Organic certification serves to regulate, as well as to facilitate, the sale of organic products. Having an organic label assures product quality and prevents misrepresentation to consumers – it also helps to promote organic produce as it becomes more and more mainstream.

Roast chicken is an iconic dish in British culture.  It probably ranks close to the top of most people's list of favourite foods.  It may be affordable for the masses, but it is also fit for a king. 

But how many of you know about the life your fresh supermarket chickens lead before they reach your table?  That their short, intensively farmed indoor existence is managed like a factory production line, to ensure the big retailers can sell them to you for as little as ?2 a bird?  Is that all the life an animal, born and raised to feed us, is worth?

I would like to see the industry 'de-intensify' by lowering stocking densities and including environmental enrichment programmes in all its chicken sheds.  Existing models for this reform include the RSPCA Freedom Foods system.  I believe that this, or similar audited systems very close to it, should be the new minimum welfare standard for indoor-reared broiler chickens. Supermarkets and fast food outlets should adopt these higher welfare systems as their new baseline standard, and should in turn insist that all their suppliers adopt them.

I would like the supermarkets to end their poultry price wars, as they put pressure on farmers to maximise the intensity of their operations.  I also urge them to pay a fair price to farmers, for higher welfare birds, and to support them with clear labelling so that consumers can understand what they are paying for.

Above all, I would like to see more birds reared outdoors, on assured free range and organic systems.  I believe this is the natural and appropriate way for a chicken to live. 

I also need you to register your support on this website .  We need thousands of signatures to convince supermarkets, farmers, government regulators and anyone else involved in this unacceptable business that they must change.

1.4 billion farmers in the world depend on farmed saved seeds to feed themselves and their families. If terminator gets the go-ahead, it would spell the end of this practice of saving and replanting seeds - and so take control of meeting their own food needs out of farmers' hands.

Terminator spells trouble for peasant farmers throughout the world because they will no longer be able to save seeds to re-use from one harvest to the next. Many poor farmers cannot afford to buy seeds each year. Instead, they save, swap and share seeds that have been developed over generations. If terminator seeds are spread into the environment farmers will be forced to buy new seeds every time, making them poorer - and the big seed companies richer. Far from helping to tackle poverty, it will increase economic injustice and add to the burdens of those already living in hardship.

In May 2008 European governments will meet at the Convention on Biodiversity in Bonn to discuss Terminator Seeds. We want them to uphold and strengthen the ban they made in 2000. Poor farmers in the developing world need your help to make this happen. Here are some ways you can help persuade the British Government to do the right thing:

Progressio , an international development charity working for justice and the eradication of poverty, would like you to write to your MP, asking them to lobby the UK government to support and strengthen the ban.

They have produced a seed packet  and seed saver website to raise awareness about the threat that Terminator technology poses to poor farmers in the developing world and to the environment. The seed packet contains the letter to send to your MP.

Order seed packets by sending the seedsaver campaign team an email now or by calling 0207 354 0883.

Alternatively: Send them an email or letter, using the contents of the word document below or express your concerns in your own words. You can use the writetothem website to contact your MP by email