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We are about to enter the 'Hungry Gap'. Thing is, we're a long way North, we're a cool-temperate climate. So there's a part of the year when historically we don't have a lot of produce. Thats now. And it matters, John. It really matters. Know why? (1) https://twitter.com/johnredwood/status/1353373513080573952
Its not called the 'hungry gap' for a laugh. Its called that because at this time of year people used to starve. Here. In the UK. January wasn't all that bad, but from here on in it gets worse. Sounds odd, doesn't it? Getting hungry as the days get longer? It was real. (2)
Why is that? Its getting lighter, but its not getting warmer yet. We've just passed 'ploughing Sunday', kind of the unofficial start of the traditional farming year, the first Sunday after Epiphany. Nothing is planted yet, nothing is growing (3)
What you've got left is a few crops in the ground, a few crops stored, and thats it. Whats still in the ground and harvestable? Parsnips maybe. Skirret, if you're old school. Carrots are probably all up. Kale, some other brassicas. Leeks. (4)
What have you got stored? Grain. Potatoes but they'll start to get a bit naff. Carrots. Swedes. And thats almost the lot of it. We don't have a climate allowing us a wide variety of crops through Winter, and as Spring approaches things get worse (5)
Leeks and parsnips go to seed, the apples in cold store (using more energy than imports) start to turn. Besides, we can't feed over 60 million people on that stuff - stocks start to be depleted as Spring progresses and the new crops aren't ready (6)
Eating locally and sustainably is great. But we aren't going to replace the tinned and imported foods. Oranges. Lemons. Tinned tomatoes. Bananas. Rice. Lettuce. Cucumbers. @johnredwood is literally saying you can't have them, mostly at all, or a least in any quantity at all (7)
...for nearly all of the year. He's saying in the 'hungry gap' you subsist off meagre stores of stored fodder that are possible in a densely populated island through Spring into Summer. You can only take the position Redwood takes if you know nothing about food production (8)
I passionately and enthusiastically support great British producers of food, and you'll notice I shout them out when I can. And they're important in food security. But I also understand that we're part of a bigger, dispersed food production network (9)
There are things we -can- produce and things we -can't-. And unless we're going to simply stop eating citrus fruit, bananas, pineapples, rice, tinned tomatoes etc., staple food stuffs now, and radically reduce fresh food intake for half of the year then Redwood is flat wrong (10)
Whether its Redwood with this bollocks or Lance Foreman with his widely mocked British produce picture, these pathetic excuses of men raised to high profile by being the acceptable face of extreme right wing culture war are merely displaying wholesale ignorance (11)
They'd be the first to starve if left to fend for themselves on seasonal produce. They'd be the first to go hungry if they actually had to feed themselves. Support British food production - but don't be a fuckwit. (fin)
