly asking of workers, why are you content to put up with this continued oppression by the capitalist class? The current wave of strikes in the UK by groups of workers is reminiscent of 1970’s industrial relations. The United Kingdom, disunited kingdom more like, is the sixth largest economy in the world. Perhaps it’s time for an up to date version of Friedrich Engels classic, “The Condition of the Working Class in 1844.” Forget Back to the Future: we are rapidly transitioning back to Hobbes life of nasty, brutish and short.

“Soaring prices, inflation, and unemployment are pushing up deprivation levels, the New Economics Foundation says The UK is on the cusp of the greatest cost-of-living crisis in modern times, with the number of those below the poverty line rising, according to a report by the New Economics Foundation (NEF).

In a study released on Monday, the think tank said that 30 million people in Britain will be unable to afford what the public considers to be a decent standard of living by the time the current Parliament ends in 2024.

Rising prices, below-inflation increases in earnings, and projected increases in unemployment will result in 43% of households lacking the resources to put enough food on the table or buy new clothes, the report said.

According to the NEF’s calculations, by 2024, almost 90% of single parents and 50% of workers with children will fall below the minimum income standard. On average, those falling below the threshold for a decent standard of living will be short by £10,000 ($12,422) a year, the research shows.

“A decade of cuts, freezes, caps, and haphazard migration between systems left the UK with one of the weakest safety nets, both among developed countries globally, as well as in the UK’s history,” NEF economist Sam Tims wrote. “Millions of families were already living in avoidable deprivation and hardship but … the day-to-day experience of low-income families is set to become even more desperate.”

Official figures show that 22% of Britons are currently living below the poverty line because they are getting by on less than 60% of the median household income.”

RT 8\12\22

Dave C.

 Coal exporters from Australia reaped as much as $45bn in windfall gain in the 2021-22 year, with a similar bonanza likely this year.

The Australia Institute has said in a report that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and subsequent disruption to energy markets alone had delivered between $13bn and $23bn of gains to coal companies. All up, those gains totalled between $39bn and $45bn.

“This research shows it’s not just gas exporters who have been reaping the benefit of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine,” said Richard Denniss, executive director of the Australia Institute. “Coal companies have also been making a killing while households and businesses are slugged with surging prices for Australian energy.”

Australia’s coal exporters made windfall gain of $45bn last year, report estimates | Coal | The Guardian

The Socialist Party stands in solidarity with the striking nurses and all other working people who have felt the need to take industrial action. 

The Royal College of Nursing said its members had been given no choice after ministers refused to reopen pay talks. The RCN has to ensure life-preserving care continues during the 12-hour strike and vital urgent care such as chemotherapy and kidney dialysis along with intensive and critical care, children’s accident and emergency and hospital neonatal units, but not routine treatment as in pre-booked appointments such as hernia repair, hip replacements or outpatient clinics.

The RCN’s general secretary, Pat Cullen explained, “Nurses are not relishing this,” she said. “We are acting with a very heavy heart…Nursing staff on picket lines is a sign of failure on the part of governments.”