Farming for the environment

It does not make sense to say that Malta can have food security by relying on farming in Malta. It never was that we could produce all our own food even in the time of the Knights. We need to import our grain, all the fruit we need and a substantial part of our greens.

So, instead of insisting on intensive farming, we should focus on farming that is friendly to the natural environment. This means farming which preserves our soils and which does not kill our birds. The decline of many birds in Europe has been linked to intensive farming.

Finding a unique niche in farming like organic farming will also, with time, improve the farmers’ income.

Let us not delude ourselves that we can live independently. Malta is very vulnerable. A disaster like an oil spill can choke Malta and stop its RO plants and cover our beaches with sludge. So we need to be advocates for the environment leading with words and examples both locally and internationally.

Joe Portelli – Nadur

Serenity and peace of mind

The birth of Jesus Christ is an indelible historical event that inspired different human beings over the years. 

Those who believe in His divinity and live life having Jesus as their best friend possess the greatest treasure in which one finds the true serenity and peace of mind, the basis of any positive lifestyle.

Those who accept Jesus only as a historical figure or are indifferent to this reality do not know what they are missing. That is why, however, every Christmas believers and non-believers are presented with an opportunity to try to discover or sustain the gift of this great love for all. 

The life of Jesus on earth offers the finest example of the significance of the values He preached, forever relevant and, consequently, beneficial to a whole world. These include humility, compassion, gratitude, generosity, endurance, creativity, justice, peace, wisdom and equality.  There can be no real equality without values.

As Vaclav Havel wrote, without commonly shared and widely-entrenched moral values and obligations, neither the law, nor democratic government, nor even the market economy will function properly.

Social equality is not easy to achieve. However, it is an ideal which everyone would do well to strive for. A just society would offer equality of opportunities for all.

So far, universal laws and regulations have not been sufficiently effective in this regard.

Excluding Jesus Christ and all that is Christian for the sake of equality reflects anything but wisdom, particularly in Europe when the principal founding fathers of the European Union like devout Catholics Robert Schuman,  Alcide De Gasperi and Konrad Adenauer were primarily motivated to establish this Union by their desire for peace, unity and equality forming part of the core values of Christianity.

Including Jesus, on the contrary, provides a sound foundation to contribute for the creation of a society in which every person is valued equally. This is the powerful message of Pope Francis’s Fratelli Tutti focusing on the contemporary social and economic problems while proposing an ideal world of fraternity and concrete actions to restore the world.

Josephine Vella – Birkirkara

Ministerial liberality

It is incredible and condemnable, of course, that Justyne Caruana (right), a lawyer and minister, could be involved in such a calamitous deal as she was in with former footballer Daniel Bogdanovic. What on earth possessed her?

But which minister, present or previous, Labour or Nationalist, has not done the same? Perhaps in a different way, and not so lucrative for the recipient, but, essentially, just as condemnable.

Caruana got caught out. The others got away with it and go to bed giggling today.

Caruana may buckle under the pressure and resign. It is the thing to do. But will that stop the liberality which ministers, Labour and Nationalist, use with public money to keep close canvassers happy and keen in their efforts for their re-election?

Does anyone hear any MP calling for a foolproof way to stop such inroads into the public purse?

I voted for Caruana at the last election and will do so again the next time round if she is a candidate.

In case anyone thinks l have some personal aim, or obligation, in this – l don’t. I have only once spoken to Caruana and that was in 2017. She cannot even remember the occasion, or me.

Roger Mifsud –Sannat

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