The rumours circulating around the future of the UK’s Food Standards Agency (FSA) were made official on July 20, 2010 with a Prime Minister’s ministerial statement. The FSA is to remain as a non-ministerial department responsible for food safety, reporting to Parliament through Health ministers, although its mandate is to be seriously reduced. Previous responsibilities [...]
Recent Articles
Bearing the Weight of Britain’s Child Obesity
The independent research company, Datamonitor, yesterday released its report on the rate of Britain’s child obesity. Alarmingly, the report declared that British children are spending nearly twice as much annually on sweets and chocolates, with British average spending at £372 as compared to £150 for American children. The report continues to report that more than one [...]
Russia and the USA: the Politics of Poultry
In the 1990s, as Russia thawed to liberal economics during the days of the Bush administration, Russia found itself flooded with American fowl. So abundant was American chicken in Russia that it became popularly known as “Bush Legs”. This onslaught of poultry exports finally resulted in a trade row and a Russian ban on imports of American [...]
The Conference on Biodiversity 2010 – the “mitigation of perverse and the promotion of positive”
The conference on biodiversity (CBD), running from 10-21 May 2010, is currently taking place in Nairobi. As 2010 is also the UN “International Year of Biodiversity” there has been quite a lot of activity surrounding the meetings. While most events in this vain fail to deliver tangible outcomes this particular CBD/SBSTTA 14 technical meeting is [...]
UK Food Group Briefing – Food Sovereignty, Agroecology & Ecological Food Provision
This briefing paper by the UK Food Group is a beautifully framed presentation of what is wrong with the international food system and how it can be brought back into balance. While the paper addresses the problems of the international food complex, the paper is positive in its tone and its proposals are constructive. The [...]
DEFRA’s UK Food Security Assessment Matrix
In January 2010, DEFRA produced a handy assessment of the UK’s food security in a helpful matrix. The assessment covers issues under the headings: Global Availability, Global Resource Sustainability, UK Availability and Access, UK Food Chain Resilience, Household Food Security, Safety and Confidence. The matrix describes and scores each category using a traffic light system [...]
Professor Tim Lang and the New Fundamentals
This is a video presentation by Professor Tim Lang on the the New Fundamentals, those being the key areas of concern for global food security and sustainability. Professor Lang, in his lecture at the Garden Organic annual meeting, describes how the issues of oil, water, climate change, biodiversity, demographics, urbanisation, labour, nutrition transition, health care costs [...]
DFID/Defra Policy Narrative on Global Food Security and Sustainable Agriculture
DFID and DEFRA have recently released this summary report which covers most of the UK’s governmental efforts related to food security. The report briefly defines the issues which led to the 2008 food price spikes and explain what their responses were. The report also assesses the current stresses on global food security and explains the [...]
In Memory of Mariusz Handzlik
Although this post is not related to food policy, it is related to the people that make policy. Yesterday my dear friend, Mariusz Handzlik, died tragically when the plane carrying the President of the Republic of Poland, and many others from the cabinet of the president and officers of state crashed in Russia. Mariusz was [...]
Food poverty and inequality: The growth of hunger in the UK – a lecture by Martin Caraher
City University’s Centre for Food Policy has grown to become one of the nation’s leading voices in food policy. Led by Prof. Tim Lang the centre not only is the leading food policy academic program in the country but also provides strong council to the nation as a whole through its participation in governmental and [...]
