Donkeys used by M & S on their flower farms

Brilliant. Excellent PR for the company. The donkeys look very well.

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Had to look up where Naivasha was though (Kenya) - something new everyday, I may never need that bit of trivia again but it's in there.
 
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Love it!

Anyone else think as fuel prices go up more and more, we'll start seeing a return to horsepower? Not for long distances of course, but I know there have been a few news reports of people trading in 2nd cars for pony + cart for taking kids to school and local journeys.

Would love local rural businesses to start thinking outside the box for this type of thing.
 
teazle said:
Love it!

Anyone else think as fuel prices go up more and more, we'll start seeing a return to horsepower? Not for long distances of course, but I know there have been a few news reports of people trading in 2nd cars for pony + cart for taking kids to school and local journeys.

Would love local rural businesses to start thinking outside the box for this type of thing.
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And removal of the horrid concrete roads and replacing with hoof friendly pea gravel tracks ;)

Finally our horses may actually work hard enough to deserve all that lovely food we give them :D
 
"plus the donkeys enjoyed their work, reporting to their work stations each morning without herding!"

:o
 
teazle said:
Love it!

Anyone else think as fuel prices go up more and more, we'll start seeing a return to horsepower? Not for long distances of course, but I know there have been a few news reports of people trading in 2nd cars for pony + cart for taking kids to school and local journeys.

Would love local rural businesses to start thinking outside the box for this type of thing.
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When I was at school, and we are talking 30 years ago here, so way back in the dark ages, my Mother used to collect us from school with the ponies, she'd ride one and my brother and I would double on another. Several parents used to do that, they were usually wrecked anyway having all gone out for lunch in the village with sundry ponies, had a couple of bottles of wine and collected us afterwards. :) Got to love rural life.

Seeing horse drawn buggies and carts and farm equipment is nothing unusual here because we live in a Mennonite community (like the Amish) A lot of stores have hitching rails and you'll see horses in the parking lots beside farm trucks.

Sadly I think the main reason why only a few people will do it is lack of time, or rather, an unwillingness to make time, to harness up and drive a couple of miles.
 
Enfys it isn't lack of time - often considered taking the SecA to junior school, it's the traffic/lack of parking for a trap. Likewise secondary school had a couple of mini fields opposite, would have been fab for daughter to ride to and from school, but the journey involves about a mile of the A4, and where could she keep the saddle and kit? Certainly not in a little school locker!
 
Enfys said:
Sadly I think the main reason why only a few people will do it is lack of time, or rather, an unwillingness to make time, to harness up and drive a couple of miles.
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There are other problems - my husband and I both work full time...otherwise we couldn't afford the mortgage on our very modest house as well as my horses.

My son goes to a specialist school on the other side of town and my horses are kept at a livery yard an hour and a half's walk away.

However lovely it would be, it is simply impossible logistically :(
 
Enfys said:
When I was at school, and we are talking 30 years ago here, so way back in the dark ages, my Mother used to collect us from school with the ponies, she'd ride one and my brother and I would double on another. Several parents used to do that, they were usually wrecked anyway having all gone out for lunch in the village with sundry ponies, had a couple of bottles of wine and collected us afterwards. :) Got to love rural life.
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How wonderful :) I think that is something we all dreamed of as children, but only got to read about in girls' pony fiction books!!!
 
Regarding the donkeys, I've seen donkeys used to pull the feed cart on a goat dairy in France. Apparently the goats didn't like the tractor, and the yield went down. Swapped the tractor for a donkey, up went the yield.
 
Awful awful story :mad:

I have been to where the flowers farms are in Kenya, and it appalls me that they use the water from an internationall protected wetland - the RAMSAR Lake Naivasha to the detriment of the community that live there. Yes, they bring in jobs, hospitals etc, but speaking to people there there are other ways to make the money in the area, Hells Gate National Park with its thermal springs is right next door, the whole area needs protecting not stripping of its goodies :( It doesn't need water hungry plants like flowers produced for european nations, removing that vital water from the ecosystem entirely, and transporting it at huge economic and environmental cost to nations for aesthetic purposes. Its not something we need, flowers are a luxury! I HATE cut flowers for this reason, unless they are sourced from within europe, or preferably, the UK - all my wedding flowers were grown in Yorkshire, within 30 miles of my venue.

This is the place I stayed and met our awesome guide Isaac Ouma, this is on the shores of the RAMSAR wetland, and you can watch the hippos from the terrace on the gardens, and in the lake. The shoreline has receeded every year since the flower farms have been there, and its only going to get worse as time goes on, when will it stop? :(

http://www.fishermanscamp.com/

Sorry rant over. :o
 
Aye caramba! Yin and yang as always.. So much for enjoying a good story.... Shame about the wetlands.
 
But to stop the growing of flowers / beans etc that are imported from Kenya, would massively impact on the daily lives of the people who benefit from the trade and the jobs and income it produces........

Whilst I agree that much needs to be done to make such trade fairer and less invasive on the environment, to put western ideas about the importance of ecology above daily survival is also a first world luxury.

We can focus on ecology because we don't live in horrendous life threatening poverty. The developing world also needs a chance to develop just as we did. It's not fair for us to stop them in the name of ecology.
 
BeesKnees said:
But to stop the growing of flowers / beans etc that are imported from Kenya, would massively impact on the daily lives of the people who benefit from the trade and the jobs and income it produces........

Whilst I agree that much needs to be done to make such trade fairer and less invasive on the environment, to put western ideas about the importance of ecology above daily survival is also a first world luxury.

We can focus on ecology because we don't live in horrendous life threatening poverty. The developing world also needs a chance to develop just as we did. It's not fair for us to stop them in the name of ecology.
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If we don't prioritize ecology as well as fair trade and locally sourced products, there will be nothing left to share out fairly on this tortured planet of ours.
 
So the developed countries who've had 'their turn', need to reduce their usage and give the developing world a chance to bring themselves out of poverty.

But simply stopping trade with the developing world is not the answer for them.
 
BeesKnees said:
So the developed countries who've had 'their turn', need to reduce their usage and give the developing world a chance to bring themselves out of poverty.

But simply stopping trade with the developing world is not the answer for them.
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Yes of course, I agree. :) But if these flower farms really are draining vital water from wetlands in order to provide cut flowers to over-privileged nations, they are not the way forward.

There are many organisations working to encourage ethical trade which work with the environment not against it. If what stencilface says is correct, M&S clearly aren't one of them.

I suspect you and I are on the same side, BeesKnees, just putting things slightly differently. :)
 
Dubsie said:
Enfys it isn't lack of time - often considered taking the SecA to junior school, it's the traffic/lack of parking for a trap. Likewise secondary school had a couple of mini fields opposite, would have been fab for daughter to ride to and from school, but the journey involves about a mile of the A4, and where could she keep the saddle and kit? Certainly not in a little school locker!
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I agree, its not just about time.
I tried it once, took a pony to meet my little sister when I was to collect her, got ripped apart by rabid mothers saying it was dangerous to be in the vicinity with a pony, health and safety blah blah blah, I was lucky to get out unscathed. Never mind the animal causing carnage the mums were vicious.
 
FionaM12 said:
Yes of course, I agree. :) But if these flower farms really are draining vital water from wetlands in order to provide cut flowers to over-privileged nations, they are not the way forward.
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And yet how many of us who balk at the destruction of wetlands, will happily shop in Primark etc to buy cheap clothes produced in sweat shop and child labour conditions?

I guess having seen poverty in India and spoken with my husband's cousins, both leading Development economists in Delhi, I find it hard to put wetlands and hippos in front of people? To me it seems the height of Western selfishness. But that is only one viewpoint, and it is a tricky balance no doubt. Let's hope we can find it! :D
 
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