Country Life 17-Nov-2021

IF there is one message from COP 26, it’s that our lives will change. Either we shall have to adjust, as best we can, to the excessive temperatures and flash flooding of an altered climate or the world will have to discipline itself to consume less. Politicians glibly say that the latter can be done without donning a hairshirt, but it seems unlikely. The reality is that the restrictions on life imposed by Covid are small beer in comparison with those required to meet the carbon targets being set for us. Some people will embrace them more zealously than others. In London, the movement of traffic is being deliberately slowed to reduce car numbers. In the country, wood-burners and fires are being phased out, as anyone wanting a chimney lined will…

THE first Environment Act in almost 30 years received Royal Assent last week, with both the Government and conservationists hailing this as a historic moment that introduces stringent protection for wildlife and landscapes. Three years in the making, the Act requires Defra to set legally binding targets for Nature, water, air quality, resource efficiency and waste, sets out plans to improve soil health, expands protection for ancient woodland and creates a new watchdog for England and Northern Ireland, the Office for Environmental Protection (OEP). Defra Secretary George Eustice said that it delivers ‘the most ambitious environmental programme of any country on earth’. Not everyone is as jubilant. Some conservationists would have wanted greater independence for the OEP and many believe the Act’s provisions to reduce sewage discharges in rivers is too…

EAGLE-EYED readers will have spotted that a new art critic is commenting on The Brera Madonna, painted by Piero della Francesca, in this issue’s My Favourite Painting (page 52). John McEwen, who has written so interestingly about art for the magazine for the past 13 years, has retired and Charlotte Mullins replaces him. A graduate of the Courtauld Institute of Art and Sotheby’s Institute, with a PhD in art history from the University of Sussex and National Maritime Museum, Dr Mullins has published numerous books, including A Little Feminist History of Art (Tate Publishing, 2019), and has recently finished A Little History of Art, which comes out in April 2022 (through Yale University Press). She is a regular contributor to the BBC’s Front Row and Saturday Review. ‘I am looking forward…

Rural communities The Countryside Alliance has criticised the Government for not finding parliamentary time to discuss a Lords amendment to the Police Bill that would increase penalties for the rising crime of hare poaching Pest control Wild Justice has launched a legal challenge against the general licences in Northern Ireland, after doing the same in England and Wales Biodiversity Monoculture forest planting, often undertaken by companies to offset their emissions, may damage Nature, according to ecosystem ecology professor and Earthshotprize finalist Thomas Crowther Art collectors In the catalogue for its exhibition, ‘Leonardo and the Copy of the Mona Lisa', the Prado has downgraded Salvator Mundi, sold for about £336 million ($450m) at Christie's in 2017 as a fully authenticated painting by Leonardo, to ‘attributed works, workshop or authorised and supervised' by the Old Master For all the latest…

LAST week, the COP 26 presidency published the summit’s draft agreement on climate strategy. The document reiterates a global commitment to contain temperature rises to within 1.5ºC above pre-industrial levels and calls for an acceleration in phasing out ‘unabated coal power’ and some fossil-fuel subsidies—the first time this is mentioned in an official climate document. It also highlights the need for ‘accelerated action’ to cut greenhouse-gas emissions in the next decade and urges developed countries to support developing ones in their mitigation and adaptation efforts. Environmental campaigners gave it a mixed reception: ‘There are some welcome signs within the draft texts,’ says Zoe Avison from Green Alliance. ‘It is the first time that fossil fuels have been explicitly mentioned, the role of Nature is recognised and there are calls for climate…

Plant science The Government will provide £15 million towards the digitisation of the Herbarium at Kew Gardens, the world's largest collection of plant and fungi specimens, with some collected by Charles Darwin London’s aquatic life Once declared biologically dead, the Thames Estuary is now home to eels, seals, seahorses and even sharks Eco-conscious clubbers A Glasgow club will trial technology that captures dancers' body heat to create renewable energy Sporting guns As live-quarry shooting transitions away from lead, a ballistic study carried out by Cranfield University shows that steel shot performs just as well in ranges up to 50 yards…