| Fund independent journalism | | |  | | | | 16/06/2024 This week's newsletter from the Observer | |
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| Tim Adams, staff writer |  |
| | | It's not often that you come away from lunch with an environmentalist feeling full of hope, but that was the case for me after a couple of hours in the company of the happily named Isabella Tree. For this week's Observer Food Monthly she described to me the inspiring impact of the work she and her husband, Charlie Burrell, have made in rewilding the 1,400 acres they previously farmed intensively at Knepp in Sussex. The process of letting loose wild exmoor ponies, longhorn cattle and Tamworth pigs onto their land, and allowing them to do their thing, began as a sort of last-ditch experiment, and has become, over 20 years, a case study in the ways that nature heals itself first by feeding the soil. From there everything else – restored biodiversity, cleaner air, floodwater management – follows. Rewilding has become a "controversial" or "elitist" issue in the tabloids so there is little in the manifesto of the Labour party about sustainability – beyond the usual platitudes about "food security" and "environmental standards" – and still less in the public debates that we have suffered through so far in this election campaign. One of the ways in which OFM has consistently led on issues around food and farming, however, is to give space to the nuance and challenges of positive change. Tree's detailed ambition for veins and arteries of rewilded land across the country is the kind of practical initiative that could, in the abstract language of politicians, begin to "make environment land management work for farmers and nature"; she has a nice phrase for the idea of humans finally trying to work with nature rather than against it, one that would be my kind of political slogan: "Don't just do something, stand there." | |
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| | | | News, politics and opinion | | |
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| | | | Sunday spotlight | | | If you're planning a visit to the holiday hotspots of the West Country, Kent or the Edinburgh area – OFM has researched the food and drink destinations in these areas that will make for the highlights of your trip. From curry tasting in Fife to oysters on Exmoor, these are tips for foodie holidays around Britain from four local experts. | |
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| | | | We recommend | | | York is lovely at any time of year, but for fans of early music, July is the time to visit. The York Early Music Festival was established in 1977, and it grows ever more alluring: one great performance after another, in a series of extraordinary buildings; no wonder some are already sold out. Highlights for 2024 include appearances by the Orchestra of the Age of the Enlightenment, Ensemble in Echo, and the mezzo soprano Rebecca Leggett – though for many, the must-see will be Harry Christophers' peerless choir, The Sixteen, whose programme will include music by Maddalena Casulana, the first western female composer to have a book of her music printed and published. The concert is in York Minster and also happens to be sinfully close to 22 Yards, the city's most delightful wine bar – for (local and fantastic) Haxby sourdough, charcuterie, oysters and all kinds of delicious small plates. Chosen by Rachel Cooke, Observer critic | |
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| | | | Archive | | | From the Observer 21 January 2001: Gareth Southgate You wonder, in weeks like this, why you still bother with it. Football a simple game? Try telling that to those trying to make sense of its corruption. Then you spend some time in the company of Gareth Southgate. The thoughtful, decent Southgate and players like him are the reason why you do stick with the grand, tattered old game. When it kicks off at 3pm on a Saturday, the tosh of the previous seven days that surrounds it just goes out of the window. He certainly has all the credentials to make an outstanding manager. If men like him do not stay in the game, football will suffer. It could mirror politics where some of the best brains, the most able men, are frightened off by the cynical, peripheral stuff and nonsense. Ian Ridley | |
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| | | | Guess the painting | | | This week's detail shows the art of crochet. The painting, from 1880, shows the American artist's older sister outdoors in a garden 15km from Paris. It is a perfect image of true skill – the ability to hold the hook in one hand, and govern both wool and tension in the other. One artist to another… For the answer, turn to page 46 of this week's Observer New Review Set by Laura Cumming, our award-winning art critic | |
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