The Guardian
Post-Brexit Britain should phase out tariffs on food, says thinktank
Policy Exchange says EU agricultural policy should be replaced by system that makes imported meat cheaper for consumers
Britain should abandon tariffs on American and Argentinian meat products after Brexit to bring consumer food prices down, according to a leading rightwing thinktank.
Policy Exchange said the UK should phase out tariffs on agricultural products, saying they raise prices and complicate trade deals, although critics say that would pave the way for hormone-treated beef or chlorine-washed chickens, currently banned under EU law, to reach British supermarket shelves.
Continue reading...Suicides of nearly 60,000 Indian farmers linked to climate change, study claims
Rising temperatures and the resultant stress on India’s agricultural sector may have contributed to increase in suicides over the past 30 years, research shows
Climate change may have contributed to the suicides of nearly 60,000 Indian farmers and farm workers over the past three decades, according to new research that examines the toll rising temperatures are already taking on vulnerable societies.
Illustrating the extreme sensitivity of the Indian agricultural industry to spikes in temperature, the study from the University of California, Berkeley, found an increase of just 1C on an average day during the growing season was associated with 67 more suicides.
Continue reading...Engels’ view on the loss of public space | Letters
The contradictions of Friedrich Engels’ newly installed statue looking down on the private “public” space of Tony Wilson Place would not have escaped the young man living in 1840s Manchester. Privatisation of public land by stealth (The insidious creep of London’s pseudo-public land, 24 July) is subtly altering access to the city and its amenities. Ambiguous road markings and street signs confuse the public, maximising the landowners’ profits and discriminating against people with disabilities. Close to Engels’ statue a penalty notice was issued for using a blue badge on a street without road markings – notices on building hoardings apparently overruled the absence of yellow lines and the rights of the disabled. In Spinningfields £100 penalties are threatened for stopping cars anywhere, without defining what constitutes “stopping”. Local councils and elected mayors must move quickly to enforce the same regulations on private space as those in public space, make private landowners accountable, end discriminatory practices and be fully open about changing land ownership.
Bob Dinn
Manchester
• Join the debate – email guardian.letters@theguardian.com
Continue reading...How to avoid being bitten by a snake – and what to do if you are
Summer is the peak season for attacks by the UK’s only venomous snake, the common European adder. We asked a toxicology expert for the dos and don’ts
As any six-year-old will tell you, there is only one venomous snake native to Britain: Vipera berus, AKA the common European adder. Still, it can give you a nasty bite, and doctors have warned that bite victims are walking into a world of pain by not getting help soon enough.
“I’m astonished by the number of people who know they’ve been bitten but just go home,” says Michael Eddleston, a professor of clinical toxicology at the University of Edinburgh and a snake expert. “Then they wake up with massive swelling, when treatment is far less effective.”
Continue reading...Planet has just 5% chance of reaching Paris climate goal, study says
Researchers find that economic, emissions and population trends point to very small chance Earth will avoid warming more than 2C by century’s end
There is only a 5% chance that the Earth will avoid warming by at least 2C come the end of the century, according to new research that paints a sobering picture of the international effort to stem dangerous climate change.
Related: Bill Nye: 'You can shoot the messenger but climate is still changing'
Continue reading...2017 is so far the second-hottest year on record thanks to global warming | Dana Nuccitelli
2017 is behind only El Niño-amplified 2016.
With the first six months of 2017 in the books, average global surface temperatures so far this year are 0.94°C above the 1950–1980 average, according to NASA. That makes 2017 the second-hottest first six calendar months on record, behind only 2016.
That’s remarkable because 2017 hasn’t had the warming influence of an El Niño event. El Niños bring warm ocean water to the surface, temporarily causing average global surface temperatures to rise. 2016 – including the first six months of the year – was influenced by one of the strongest El Niño events on record.
Continue reading...Culling of Scotland's mountain hares should be banned, says charity
Death rates of hares native to Highlands are not monitored and animals are widely persecuted for sport, OneKind says
Unregulated culling of Scotland’s mountain hares should be banned and the species protected, according to a report that says shooting the animals for sport is inhumane and uncontrolled.
Landowners can shoot the hares without a licence from August to February and claim culls are necessary to protect game, especially red grouse, from disease.
Saving the world's wildlife is not just 'a white person thing'
The conservation sector is dominated by white faces, and for many people it looks a bit like colonialism. It’s time for new voices to take up the fight
In a few days it will be the 18th anniversary of the death of Michael Werikhe, the enigmatic African conservationist. You don’t hear or read much of him these days.
Nicknamed “the Rhino Man” because his work and campaigns focused on the critically endangered black rhino, Werikhe’s main campaign tactic of choice was walking to raise awareness. His first walk, starting on Christmas Day 1982, took him from Mombasa to the Kenyan capital Nairobi – a distance of 484 kilometres – and lasted for 27 days. He later walked in East Africa, Europe and North America to raise awareness and money, raising nearly $1m and covering nearly 5,000km.
Continue reading...Swapping cars for bikes, not diesel for electric, is the best route to clean air
Cycling can be a huge part of the fight to tackle city air pollution. Tim Burns of Sustrans explains how their Active Travel Toolbox can help us get there
The government’s air quality plan may make our air more breathable in the long run but it fails to tackle some of the biggest issues facing cities and towns in the UK, and more people on bikes are a huge part of the answer.
At the heart of the plan is a move to ban all new diesel and petrol vans and cars from 2040, alongside a range of measures to support the electric car market and retrofit existing vehicles. It remains to be seen if the plan will be an effective measure to improve air quality, but it is almost guaranteed that this will be another missed opportunity to think about how we move about and live in cities and towns.
Continue reading...Seals going swimmingly in the greater Thames estuary
The river was once biologically dead but seals are back and a population survey will help guard against threats from disease and dredging
“It’s a good news story,” says zoologist Anna-Christina Cucknell, as she watches seals glide smoothly through the water, their dark eyes watchful as their heads swivel like periscopes. “In the 1950s, the Thames was declared biologically dead. But the seals are coming back.”
Cucknell will lead a land, air and sea survey of the seals in the greater Thames estuary which begins on Monday, including the harbour seals she is watching in the mouth of the river Stour, a short boat trip from Ramsgate marina.
Continue reading...Heading to Venice? Don’t forget your pollution mask | Axel Friedrich
Venetians regularly protest against the huge cruise ships docking in the city, but mass tourism is not the only problem they bring – the toxic air they pump out is harmful to locals and visitors alike
If you’re heading to Venice on holiday this summer, don’t forget to pack your pollution mask. Worrying about toxic air might seem strange in a city with few roads and cars, but Venice’s air carries hidden risks.
Every day five or six of the world’s largest cruise ships chug into the heart of the ancient city, which hosts the Mediterranean’s largest cruise terminal. These ships advertise luxurious restaurants, vast swimming pools and exotic entertainment – but keep quiet about the hidden fumes they pump into the city’s air.
Continue reading...This tranquil bogland is not without its perils
Epping Forest, Essex The deep carpet of moss hides a watery void, and the sparkling sundews are busy trapping insects
The Lodge Road bog is a pool of tranquillity at the centre of the commuter-traffic hum. Both my mobile phone and walkie-talkie radio signals have died, and only a few darting dragonflies break the stillness. Sponging up the sunlight, the bog glistens, a curve of brilliant green amid the deep summer gloom cast by surrounding beeches.
On the outer orbit of London, the survival of this fragile place, the most important habitat of its kind in Essex, seems astounding. Carbon-dating reveals that the first layer of vegetation was laid down here more than 4,000 years ago. Ponded back by a Neolithic trackway, or just some natural lip of gravel, the area was deepened by road building for the various incarnations of nearby Copped Hall since the middle ages.
Continue reading...The Murray-Darling basin: a brief history – video
The Murray-Darling basin covers more than 1 million sq km in south-eastern Australia. In response to the severe droughts of the early 2000s, the Murray-Darling basin plan was signed to secure its long-term ecological health. So far, it has not been successful and serious allegations surrounding compliance have further put the basin at risk
Continue reading...The adaptable caterpillar: Country diary 100 years ago
Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 3 August 1917
A caterpillar sent to me for identification had been place in a cardboard box surrounded by corrugated paper, and marked, “Do not crush”; nevertheless, the post office had done its best, and when I unwrapped the paper no caterpillar was visible in the smashed box. I was puzzled by its absence until I noticed a hard lump on the corrugated paper; the lava, released from the box, had employed its leisure by spinning a cocoon in which to pupate. The normal cocoon of the puss moth, the species which had been sent, is placed on the trunk of a willow or poplar, and the caterpillar mixes with its sticky and quickly hardening silk particles of wood and bark, so that the finished abode looks exactly like its surroundings; the present cocoon looks like a swelling of the paper. Here was a case for the advocates of protective resemblance, correct enough in a way, yet simply caused unconsciously by the caterpillar making use of materials at hand; many similar phenomena can be explained in the same way.
Continue reading...Heavy rain brings flooding and loss of life
From New Zealand to India and North America, wet weather has brought misery to tens of thousands of people
After wet winter weather across New Zealand, the South Island has suffered from a deluge of flooding in the past week. Severe storms caused widespread flash flooding and landslides, which led to a state of emergency being declared across the affected areas; including Canterbury and the island’s largest city, Christchurch.
In the worst affected locations, about 200mm of rain fell in only 24 hours, inundating multiple roads and buildings, with members of the armed forces being rallied to help rescue people trapped in their homes.
Continue reading...Electric cars are pollution shifters: we will need huge investment in generation capacity | Letters
There seems to be little understanding of the simple fact that electric vehicles (EV) are, in the main, pollution shifters – from tailpipe to power generation facility (Ban from 2040 on diesel and petrol car sales, 26 July). The electricity generation and transmission system is already tested to its limits during a harsh winter. Only if objections disappeared to the mass building of thousands of the largest wind turbines, plus similar numbers of hectares of photovoltaic solar generation, could the pollution shifters’ argument be refuted. Even then, there would still be need for conventional or nuclear generation for when the sun doesn’t shine and wind doesn’t blow – doubling the capital requirement.
Then there is the transmission system. Its capacity is based on “averaging”. It assumes that not everyone will be using the full load available to their house at the same time. Each EV charging station takes minimum 3.3kW for around 12 hours – or 7.2kW for fast charging. It would be the equivalent of every house having an electric shower in service for many hours, all at the same time. The distribution system is simply not designed to cope with these simultaneous loads. If the government is serious about no new hydrocarbon-fuelled cars after 2040, we would need to start a programme of upgrades or replacement to the entire electricity distribution system.
Continue reading...Bike blog: five thoughts on the RideLondon 100-mile cycle
As the capital’s annual cycling marathon enters its fifth year, it is smaller and safer but still predominantly male
This year’s RideLondon was the fifth time the event that now bills itself as the world’s biggest weekend of cycling has taken place.
And as has become a tradition, here are my first thoughts – typed in the press centre, still in my bike gear – about the 100-mile event. As ever, feel free to disagree/add your own observations below.
Continue reading...Observer Ethical Awards 2017: key facts
• Read more about this year’s categories
Launch
30 July 2017
As the UK plans to phase out petrol cars, is Australia being left behind?
Britain has joined France and India in trying to ban the sale of diesel and petrol cars, but some say Australia’s size makes the transition too difficult
It is only a matter of time until every Australian car is all-electric. But while other countries are speeding up the transition, with plans to ban petrol cars within a couple of decades, Australia is stuck debating even modest cuts to vehicle emissions, let alone policies to encourage zero-emissions cars.
But as the UK, France, India and other countries move quickly towards getting all petrol cars off the roads, could Australia’s fleet be caught up in the winds of change?
Continue reading...Observer Ethical Awards 2017: judges
The ethical experts judging your nominations
• Read about this year’s categories
Lucy founded the Observer Ethical Awards in 2005. She writes the Observer Magazine’s Ethical Living column specialising in ethical fashion. She is author of To Die For (Harper Collins, 2011) and executive producer of the Netflix documentary The True Cost (available on Netflix).
Continue reading...