It has been suggested that farming is a smokestack industry. Farming is still a fundamental industry in this country. It is looking after the countryside. It produces excellent foodstuffs for the people of this country. And we probably get these diseases from foodstuffs coming from outside of this country and Europe.
Farmers have their advocates and allies, of course.
Farmers union policy director Martin Howarth said donations from average Britons are pouring in. But columnist Deborah Orr argued in the Independent newspaper that Britons must face up to the fact that the agricultural industry is not economically viable. Many critics hold U.S-style factory farming methods to blame for the dimensions of the epidemic, and even the government has attacked the growing power of supermarket chains for driving down the price of commodities to the detriment of farmers. Organic chicken costs about a third more than traditionally raised birds, while organically raised pork can cost twice as much. In supermarkets and national newspapers, some people have called farmers the purveyors of disease.