Summary of newspapers of the previous day – 17.09. 2008

Brussels wants more humane slaughter; it does not concern Czech hog-killings

The European Commission strives for more humane killing animals on slaughters. Fears from a period before the CR accession in the EU that these efforts could complicate organization of popular domestic hog-killings are, however, unfounded this time. The Brussels´ proposal, according to the present information, counts on improvement of conditions only in animals in regular raisings. Not in animals which people raise for individual need. The current rules which regulate slaughters in the European Union come from 1993 and do not conform to the present. Since the time many technologies have appeared which could reduce suffering of animals.

13 hectares of land disappear daily

According to LPIS accounting (a geographical information system for registration of agricultural land use) 3,5 million hectares of agriculture land in used in the CR; of it 2,620 million hectares of arable land. Since 1927 826 000 hectares of agriculture land has decreased which represents 19 percents of acreage. From 1990 to 2000 it is dealt with a decrease of about thousand hectares and from 2000 to the present occupations of agricultural land increased to approximately 4000-5000 hectares yearly.

Maybe, amount of wheat will be less next year

The biggest strengthening in last three weeks was recorded in frame of yesterday´s business seance on the exchange Chicago Board of Trade in the most active December wheat futures contract. The cause was speculations according to which farmers will sow for the next period less amount of the mentioned cereal than it was originally expected. The reason of the fact could be overcharged price of artificial fertilizers which are need for right growth of wheat in big amount and vice versa recently steadily decreasing sale price of wheat which since the last historical record from February this year fell on the exchange CBOT by 47 %. On the other hand, price of ammonia in the USA, needed for production of artificial fertilizers, tripled in the last year. According to independent sources a similar fate could meet also farmers whose production is concentrated on growing of corn.

Health in purchase basket

In a project Health basket people purchasing food will get an advice how to eat healthy. In selected supermarkets in September and October people can ask a team of experts which will advise free of charge what more healthy variants they cold choose. The project is supported by the Všeobecná zdravotní pojišťovna (VZP) “What food we will decide for it will influence significantly our health. However, we often choose and buy improper foods and the result is the overweight. More than a half people in the Czech Republic has problem with excessive kilograms – 35 percents have overweight and 17 percent fall in the category of obese people”, Marcela Kubová said on behalf of organizers of the project.