This is a great film about corporate farming to pass on. It is not 'anti-farmer' per se. It talks about corporate farming impact on land-tenure and communities, our health, animals' living conditions, and peoples' rights. It will make you laugh. See also "How to make our agricultural sector sustainable"

When I was very young, 18, I remember taking a college course on agronomy, taught by an old professor with white hair. Many years later I realized the values he was trying to teach us... (Dairyman Dave)

Victoria's Water Minister, Tim Holding, is angry that his government's regulations to allow country water to be funnelled to Melbourne via a north-south pipeline were rejected in the Victorian parliament on Wednesday. The opposition moved a disallowance motion to block the order, which regulates the delivery of pipeline water. The Greens and DLP supported the motion, giving the coalition the numbers it needed for it to pass.

"It will be interesting to see if the exact matters we have argued through the legislative process end up being argued in a court somewhere, where perhaps some of the facts we have been so desperately trying to expose can for once be tested. Perhaps the people in the community can be offered not just an environmental and social future but some answers to the questions they have been so regularly and constantly asking." Greg Barber, Greens MLC 12-8-09

“Today’s successful disallowance motion in Parliament highlights the overwhelming opposition to the Government’s attempts to loot water from food producers and the environment because it has failed to plan for Melbourne’s future water needs,” Mr Ryan, Liberal Nationals Coalition.

“The Order clearly breached commitments the government made to the environment, food producers and Victorian communities and shows the Brumby Government is prepared to place the future of farming communities and our rivers in jeopardy for the sake of sending 75 gigalitres of northern Victoria’s water to Melbourne."

Listen to interview.
New data shows that the effect of the rapid increase in privately-held water in the Darling Basin on the volumes of water available for essential public and environmental use is the main cause of the water crisis, not the drought. The Senior water advisor to the United Nations supports a call for declaration of a State of Emergency and the establishment of a Royal Commission of Inquiry into the management of the water of the Murray-Darling Basin.

Investing in water for the suburban home-owner; turning overpopulation to profit; growing your water capital. Water and democracy. Water and suburban conflict. Plumbing negotiations.

Oz Turtles' crushed under weight of bristle-worm parasite are quickly cured by fresh water bath, but hundreds die in absence of life-giving flow, for water-guzzling agribusiness - uglier than bristle-worm

Australia has two environment ministers and yet things just get worse.

See also: Why did Karlene Maywald conceal surrender in fight to save Coorong from Goolwa meeting?

Word is that Melbourne is getting its 1 million more ten years early and that the Vic Government is in a panic because it has no idea how many permanent new guests have taken up its foolhardy invitations to come and stay. Who the hell is responsible?

Should Australia allow its agricultural soils to be destroyed because of economic pressures caused by our unsustainable booms in mining and real estate?

See also: Working the land - or not of 24 Jun 08 by Jenny Hume on Web Diary, Who owns your sewage? of 3 Jul 08 by Valerie Yule on Online Opinion, Last gasp for single desk marketing of Australian wheat of 17 Jun 08, Peak oil prices cause South Australian Farmers to call for 'fair market forces' of 10 Jun 08, Orwellian Waterworks: big-agribusiness and Victorian Gov of 27 May 08, Insight program's take on Labor Shortage of 17 Jun 08, A 10,000 year misunderstanding of 1 May 08 by Canadian soil microbiologist Peter Salonius, I will govern for all Victorians (caveat: but only if you are powerful and connected) of 26 Jun 08.

Over 500 farmers have turned out in force to protest at Parliament in Canberra in a last ditch attempt to persuade the Government not to ditch the single desk marketing of Australian wheat.