Wednesday, 01 May 2024 11:57

Wrongheaded

Written by Milking It

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OPINION: Food security is a sore point in the UK, as a direct result of its National Food Strategy, and there’s a lesson in this for other food producing nations like NZ: government meddling in farming is a very bad idea!

To farm in the UK you need a special barn just to store all the paperwork in.

The Strategy turned the red tape up a notch, rewiring the entire food production system, essentially to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Farmers are paid incentives to take land out of production, reduce livestock numbers and plant non-food carbon-fixing crops.

The result is a massive drop in food production in the UK, driving up food prices and reducing food security.

So it was a relief to hear NZ’s unworkable winter grazing rules have been axed.

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