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Farming Today: 13/08/2012

13/08/2012

BBC Radio 4 - Farming Today, 13/08/2012

The advantages of blight-resistant GM potatoes and warnings of a global food crisis.

The advantages of blight-resistant GM potatoes and warnings of a global food crisis. Plus Charlotte Smith hears the Farming Today cow, Bradley Cora 289, has been a star performer.

Charlotte Smith asks if a commercial crop of blight-resistant GM potatoes could be the answer to weather conditions like this year's. And the Potato Council say, thanks to the weather, shoppers should expect smaller home-grown potatoes this year.

The US Department of Agriculture has further reduced its expectations for this year's maize and soyabean harvest, in response to ongoing drought across the Mid-West. Now, there are warnings from the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation that food prices are rising across the world. Charlotte asks whether this could lead to the similar food shortages of 2007/8?

And Sarah Swadling visits the Farming Today cow, Bradley Cora 289, for the final time to recap a year in the life of a dairy cow.

Presented by Charlotte Smith and produced by Clare Freeman in BBC Birmingham.

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