Letter: We need organic livestock, not none at all

Tony Banks ("Why all meat should be condemned", 16 March) rightly attacks modern agricultural practices. Industrial farming is implicated in all the recent food scares. Switching to a completely vegetarian society, however, would not only be no panacea but would have undesirable consequences of its own.

Arable farming is responsible for the application of thousands of tons of up to 600 different pesticides on the land, contaminating food and the environment, and is the main source of nitrates in drinking water. The E. coli bacteria has been found on vegetables as well as meat.

The ending of livestock farming would have an incalculable effect on the flora and fauna of the British countryside and would most likely lead to a monoculture agriculture with a prairie-like landscape of open fields. Domesticated farm animals would face enforced extinction.

Organic farming already offers a set of internationally recognised rules of husbandry with a minimal use of chemicals and the highest standards of animal welfare. With conversion grants comparable to those available in Austria and a fraction of the billions of pounds currently paid annually in direct and indirect subsidy to support industrial agriculture, organic farming could provide safe and affordable food to the benefit of the taxpayer, the consumer and the environment.

Roger Houghton

Bath, Somerset