Eating, worrying, writing books #EthicalCarnivore #AvocadoAnxiety Sheep wrangling, rhoddie bashing, writing @bendamph Born at 334 ppm.
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Articles by Louise Gray
Remaking Downtown Pittsburgh
Editor’s note: We invited 13 regional leaders to give their thoughts on how to revitalize and reinvigorate Downtown Pittsburgh. Despite numerous emails back and forth with the communications staff of Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey from March 15 to April 20, the Mayor did not offer his thoughts on Downtown Pittsburgh. The responses of 12 other leaders follow. DAVID L. HOLMBERG, PRESIDENT & CEO, HIGHMARK HEALTH I view Downtown Pittsburgh from multiple perspectives.
'The life of an animal is not an experiment'
A large chunk of land in the Highlands of Scotland is now owned by conservation bodies, and a big part of what they do is manage deer numbers. Red deer populations have never been higher than they are today, and it is generally agreed that, to allow woodland to regenerate, a certain number have to be culled. That means that, for the first time in recent history, conservationists and deer stalkers have to understand each other: they have to find a middle ground.
“No Bees, No Food.” How Insects Help Farmers With Their Harvest
On a May morning, when the first orange-tip butterflies are feeding on the wildflowers left on the road verges, I drive down to the Borders to visit Scotland’s biggest tomato farm. At first, I think I have missed it. As I park up at Standhill Farm, I can see Holstein cattle—another Dutch import—grazing the fields and bales of silage stacked against the old stone walls, but no sign of a greenhouse.
Avocado Anxiety - Books from Scotland
‘I believe that by making the consumer aware we can drive those in power to take seriously the role of food in making our population healthier and our environment more resilient.’ For her first book, The Ethical Carnivore, Louise Gray wrote about only eating animals she killed herself in order to explore the impact of meat on climate change.
Avocado Anxiety - Books from Scotland
Louise Gray Louise Gray is a freelance writer based in Scotland. She trained with The Press Association and was a staff writer for The Scotsman. She covered UN climate change talks, GM foods and the badger cull during five years as the Environment Correspondent for The Daily Telegraph. Louise specialises in writing about food, farming and climate change. In recent years, she has written for , , theand , among others. She has also appeared on BBC television and radio.
How to freeze veg
Food waste | Eating & drinking | Climate change Bob Andrew 2nd March 2021 No Time to Waste. This article is part of a joint campaign by Riverford and Wicked Leeks to help people cut food waste and raise awareness. Fruit and veg are ideally eaten fresh, and in the week of delivery if you’re receiving a veg box, but freezing is a great way to put some aside for later and avoid food waste.
A guide to ethical gift wrap
Food waste | Recycling Becky Blench 3rd December 2021 Gift wrap is often last on the list and gets grabbed in a hurry, but change is happening this year as more become aware of curbing waste and reducing or recycling what we use. A huge amount of wrapping paper is wasted at Christmas. Defra estimated that it would be enough to wrap up Guernsey, and if we all recycled just half of the 8,000 tonnes produced we’d save 25,000 trees.
COP26 fails to tackle nitrogen in farming
COP26 | Farming | Climate change Louise Gray 16th November 2021 Exclusive: Louise Gray, in Glasgow Scientists and farmers are angry that UK diplomats at the recent COP26 climate talks in Glasgow failed to include cutting nitrogen pollution as part of efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The Glasgow Climate Pact just about kept alive the hope that global temperatures can be kept below 1.5 degrees of warming, although Greenpeace described it as “on life support”.
Why are COP26 delegates turning their noses up at haggis?
Bad for the planet? (Credit: Getty images) As if negotiating a global climate deal into the early hours was not enough, delegates at COP26 have to worry about whether the haggis, neeps and tatties they enjoyed for lunch is destroying the planet. The COP26 menu tells delegates that each serving of the traditional Scottish dish generates 3.4kg of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e). It is the heaviest carbon footprint on the COP menu, worse even than the Scottish beef burger (at 3.3kg CO2e).
Devon farmer spells SOS COP26 on sand
COP26 | Climate change | Community Nina Pullman 12th November 2021 A Devon farmer helped a community spell out SOS COP26 to send a message to leaders meeting in Glasgow to discuss climate action and launch their own action plan. John Tucker, who grows organic veg, cereals and raises lamb and beef with his daughter Cathy Case and supplies organic veg box company Riverford, drove his tractor onto the beach to spell out the message as the community gathered on the beach.
COP26: Meat, industrial farming and the future of food
COP26 | Climate change | Farming Louise Gray 10th November 2021 As the last few days of COP26 comes to a head there is frustration that the climate talks have been more ‘blah, blah, blah’, as Greta Thunberg memorably put it. The latest scientific assessment suggests that current commitments by countries to cut carbon fails to prevent dangerous global warming.
Farmers and landworkers assemble at COP26
COP26 | Climate change | Biodiversity | Ethical business | Farming Becky Blench 1st November 2021 Farmers, foresters and landworkers are set to march at the climate conference COP26 in Glasgow this week as part of the Global Day of Action for Climate Justice.
Organic brewer shortlisted for net zero award
COP26 | Climate change | Net zero Nina Pullman 28th October 2021 An organic microbrewer from Devon is one of five finalists for a prestigious award recognising ‘Heroes in Net Zero’ and will travel to the climate talks in Glasgow next week for the ceremony.
Business leaders and celebrities join forces ahead of COP26
Climate change | Politics Nina Pullman 25th October 2021 Founder of organic veg box company Riverford Guy Singh-Watson and fashion designer Vivienne Westwood are among 30 business leaders and celebrities who will release a self-penned ‘Letter to the Earth’ in this week’s countdown before the pivotal COP26 climate talks.
Business leaders and celebrities join forces ahead of COP26
Climate change | Politics | COP26 Nina Pullman 25th October 2021 Founder of organic veg box company Riverford Guy Singh-Watson and fashion designer Vivienne Westwood are among 30 business leaders and celebrities who will release a self-penned ‘Letter to the Earth’ in this week’s countdown before the pivotal COP26 climate talks.
Roots to Fruits: Scare yourself into eating pumpkin
Food waste | Climate change | Eating & drinking Louise Gray 21st October 2021 Every year we compete to carve the scariest faces in our pumpkins, but the scariest thing is how much food waste is caused by this relatively recent Halloween tradition. The environmental charity Hubbub estimates we waste 14.5 million pumpkins around the 31st October, enough to make a bowl of soup for everyone in Britain.
Brits are eating 17 per cent less meat
Meat | Climate change | Health Nina Pullman 21st October 2021 Brits are eating 17 per cent less meat overall but still consume on average one portion a day and have increased their white meat consumption, new analysis has shown. From 2008 to 2019, average meat consumption per day decreased from 103·7g to 86·3 g per day (a reduction of 17 per cent), including a reduction in red meat of 13·7g, a reduction in processed meat of 7g, and a 3·2g increase in white meat consumption.
Totnes raises £27k in two weeks for climate centre
Climate change | Community Nina Pullman 14th October 2021 The community of the Devon town Totnes has raised almost £30,000 in two weeks to fund a new climate change response centre to provide information, meeting points and a base for action groups to work from. The centre will be set up in the middle of Totnes town, to inspire, educate and enable the community to respond effectively and creatively to climate and ecological breakdown at a local level.
Gene editing red tape to be lifted despite no consensus
Technology | Environment & ethics | Farming Nina Pullman 4th October 2021 The government is relaxing red tape around trials of gene-edited fruit, veg and livestock despite a public consultation that suggested most people support continuing regulation. A public consultation launched earlier this year gathered views on the regulation of genetic technology in food, asking whether gene editing (GE) should still be considered as a genetically modified organism (GMO).
What has COP26 got to do with your breakfast?
Climate change | Eating & drinking | Fairtrade | Farming | Meat | Politics Louise Gray 28th September 2021 In just a few weeks the world will meet in Scotland to agree the best way to meet a target to keep global warming below 2C, ideally 1.5C. Already there have been promises to shift the world to renewable energy and electric cars. But what about how we eat? A third of human-caused greenhouse gas emissions are from the food system.
Opening the door to nature
Nature | Mental health | Inequality | Inequality Becky Blench 8th October 2021 Since the start of the pandemic, lockdowns have highlighted not only the vital importance of connecting with nature for our physical wellbeing and mental health, but also existing inequalities and the way they impact access to green spaces, both urban and rural.
In praise of a Real Living Wage
Politics | News from the farm Guy Singh-Watson 30th September 2021 With or without Covid, removing 1.3 million EU workers – by making them feel insecure and unwelcome, or by making them illegal – was bound to disrupt the job market. Unsurprisingly, the impact is being felt most in the industries that have become most reliant on East European labour over the last 20 years: food manufacturing, hospitality, care, transport, and farming. With so many vacancies, wages are rising fast.
Grapes top of list for pesticide residues
Biodiversity | Health Becky Blench 30th September 2021 The nation’s favourite fruits contain the highest level of pesticides residues according to the latest Dirty Dozen ranking. Green, red and black grapes are three of the UK’s favourite five fruits, but come top of this year’s ‘Dirty Dozen’, a list of fruits and vegetables with the highest level of pesticide residues, compiled with official UK government testing figures.
Roots to Fruits: The magic of foraging
Biodiversity | Local sourcing Louise Gray 21st September 2021 At this time of year I always go ‘brambling’, but it wasn’t until I looked into the history and science of foraging that I realised just how powerful picking blackberries can be. The best place I know for brambles is near a little town in East Lothian called Haddington. I was vaguely aware that in the 16th Century the area was part of a witchcraft ‘outbreak’.
Cheap housing, not cheap food
Ethical business | Environment & ethics | Health Guy Singh-Watson 28th July 2021 Henry Dimbleby’s National Food Strategy, published last month, seeks to address the twin challenges of saving our health, and saving our planet. It delivers an excellent analysis of the problems in food and farming, and how we got here. The logical and well-thought-through recommendations that follow include: - Taxes on salt and sugar, and large food companies to report on sales and waste.
'The relief corp' and a pool of untapped talent
Ethical business | Inequality | Politics David Markson 27th July 2021 ‘The object of government in peace and war is not the glory of rulers or of races, but of the happiness of the common man.’ Sir William Beveridge, Social Insurance and Allied Services report, 1942. Imagine a society where everyone is incentivised to be involved in the wellbeing of each other. Want help filling in that tricky form? Your children collected from school? Covering a catering shift? A parcel delivery?
Growers face losses after erratic weather
Farming | Food waste Nina Pullman 29th July 2021 British growers have faced one of the toughest years on record as the erratic weather since spring has left them battling a barrage of pests and weeds and causing significant crop losses. It comes as a new report looked at food waste on farms for the first time since 2011, and found it is a “significant but overlooked hotspot” that has been neglected in comparison to efforts cutting waste in shops and homes.
Roots to Fruits: Bees, biogas and British tomatoes
Environment & ethics | Technology | Farming Louise Gray 30th June 2021 Has anyone else noticed that tomatoes are starting to taste better? It used to be you would pick up some salad tomatoes at the supermarket and most would be a uniform size, shape and taste. Nowadays you can pick up colourful varieties produced in Britain all year round. The British tomato-growing boom is nothing new.
Palestine harvests under threat from conflict
Ethical business | Fairtrade Nina Pullman 21st May 2021 Farmers in Palestine’s West Bank have saved their heritage wheat harvest from a fire started in the fields during clashes between protestors and the Israeli army. Fairtrade organisation Canaan Palestine, which grows heritage wheat varieties in fields around the village of Jalameh in the West Bank, said farmers raced to contain the blaze and managed to continue to harvest during the clashes.
Is it the end of the road for food miles?
Dear MetLink Thanks for your query. I have actually had a lot of young people asking me about this. This generation want to know how they can make a difference to climate change through what they eat. They know to eat less meat. But how can they reduce carbon through the fruits and vegetables they choose to eat?
Prince Charles hopes for ‘landmark’ climate talks
Climate change | Farming | Environment & ethics Jack Thompson 10th May 2021 Prince Charles has backed plans to simplify how sustainability in farming is measured to cut workload and data fatigue for farmers caused by the proliferation in eco labels. The new framework has been developed over four years by the Sustainable Food Trust, along with contributors, and hopes to harmonise methods of measuring sustainability on farms and accelerate the transition to a lower impact food chain.
Riverford launches organic ‘soil boxes’
Organics | Grow your own Nina Pullman 1st April 2021 Soil is rising up the agenda thanks to its role as a carbon sink and veg box company Riverford has taken it one step further with the launch of its new organic soil boxes. Responding to calls from customers, Riverford will sell organic soil boxes alongside its offering of seasonal organic fruit and veg, delivering straight to customers at a price of £34.95.
Wanted: Female leaders
Diversity | Environment & ethics Anna Turns 7th March 2021 When 22-year-old poet Amanda Gorman took to the stage at the Biden inauguration and so eloquently performed The Hill We Climb just after Kamala Harris was sworn in as the first female and first black and South Asian American Vice President of the US, history was made.
Roots to fruits: Why bananas are the perfect pandemic fruit
Diversity | Nature | Fairtrade | Organics Louise Gray 15th March 2021 Banana bread has become the unofficial baked good of lockdown. But there is a more important reason why, for me, the banana should be the official fruit of the pandemic. For the last 30 years the banana has been in the teeth of its own global epidemic, and bizarre as it may seem, a humble fruit may have some answers for all of us on how we return to a ‘new normal’.
Roots to fruits: The joy of beans
Plant-based | Eating & drinking | Local sourcing Louise Gray 10th February 2021 Anyone else breathe a sigh of relief when Veganuary (formerly known as January) was over this year? If the weather and a global pandemic were not hard enough to bear, cutting out cheese and bacon made it even more difficult for some people. Don’t get me wrong, I have no issue with individuals deciding to eat a plant-based diet if that is right for you.
Anxiety is normal but not inevitable
Climate change | Health Amy Leech 18th March 2020 While coronavirus continues to sweep across the world, anxiety is understandably increasing. But before the virus took hold, it was climate and eco anxiety that were troubling many. And rightly so.
Life after Veganuary: the ethical guide to eating meat, eggs and dairy
Veganuary is over, leaving only the remains of a seitan burger and some cashew cheese in the back of the fridge. Perhaps you feel lighter and healthier; you will certainly feel more virtuous. But do you also feel like a steak? It is OK – you can admit it. The campaign group behind this annual event estimates that only half of the participants plan to remain meat-free beyond the end of the month.
Food sustainability is nothing without equality
Environment & ethics | Price | Politics Nina Pullman 11th December 2019 One of the most common conclusions in debates about how to make our food system more sustainable, and reward and incentivise farmers for producing in a more sustainable way, is that consumers need to be persuaded to pay more for food. And it’s true that we live in a world where unhealthy, processed and intensively-produced food is cheaper, while ethical food reflects the ‘true’, and higher, cost of food production.
Louise Gray: Call me a hack, just don’t call me an environmentalist | Climate Home - climate change news
Why do environmental journalists get accused of being campaigners if they point out climate change is happening? It always makes me laugh when people ask: “So you’re an environmental journalist – do you believe in global warming?” “Er, yes, yes it happens I do.
My Year Killing to Eat
“A courageous and important narrative offering an enlightened perspective on making informed choices about eating meat.” – Kirkus Reviews “A charming and eye-opening book” – the Guardian “A thorough, engaging, sometimes shocking account of where our meat comes from.
My Year Killing to Eat
“A charming and eye-opening book” – the Guardian “The author more than earns her stripes... It's impossible not to admire her.” – The Evening Standard “This humane, adventurous and wonderfully illuminating exploration will entertain and challenge everyone, from carnivore to vegan.” – Patrick Barkham, “Vivid, visceral and honest. Gray observes without ever being detached, and that's a rare talent.” – Ella Risbridger, “Compellingly readable, wise and kind.
Local Dispatch: Why we still send Christmas cards
The holiday season is filled with traditions that might seem to be meaningless. But one tradition, in my mind, is a keeper — the sending of Christmas cards. I grew up in an extended immigrant family, and sending Christmas cards made them feel more like Americans. Grandma Helen, with her broken English and rough handwriting, needed a ghostwriter.
Local Dispatch: Appetite for conversation can lead to rare friendship
When I was a little girl, my mother used to warn people about my gift of gab by saying, "Louise likes to talk." That particular aspect of my personality did not disappear as I grew older. The front of our Shadyside home has a small garden area that affords me an opportunity to chat as I water and weed. One summer afternoon in the late 1990s, a Chinese man passed by and I and greeted him with "Ni hao ma." A big grin appeared on his face after hearing his native tongue.
Is It Possible To Be An Ethical Carnivore?
Everyone knows one of the easiest things you can do to help the planet is stop eating meat, right? As an environmental journalist for the last six years, I am more aware than most of the statistics. I know that meat production creates 18% of greenhouse gas emissions – a little more than all of the world’s cars, trains and planes combined. I know that giving up meat can not only reduce carbon dioxide but water use and deforestation.
Louise Gray: Call me a hack, just don’t call me an environmentalist
Why do environmental journalists get accused of being campaigners if they point out climate change is happening? It always makes me laugh when people ask: “So you’re an environmental journalist – do you believe in global warming?” “Er, yes, yes it happens I do.
To fight climate change, we in the UK are better together
COMMENT: An independent Scotland – or the rest of the UK it leaves behind – will not hold much sway at climate talks I have put off writing about Scotland’s independence referendum. Despite being a former political correspondent on The Scotsman, I have only been living up here for a year or so and didn’t feel I had the right to tell people how to vote. After five years as environment correspondent on the Daily Telegraph my area of knowledge is climate change.
The Wire Issue 308
Collaborating with hauntologists The Focus Group, Warp's defining post-rock duo summon an occult pop laden with psychedelia. By Joseph Stannard On the eve of his Metal Machine Trio tour, The Velvet Underground veteran takes a walk on the wild side of The Wire's record collection. Tested by Alan Licht A surreal dream set the Romanian composer on his lifelong quest to liberate sound's rude splendour from 400 years of classical tradition.
Roots to Fruits: Billionaires, courgettes and the space race
Climate change | Nature | Grow your own Louise Gray 24th August 2021 Is anyone else bored of the Billionaire Space Race? All summer long it seems we’ve been reading reports of very rich white men conquering the final frontier. First Richard Branson went into space with Virgin Galactic, then Jeff Bezos launched Blue Origin into outer space and this month Elon Musk claimed SpaceX can “probably” land humans on the moon before 2024.
Most people in denial over climate change, according to psychologists
In a paper presented to an Oxford University conference this week, he said people react in three different ways to a frightening situation: denial, apathy or action. In the case of climate change, he said a minority of people in Britain are in complete denial and refuse to believe man-made greenhouse gases are causing the temperatures to rise.
REFLECTIONS: POCKET KNIVES WERE TREASURES
Every boy, when I was in high school in the 1920s, carried a pocket knife. It was a proud possession, used with care and skill. In a sense, the pocket knife was a symbol of having achieved a level of boyhood and approaching manhood. No one looked upon the pocket knife as a weapon. No one imagined that it would be used in anger or violence or that possession would be viewed with disfavor or carry a penalty as it does today. How old was a boy when he received his first knife?
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