Land

To reform farming, we have to look at the bigger picture.

It may not be on tonight's telly, but there's only one story on the lips of SNP members at their party's conference in Aberdeen, writes Jen Stout - the grassroots revolt against the feeble land reform bill advanced by the party leadership, rejected outright by members in a decisive vote. Now the SNP must come up with a bill that's as 'radical' as Nicola Sturgeon's speeches.

On Monday the World Bank's Conference on Land and Poverty begins in the US. But farmer organizations, indigenous groups, trade unions and others denounce the whole exercise as a sham that, in tandem with other Bank initiatives, is all about accelerating corporate land grabs and robbing the poor that the Bank was founded to assist.

Coca-Cola has announced a "zero tolerance for land grabs" policy aimed at protecting communities from having their land stolen by big landlords and agro-industrial enterprises.

As budgets are cut local authorities are selling off farmland without considering the long-term implications of losing a valuable asset for future generations. Tom Levitt reports

A written charter for land use must be adopted to best manage England’s land resources as part of the 'Big Society', according to academics from the Rural Economy and Land Use Programme

Everyone has an opinion on how best to use land in the UK, but bridges need to be built between those who want to see every inch producing food and fuel, and those who believe that land means more than farming

Economists have all but forgotten about the source of real wealth - the land under our feet. They do so at their peril

A Community Land Bank to negotiate and release areas of land to groups of local people could help solve our growing land crisis

Green leader Caroline Lucas will today use a Campaign to Protect Rural England lecture to call for urgent action to resolve conflicting land use issues

A consultation by the Welsh Assembly Government proposes more stringent measures to protect Wales's farmers from the threat of cross-contamination by GM crops

Henry VIII’s land-grab robbed ordinary people of their commons – now a new campaign offers us the chance to take back what we’re owed.

Wealthy countries and agribusiness want farmland, poorer countries need capital – but what happens to the locals? By Martin Large and Neil Ravenscroft

What started as a pub chat evolved into Greenpeace’s most audacious coup yet. Joss Garman reports on a plan to pull the carpet out from under BAA ’s third runway at Heathrow – by buying up the very land beneath its feet

A new generation of biofuels is poised to come into the market. Grown on unused, ‘marginal’ land they won’t compete for our food crops. But just where exactly is all this marginal land, and whose backyard might it be? Helena Paul reports

In 1996 there were no farmers’ markets anywhere in the UK. Today they outnumber Asda stores. Dan Box celebrates their comeback and why we should all be using them.