Category: Column

This week Bosco Santimano, founder and executive director of social enterprise You Can Cook, shares his thoughts on the farming crisis.

What a fine mess we find ourselves in during the COVID-19 pandemic that is sweeping the world. The sector that was already struggling before the virus hit us was farming. Due to the rise of English nationalism which was followed by Brexit and the unwelcoming attitudes of all Brexiteers to European nationals; we now fully understand the contributions to sectors like farming made by nationals from Romania and other eastern European nations. Citizens of these countries were doing the jobs British folk considered lowly and beneath them. Take into consideration that these jobs are mostly low paid and seasonal and also having to wake up at 4am! You get the picture why these jobs are not popular with the locals. Farmers faced the first wave of labour shortages soon after the EU referendum in 2016 and only got worse over the years until the final nail in the coffin was delivered by the people of England who voted overwhelming to elect a Conservative & Unionist government to get Brexit done. Where does that leave us now? Farmers are now complaining that they need over 70,000 seasonal workers this year from Britain to make up those workers who will not be coming or can’t come due to the hostile nature and immigration rules imposed by the Tories on the whole of the United Kingdom. Repeated pleas made by the Scottish government to have separate immigration rules for Scotland has fallen on deaf years by Boris Johnson and his government.

“Feed the Nation” was a major hiring drive initiated by the three main recruiters(HOPS, Concordia & Fruitful Jobs) in agriculture to attract locals to fill the jobs now left vacant during the coronavirus pandemic. It attracted more than 27,000 applicants  but just over 4000 took up an offer for an interview. Other EU countries like Germany are allowing over 80,000 seasonal farm workers to come from Eastern Europe to help harvest crops during the peak season. All workers will have to be flown by air, undergo the necessary medical tests and follow social distancing guidelines while on the farms.

There is a simple solution to this problem! Why don’t all the Brexiteers now come forward to save queen and country? Brexit means Brexit! So please signup along with your family and friends who voted to leave the EU and save Britain once again; by getting off your backside and taking back control of your farms from EU/foreign workers. As this goes to print six charter flights have already landed in England bringing around 400 workers from Romania in the first of many flights in the coming weeks. Fruit and vegetable pickers will be specially flown in to meet demand and shortage of farm workers. 99 percent of seasonal agriculture jobs are filled by eastern Europeans, namely Romanians and Bulgarians according to the Office of National Statistics as reported in 2018.

Scotland is at a big disadvantage in this crisis as part of the United Kingdom as it has no powers to operate and do what it thinks is right for its farmers and citizens.

It will be an absolute scandal if crops are left to rot due to a shortage of farm workers and this will only make the current shortage of food worse, expensive and beyond the reach of normal citizens. Food poverty rates have already spiralled out of control during the lockdown and the battle to feed the nation would be lost due to political apathy and negligence. Brexit will just tip us over the edge.

It’s not too late to change course.

*Originally written & published in the Peeblesshire News.

This week Bosco Santimano, founder and executive director of social enterprise You Can Cook, shares his thoughts on panic buying.

It’s been a week now since we are in semi-lockdown and what a emotional roller coaster it has been for all of us here in the UK and around the globe. Since news went viral on social media that 3 cases of coronavirus have been identified in the Borders, locals in the region went berserk with shoppers driving to all the main supermarkets and panic buying food and toilet paper! I am yet to understand the logic behind toilet paper, but never mind. Pasta, tin foods, bread, fish, chicken, cheap fresh foods, hand sanitisers, alcohol were flying off the shelves within hours. By next day the supermarkets were looking like a warzone or as if it were attacked by zombies! The apocalypse was truly here. Many elderly and vulnerable adults were left with no access to their normal shopping items as these maniacs went on a wild rush to hoard as many items as possible. I saw cars and people carriers being stuffed with toilet paper and all other fresh food items that would in my opinion either be frozen or wasted in a couple of days.

Unfortunately I was right as news reports from all over the country saw a huge spike in food waste! What a disgrace and a typical human response in times of crisis. Many people become selfish, greedy and paranoid and in these difficult times its always the rich that can buy and hoard goods in their big houses and garages while the majority of us have to pray and hope that we don’t have to resort to cannibalism to survive. Just kidding by the way! Food and other essentials are slowly making their way onto the shelves and thankfully people are realising that we are all in this together and sanity seems to be coming back into our lives as we don’t want the scenario of a Mad Max movie, where instead of oil we are fighting and killing for food.

You Can Cook was setup in 2007 after doing my research and finding out a few key issues with food and the supply chain. First, many people did not know how to cook from scratch, second over 70% of our food came from abroad, a disaster waiting to happen as the current crisis clearly shows us the fallacy of this policy, and third we don’t grow enough food on these islands to feed the whole population, while government and European Union policies dictated paying farmers grants and subsidies not to grow food! This economic policy is what has led to a big divide between the rich and poor countries, whereby we in the developed West are using developing and third world countries to grow food on our behalf while the citizens of those countries are forced to grow foods for the western markets eg. soya, at the expense of not growing their own staple foods.

On these islands growing food has never been so important and we as part of a holistic approach to tackling these problems work to alleviate and empower communities across Scotland through cooking and growing. Please visit our website for more health related information and loads of recipes to try while you and your family are self-isolating.

Take care.

*Originally written & published in the Peeblesshire News.

This week Bosco Santimano founder and executive director of social enterprise You Can Cook, shares his thoughts on humans battling with the onslaught of machines in our day to day lives; this week its self-checkout tills.

It’s been a couple of decades since self-checkout machines really took off on these islands. Our two big supermarkets in Peebles have installed them to ease queues and provide a quick and efficient way to shop. I have seen people refusing to use them and some actually bewildered by them and some of course yelling at these machines! Well! It’s the voice activation that drives people nuts; “unexpected item in the bagging area” the dreaded trigger that I have seen provoking normal people into a rage. Staff politely come to the rescue of these stranded shoppers and help ease the frustration by diffusing the volatile situation just like bomb disposal experts.

So! What’s the big fuss you may ask about technology that is supposedly helping us in our shopping experience? Well! Apart from many people who swear by these check-out tills there are many who would prefer to see them gone for good and below are a number of reasons why.

The big benefit to retailers is substantial reduced labour costs. Retailers are all for hiring us as unpaid staff with no legal responsibility to pay taxes, employer national insurance and pension contributions, by doing the job of staff. One member of staff can often run six checkout tills with the work of the cashier now done by us the customer! One of the arguments for self-checkout tills is the efficiency and speed with which shopping can be done but anyone who has used a till will know that it’s not all easy and simple to use. Of course there are some who prefer these counters as they have maybe a single item or a few and in these scenarios it’s well worth using them if staff are busy. Plus a study done in 2002 showed people with disabilities where adversely impacted by the self-checkout tills as most of them are not designed keeping accessibility in mind.

Customers have complained about the repeated sounds of a robot coming out of these tills and this promoted Tesco to replace the robotic voice with more human sounding voices. Being more complex, self-check-out tills are prone to failure on a regular basis. For example, they use scales to weigh goods in the bagging area, and, if the scale fails, the machine does not work. Also, in a manned checkout lane, any simple problems like lack of receipt paper would be immediately fixed by the operator, while self-checkouts may not be fixed for quite some time. This lack of reliability can be compensated for by having excess lanes available or enough staff on hand to perform immediate maintenance.

Retailers are getting massive tax breaks and subsidies from the government in many cases for providing jobs locally but unfortunately jobs are being lost to machines instead. All profits are diverted to shareholders who along with the retailers often avoid tax legally by investing in tax havens. This has been investigated over the years by journalists covering tax avoidance schemes.

Please remember, the more we use checkout tills, the more justification for job losses and less taxes collected to pay for vital public services. Ultimately we end up working for corporations without realising we are doing a great disservice to staff who as part of their role provide a much needed community service.

*Originally written & published in the Peeblesshire News.

This week Bosco Santimano, founder and executive director of social enterprise You Can Cook, shares his thoughts on the UK leaving the European Union.

Finally its happened! We have officially left the European Union for “Unity, Peace and stability”. It’s taken three and a half years, three Prime Ministers and two elections to finally get to this stage. The initial process is now complete and the negotiations begin for what may turn out to be an eventful year ahead, especially for Scotland and Northern Ireland. As an organisation we are saddened to see the state of affairs as Westminster politics takes centre stage and holds the rest of the countries in this United Kingdom to ransom. Can we make it alone as an Independent nation or group of nations outside the EU? of course we can. Our concern is mainly about food, environment, climate change and health of Scottish residents post Brexit. Having personally worked closely with the EU and the Scottish government in the past it concerns me that all the safeguards that the EU put in place for our health and other social benefits will be removed or watered down to get trade agreements with the biggest shark in the world! America. Chlorinated chicken is the least of our worries as environmental laws and other climate related initiatives may be watered down to suit the Americans to get a free trade deal. Great Britain may be in the process of becoming Little Britain by the end of this year if we the people become complacent and think all is now lost.

As an organisation working at the grassroots and campaigning for equal health and access to cheap and good food rights for all Scottish residents, we will be specifically looking at costs of fresh foods, post Brexit, until December 2020 and beyond 2021 when supposedly we will have a trade deal with the EU. Prices of essential food and other items have increased by over 40% since 2007-08 recession and then again after the 2016 EU referendum by another 30%. I have taken a conservative figure compared to what the actual figure is; i.e. over 50 to 60%! Wages and benefits have not increased during this period, hence the establishment of the United Kingdom of Food Banks which have been setup all over this G7 country for the poor and working class. We did and in some cases did not support many regulations that were coming out of the EU over the years but many people fail to understand that those laws and regulations that were passed were fully approved by the governments of all the 28 EU nations, a fact conveniently left out by all right wing newspapers and tabloids and politicians. The EU has been proactive in banning harmful pesticides and fertilisers that scientific evidence proved was harming the environment and its people. American Corporations are waiting in glee to ravage this country with their toxic chemicals and products. Will Genetically Modified Seeds (GMO’s) now be allowed to grow in Scotland?

We hope not.

*Originally written & published in the Peeblesshire News.

This week Bosco Santimano, founder and executive director of social enterprise You Can Cook, shares his thoughts on recovering from the festive season.

It’s the end of the festive season and many are probably feeling physically and mentally exhausted, bloated and depressed. In my December column I wrote about how to avoid eating foods that are detrimental to our health during the festive season as prevention is better than cure. But for most of us it may have been an uphill task sticking to the do’s and don’ts mentioned in my article. So here are a few tips and suggestions to get you back in shape quickly and safely without resorting to a crash diet or hours of exercise in order to lose the extra pounds gained.

We all can be tempted to eat less especially high fat foods like processed meats but it’s very important to keep eating foods like veggies, fruits and plant based proteins in order to feel our bodies are receiving the right amount of nourishment. Our bodies will need to go through a proper cleansing process in order to feel vibrant and energised. Start each day in the new year with a cup of warm water preferably with a few drops of fresh lemon added as this will help detoxify the body. Avoid alcohol and caffeine during this period and switch to Green tea if possible as it is full of antioxidants but bear in mind to keep it a maximum of two cups a day as it still contains caffeine! As mentioned earlier switch to steamed vegetables, soups and smoothies and avoid eating a meal after 7pm. Drinking plenty of water will keep your body hydrated and will reduce your desire to eat/snack often during the day.

Sugar is one of the big culprits and we need to reduce our intake substantially during this detoxifying period. Eating a full breakfast will help you to avoid snacking before lunch and sticking to fruits and nuts after lunch as light snacks will keep you going comfortably until dinner. Make sure to have a light lunch, like a salad or brown bread as a base for your sandwich, keeping in mind to avoid any processed meats.

Get a good night’s sleep and avoid screens at least an hour before bedtime. Resting your mind and eyes during this process will help you feel better and more energised and resort to power napping during the day especially after lunch if you can as this can work wonders if you suffer from sleep deprivation. Please remember there are pros and cons to detoxifying; benefits include increased energy and sleep, while downsides are headaches and nausea. While these are just a few examples its best to consult your Doctor if you have any underlying health condition or just for advice and support. Don’t give up as its usually the first three days that can be extremely difficult and feels almost impossible to continue the detoxification process. These are just normal withdrawal symptoms and will go away once your body gets adjusted to this new routine.

So here is wishing you all a Healthy and Happy New Year 2020!

*Originally written & published in the Peeblesshire News.