Taking organic forward
Last month four prominent Soil Association trustees who recently resigned from the charity accused it of disowning the ‘O’ word. They also warned that the...
A price to pay
Organic retail sales in the UK are on the move again and growth, though modest, are outpacing conventional sales. But organic’s share of total...
The good earth
In the New Year the Soil Association is to get a rebrand. The most visible change will be the organic charity's new logo, which...
We need to keep the GM debate alive and urgent
In 2002 the pro-GM Labour Government held a national debate to test public opinion on GM food. When the findings of the GM Nation?...
Let’s get down to details
When the big four supermarkets pulled swathes of organic lines from their shelves in the early stages of the 2008 recession they set in...
The future of retailing … or ungroovy uncle of an idea?
“A compelling combination of retail, food service and community”
“The retail equivalent of your uncle trying to be groovy at a wedding and failing”
Two rather...
Town centre ‘vision’ – or dark comedy?
The former Iceland and Wickes chief executive Peter Grimsey is the latest supermarket boss (ex in this case) to give a mauling to Mary...
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!
Tesco’s horsemeat media confessional continues.
First there was the visually stark yet otherwise strangely chatty We Apolgise advertisement. “You’ve probably heard or read that we...
Owen Paterson doesn’t get it
“Some companies seem to think consumers will keep taking it on the chin because we accepted being spoon fed this stuff for so long...
Regulatory threats … and opportunities
“Next week”, announced the dulcet-toned Charlotte Green, “Radio 4 will broadcast the first in a two part-series in which Lord Gus O'Donnell makes a...
Don’t leave it all to a few heroes
“Some people join associations to make problems go away. It’s not enough. You’ve got to engage.”
How true and how right I can imagine quite...
These GM protests were 10,000 years in the making
I'm not sure when the phrase 'reconnecting people with their food' was first coined (it began cropping up in the media around the time...
Hardy ‘millennials’?
Forget the Baby Boomers and Generation X (oh, and the Echo Boomers and Generation Y). Here come the ‘millennials'.
And just in case you’re thinking,...
Organic and Green? It’s our bling.
Residents of Tunbridge Wells are usually acutely aware of their ‘disgusted of’ reputation. We live each day as a national joke (yes, I speak...
Back to the earth
The philosopher Mary Midgley has written extensively about what modern thinkers can learn from Nature. She also suggests that we can all learn from...
Appy New Year?
Industry analyst Organic Monitor has an intriguing New Year prediction. Not only will mobile technology be used by growing numbers of people in 2012...
Environmentally challenged
I wonder if George Osborne might come to regret the slightly self-satisfied way he told the House of Commons last week "we are not...
Starting where the people are
In her foreword to the Soil Association's new strategy paper The Road to 2020, the organic charity’s new director, Helen Browning, writes:
“Over the last...
Setting a course for the future of organic
Over the past few months the Soil Association’s new director, Helen Browning, has been consulting widely on how best to take both the organisation...
Sweet spot
Last week I visited the brand new £225 million Pembury Hospital, just outside Tunbridge Wells. It's a genuinely state of the art building, and...