An interesting article in The Independent today, explaining why beef consumption is one of the prime causes of the acceleration destruction of the Amazon rainforest:

It began on the back of the BSE crisis in Britain, when the feed given to cattle suddenly became a matter of intense public concern. Cattle feed producers around the world switched to soya as an untainted source... Europe now imports 65 per cent of its soya from Brazil. A further impetus to the boom is coming from China, whose emerging middle class wants to eat more and more meat - so the demand for animal feed is soaring."

Full article here

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I wrote to my MP a few weeks ago telling him why I thought that Britain needed proportional representation. The new Labour govenrment obtained 55% of the seats in parliament, thus giving them an absolute and clear majority, but only received 36% of the votes cast. Obviously, this a very undemocratic result, giving a government that has nowhere near a public mandate complete power to pass any legislation it likes.

My MP replied today. In summary, he said that he supported proportional representation in principle, as long as it didn't change anything at all. Er... so that would mean you don't support it, right? Thanks very much to John Battle MP for a good set of weasel words. He can be sure he won't be getting my vote in future elections.

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Steph is off to America on Monday. I'm not. I'm staying in England. Unfortunately, we couldn't afford two flights; we couldn't really even afford one, so it had to go on the credit card. I'm jealous, not least because Steph gets to go to Wiscon, which sounds incredibly cool. I shall also mope the whole time.

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My department here is undergoing a major restructuring. I've just seen the proposals. It seems like my job is being restructured out of existence. I guess I could apply for one of the new jobs, but to be honest, they don't appeal. I like doing webmastering and web development. I even quite like doing marketing. Neither of those roles seem to be in the new plan. The only new job at my level is "Resources Manager", which sounds dire.

All this might change as it's open for consultation, but equally well I might be looking for a new job in a month or two. Bah. Can't say I like job searching.