As part of a full day of activities with the Schools of Geography, Journalism and Life Sciences, Tom Heap spoke to us about some of the challenges of balancing rural development and the environment. A key message was that we must be careful not to view rural affairs solely through the prism of the environment because rural places are homes and workplaces too.
From this basis, Tom shared a number of interesting ideas about how to reconcile the needs of food production with the needs to safeguard the environment. He took an optimistic view with respect to the role that human innovation can continue to play in increasing food production and overcoming threats associated with diminishing natural resources. However, this was tempered by the fact that food consumption continues to “deify the natural” and view scientific or non-conventional farming practices with suspicion. One particular example was a salmon farmer in Scotland who is rearing salmon in tanks on the land. Arguably this is better for the environment as it avoids polluting the seas and it also allows the producer to have complete control over inputs and outputs to the system, but, in a consumer world, this is only feasible if people will be happy to eat it.
Therefore, perhaps we need to think about whether there are ways to influence public opinion and demonstrate the safety and environmental benefits of scientific innovations or whether the agricultural sector should be looking for innovations that are more aligned to conventional views of “natural” food production.