Amazon.co.uk Review
John Humphrys, broadcaster, writer, farmer and consumer, has written
The Great Food Gamble to address the serious questions he and many of his audience have about the food on our tables in the wake of BSE, foot and mouth, and concerns about the effects of factory farming practices on the nation's health and environment. Humphrys knowledgeably traces such intensive agricultural practices to British food policy from the end of the Second World War to ask whether the relentless drive for more and more food has been a mistake and whether the risks we run are worth it to have what may ultimately prove to be an illusion of choice. Are there really no alternatives, he asks? As readers of
Devil's Advocate and listeners to Radio 4's
Today programme will no doubt expect, Humphrys has a no-nonsense approach. He has little time or patience with mealy-mouthed politicking. Industrial practices, backed up by political will, is costing our health and our environment too dear, he argues. He counts the cost of intensive factory farming, not only in terms of the destruction of our rural heritage, long-term environmental effects and mounting health concerns about the use of antibiotics and pesticides, but the hard cash cost of subsidies and cleaning up pollution that put the lie to the food industry's claim of providing "cheap" food. Humphrys adds his voice to the great food industry debate along with George Monbiot's critique of the supermarket's control of food production in
Captive State and Eric Schlosser's stomach-churning analysis of our unfortunate infatuation with fast food in
Fast Food Nation. Humphrys' prose is unashamedly popular: evocative and even nostalgic for a fast disappearing experience of the British countryside, even as he stops short of being romantic. If this means that he substitutes rhetoric for detail, he remains bang on target and knows that to engage people in this debate and connect it effectively to their lives is the most effective way to counter the enormous power wielded by the other side. A bitter harvest indeed. --
Fiona Buckland
Review
In between presenting Radio 4's Today programme, reading the Nine O'Clock News and going abroad in a variety of other BBC posts, Humphrys has managed to own a dairy farm for 10 years. Having challenged the nation's social and moral values in Devil's Advocate, his 1999 debut book, the state of the nation's food must have seemed the next logical subject. Although the text is embargoed, Hodder cheerfully predicts he will cause a storm with his controversial views on factory farming, constant use of pesticides, creation of superbugs and genetically modified food. He is part of the organic school, with consideration for wildlife, community values and proposing the reversal of damage to the land and our health through what we eat.
by Graham Harvey
by John Humphrys
by Joanna Blythman
