Farming Futures Blog

Browse by Tags

• Anaerobic Digestion
• beef
• biodiversity
• bioenergy
• Biomass
• biotechnology
• climate change
• community
• coppice willow
• Crops
• Dairy
• ecosystem services
• efficiency
• energy
• Energy Efficiency
• fodder
• food security
• footprinting
• forestry
• forestry commission
• fuel costs
• genetics
• GM
• GPS
• Horticulture
• hydroponics
• Livestock
• methane
• Micro-hydro
• miscanthus
• nitrous oxide
• nutrient
• Pigs
• population
• Potatoes
• Poultry
• precision farming
• renewables
• resources
• sheep
• soil
• Solar
• solar pv
• spending review
• uplands
• water
• Wind
• woodland

• WANT TO CREATE A CARBON WOODLAND?

  Author Name: Vicky West Trees are a good: Well-managed woodlands provide many benefits including sequestering carbon. As a result, individuals and businesses are keen to support tree planting, which adds up to an opportunity for farmers and land managers... Posted Oct 25 2011, 12:14 PM by Blog posts Select Tags... SaveCancel Filed under: carbon, woodland, forestry, forestry commission [Edit Tags]

• Carbon storage = bigger veg = happy farmers?

  Author Name: Claire Wyatt A new heat and power box stores CO2 in tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers while delivering electricity to nearby homes. Read More... Posted Mar 07 2011, 09:44 AM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, Energy Efficiency, carbon, resources, energy [Edit Tags]

• A cloud over our communities?

  Author Name: Will Dawson Imagine you are a community energy entrepreneur in the UK. How will you be feeling after the government’s action to tackle the “solar farm threat”? Read More... Posted Mar 04 2011, 09:44 AM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, Solar, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, carbon, community [Edit Tags]

• Barriers to low carbon farming - your thoughts wanted

  Author Name: Paul Sousek Here at Cottage Farm we have demonstrated that it is perfectly possible to farm sustainably and in a resilient manner, that is organically, without using fossil fuels but still utilising machinery and energy. The best place to... Posted Mar 01 2011, 06:20 PM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Wind, Biomass, Anaerobic Digestion, Horticulture, Potatoes, Solar, Livestock, Energy Efficiency, Micro-hydro, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, carbon, resources [Edit Tags]

• New funding now available for Yorkshire farmers

  Author Name: Claire Wyatt Farmers in Yorkshire can apply for RDPE funding for equipment that will help them save money and be more efficient, it was announced this week. Read More... Posted Feb 02 2011, 11:27 AM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, Livestock, Energy Efficiency, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, water, carbon, resources [Edit Tags]

• Food system revolution...who’s hungry?

  Author Name: Julian Hunt One of the most striking things about Read More... Posted Feb 01 2011, 10:33 AM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, food security, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, carbon, resources [Edit Tags]

• Who are the dynamos and who are the dinosaurs?

  Author Name: Patrick Barker Attending the Oxford Farming Conference for the first time it was my intention to absorb every bit of information thrown at me but it was the very first person that I met who gave the most pertinent piece of advice, “Establish... Posted Jan 21 2011, 09:32 AM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, food security, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, carbon, resources [Edit Tags]

• Prof Tim Lang on why we should see food security as sustainability

  Author Name: Will Frazer The only way to achieve food security is to have a sustainable food system. That’s the message from Professor Tim Lang of City University’s Centre for Food Policy, who we met at the Inside Government Food Security... Posted Jan 20 2011, 03:09 PM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, food security, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, water, carbon, resources, soil [Edit Tags]

• Climate news and knowledge #14

  Author Name: Will Frazer Climate News and Knowledge is our fortnightly round up of some of the main stories covering climate change and sustainable farming. This time there is talk of super dairies, sustainable woodland, investment in agriculture and... Posted Jan 14 2011, 09:23 AM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, water, carbon, resources, biodiversity, solar pv [Edit Tags]

• The challenge facing the next generation

  Author Name: Angharad Evans The issues of food, farming and Read More... Posted Jan 11 2011, 02:50 PM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, food security, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, water, carbon, resources, solar pv [Edit Tags]

• The threat that dare not speak its name

  Author Name: Claire Wyatt Climate change is everywhere, Peak Oil is rising on the political agenda, the fate of the economy is still uncertain, resource wars are looming and yet still very few people mention the elephant in the room that could be the... Posted Jan 07 2011, 01:18 PM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, food security, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, carbon, resources, biodiversity, climate change, population [Edit Tags]

• An energy crop that cleans toxic soil?

  Author Name: Madeleine Lewis Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE Read More... Posted Jan 04 2011, 09:00 AM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Biomass, food security, carbon, resources, bioenergy [Edit Tags]

• Climate change - it's snow joke

  Author Name: Madeleine Lewis Back in the middle of November, the Potsdam Institute for Climate Research released a rather gloriously timed piece of work. “Global Warming could cool down temperatures in winter” said the headline just a matter... Posted Dec 23 2010, 09:00 AM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, carbon, resources [Edit Tags]

• Climate change - it snow joke

  Author Name: Madeleine Lewis Back in the middle of November, the Potsdam Institute for Climate Research released a rather gloriously timed piece of work. “Global Warming could cool down temperatures in winter” said the headline just a matter... Posted Dec 23 2010, 09:00 AM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, carbon, resources [Edit Tags]

• Oxfordshire farmers get together on climate

  Author Name: Alan Spedding Farmers are notoriously busy and time constrained. From feeding the world, GM crops and new technology, to better communications and different scales of production – there is plenty to think about. And for an eclectic... Posted Dec 01 2010, 04:27 PM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, food security, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, footprinting, water, carbon, nutrient, resources, soil [Edit Tags]

• Farming conversations from across the pond

  Author Name: David Hugill Thanks to funding from the Food & Farming Forum Yorkshire and Humber, I was recently lucky enough travel to San Francisco to attend a conference on Sustainable Agricultural Partnerships. As a UK farmer this was a unique opportunity... Posted Nov 15 2010, 03:54 PM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, carbon, biotechnology, GM [Edit Tags]

• Farmers – we need to turn the energy market upside down

  Author Name: Juliet Davenport By 2050 electricity demand will at least double current levels, and simultaneously, the UK is legally bound to reducing carbon emissions by 80%. This means we’re going to see an increasing electrification of every part... Posted Oct 28 2010, 03:03 PM by Blog posts Filed under: Wind, Biomass, Anaerobic Digestion, Solar, Energy Efficiency, Micro-hydro, carbon, resources, renewables, energy, spending review [Edit Tags]

• Sustainable livestock: the benefits of big

  Author Name: Dr Duncan Pullar Let’s be clear – big livestock units are not bound to be bad. It depends, as with small units, how well designed they are and how well run they are. The vast majority of the UK public enjoys eating livestock products... Posted Oct 22 2010, 05:35 PM by Blog posts Filed under: food security, Livestock, Pigs, Dairy, footprinting, carbon, resources [Edit Tags]

• Biotechnology – magic bullet or smoke and mirrors?

  Author Name: Will Frazer A technology that boosts yields whilst using less energy and water, and simultaneously increases soil fertility? Sounds like a magic bullet in our climate changed world, doesn’t it? Some argue that this is what biotechnology... Posted Oct 20 2010, 09:00 AM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, food security, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, water, carbon, nutrient, resources, soil, biotechnology [Edit Tags]

• Grass grown at a rate of seed-to-feed in seven days... why hydroponics could revolutionise farming

  Author Name: Howard Campion The first six months of this year were the driest for 80 years in the UK. There were reports of livestock being kept indoors, poor forage production, and farmers using fodder stored for winter to keep things going. Read More... Posted Oct 13 2010, 12:37 PM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Livestock, hydroponics, Pigs, Dairy, water, carbon, nutrient, resources, soil, efficiency, fodder [Edit Tags]

• The Committee on Climate Change go anaerobic...

  Author Name: Kavita Srinivasan Along with others from the Committee on Climate Change (CCC), I recently visited Crouchlands Farm, a 750 cattle dairy business in West Sussex. It’s home to Gwyn Jones, the NFU’s Vice President. Read More... Posted Sep 29 2010, 05:04 PM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Anaerobic Digestion, Horticulture, Potatoes, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, footprinting, carbon, nutrient, resources [Edit Tags]

• Mixed farming or factory farming?

  Author Name: Jules Hayward Efficient farming or factory farming? In the last 12 months, several proposals to create ‘super dairies’ or ‘super piggeries’ have hit the headlines. It’s creating a stir in both the farming community... Posted Sep 27 2010, 12:22 PM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, sheep, footprinting, carbon, resources, methane [Edit Tags]

• The microscopic majority – we ignore them at our peril!

  Author Name: Dr Christopher van der Gast Producing sufficient crops while ensuring our farming practices are sustainable is the big challenge for agriculture. But as well as studying and improving crop plants we also have to understand the microbial diversity... Posted Sep 17 2010, 03:42 PM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, food security, carbon, resources, soil, biodiversity [Edit Tags]

• Calling all farmers - reduce fuel bills + GHGs

  Author Name: Rob Mannion Saving thousands each year in fuel use and reducing environmental impact is a no-brainer, isn’t it? I thought so. Read More... Posted Sep 10 2010, 08:00 AM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, Horticulture, Potatoes, Livestock, Poultry, Pigs, Dairy, carbon, resources, efficiency, fuel costs [Edit Tags]

• The future of farming is in precision

  Author Name: Edd Banks New technology has, throughout history, brought significant changes to the way we farm and RTK GPS is no exception. Read More... Posted Sep 09 2010, 11:22 AM by Blog posts Filed under: Crops, footprinting, carbon, nutrient, resources, GPS, precision farming [Edit Tags]