“We must make the building of a free society once more an
intellectual adventure, a deed of courage… Unless we can make the philosophic
foundations of a free society once more a living intellectual issue, and its
implementation a task which challenges the ingenuity and imagination of our
liveliest minds, the prospects of freedom are indeed dark. But if we can regain
that belief in the power of ideas which was the mark of liberalism at its best,
the battle is not lost.”
Friedrich Hayek
The Covid-19
pandemic has demonstrated both strengths and weaknesses across Australia’s governance
systems. However, the full impacts of the pandemic in both health and economic
terms are far from clear. And the ultimate levels of trust and confidence in
our elected leaders far from certain.
If we are to effectively
address the economic and social fallout of the pandemic, politicians will need
to engage with the electorate as they have never done before. Confidence and trust will be needed in
large measures for our people to make the required sacrifices to revive the
economy and maintain social harmony.
The CSIRO is commercialising seaweed product found to accelerate cattle growth and cut their hefty greenhouse gas emissions to near zero. A potential long-term saviour for the global cattle industry, which stands accused of being a bigger greenhouse gas producer than all nations apart from China and the United States. A significant body of research shows adding even small amounts of the seaweed product to cattle diets can cancel out methane emissions – through burping and flatulence – while the reduction in digestion waste results in faster growth rates (an average of 20% increase in field trials). Source AFR 10/8/20
