Today's News - 25 October 2012

"When herbicide-tolerant crops are relied on heavily, they trigger the spread and emergence of resistant weeds, which has now happened throughout the United States"
Charles Benbrook, author of a report commissioned by Greenpeace.
AFP (23 Oct)

Why traffic light labels on food will make us all fatter and ruin our farmers
Joanna Blythman reports on a new a new Government-backed ‘traffic light’ food labelling scheme due to come into effect next year.
Daily Mail (24 Oct)

Organic food really is safer for children
Harvard University Prof. Chensheng Lu notes that children are especially sensitive to pesticides because their toxic substance removal mechanisms are still not fully developed.
Haaretz (25 Oct)

Do Bayer's pesticides make worker bees lazy?
What does the health of bees have to do with the corn crop? A growing weight of evidence links a class of pesticides called neonicotinoids, which are used on nearly the entire US corn crop, to declining bee health.
Mother Jones (24 Oct)
Read the Soil Association’s position
The Soil Association’s Keep Brittan Buzzing campaign wants to ban neonicotinoid pesticides and is working promote bee-friendly organic farming so everyone can make a difference by simply changing their shopping habits.

Greenpeace warns EU off herbicide-tolerant GM crops
Global environmental watchdog Greenpeace has launched a new report warning the European Union against authorising herbicide-tolerant genetically engineered (HTGE) crops, saying they would lead to herbicide-resistant super-weeds.
AFP (23 Oct)
Greenpeace warns EU off GM crops
The Australian (23 Oct)

Plans for Welsh 1,000 cow dairy farm thrown out
A plan for a 1,000-cow dairy in Wales has been rejected by council planners less than a year after the authority appeared to back the proposal.
Farmers Weekly (24 Oct)

Ethical Consumer launches Buyers’ Guide to Milk
Ethical Consumer is now calling on shoppers to buy organic milk and to help bury the badger cull. The Buyers' Guide to Milk rates 20 brands of milk and lists Best Buys that are both organic and badger-friendly.
Ethical Consumer (24 Oct)

Badger cull delay is right, say farm groups
Farmers Weekly (24 Oct)
Badger cull delay: Farmer 'may give up' cattle farming
BBC News (24 Oct)

World record price for Charolais bull at Stirling
Records have been smashed at Stirling yesterday where the Charolais bull, Vexour Garth, sold for 100,000gns. This is a world record for the breed, for a bull sold at auction in Scotland and for the centre.
Farmers Guardian (24 Oct)

Choosing delusion
We're told that using garden chemicals is a personal choice. Gardening and environment writer John Walker argues that it needs to be an informed choice - and that we're not being told the full story.
Hartley Botanic (22 Oct)

Ash dieback disease discovered in mature woodland in East Anglia
A deadly disease that afflicts ash trees has been discovered for the first time in mature forests in the UK. The first British cases of ash trees infected by the Chalara fraxinea fungus came to light earlier this year but findings show it could be spreading far faster than expected.
Guardian (24 Oct)

Farming Today
Conservationists say new EU proposals to improve sustainable fishing are weak and won't help protect depleted fish stocks. Fisheries Minister Richard Benyon says the changes will reduce discards and support smaller fishing communities, but campaigners say a voluntary scheme can never solve the problem of overfishing. And moss is being airlifted to the Peak District to help re-seed areas of bare peat land.
BBC Radio 4, listen again (25 Oct)

And Finally…
Pictures of the day
The Telegraph (24 Oct)