Anthropocene Agricultural Law

This Essay takes stock of humanity’s arguably illusory victory over its old Malthusian foe. Having staved off imminent starvation, wealthy consumers in the United States and other developed nations are now free to focus their legal and political energy on the expressive aspects of food. Such bagatelles come at the price of ignoring deeper threats to the ecological and economic underpinnings of agricultural production. Had we world enough and time, food as ornament would be no crime. The onset of the Anthropocene, however, demands more serious attention to older, more venerable sources of concern. Resource exhaustion and evolutionary biology remain poised to deliver crippling blows to the agricultural system that serves as life support for affluent, industrialized society. As existential threats loom, the continued allure of purely symbolic disputes suggests that agricultural law remains content, quite literally, to bet the farm

Legal Liability, Intellectual Property and Genetically Modified Crops: Their Impact on World Agriculture

The use of genetic engineering and biotechnology in agriculture has attracted worldwide attention over the past decade. This technology has raised highly controversial issues and considerable international debate over the liabilities associated with crops containing genetically modified organisms (“GMOs”). In particular, the extension of intellectual property protection to GMOs, especially genetically modified crops, has produced one of the most controversial and strenuous debates of recent times. After looking briefly at some of the key features, advantages and disadvantages of GM crops, this paper outlines the debate over the associated legal liability issues. This article also examines the major elements of the debate over liability for GM contamination and assesses whether common law remedies provide adequate protection against it. The paper then details the Australian Gene Technology Act 2000 (Cth) and its essential principles and shortcomings. In its examination of all these issues, this article identifies the challenges that must be faced to ensure justice for all those affected by GM cropping

Anthropocene Agricultural Law

This Essay takes stock of humanity’s arguably illusory victory over its old Malthusian foe. Having staved off imminent starvation, wealthy consumers in the United States and other developed nations are now free to focus their legal and political energy on the expressive aspects of food. Such bagatelles come at the price of ignoring deeper threats to the ecological and economic underpinnings of agricultural production. Had we world enough and time, food as ornament would be no crime. The onset of the Anthropocene, however, demands more serious attention to older, more venerable sources of concern. Resource exhaustion and evolutionary biology remain poised to deliver crippling blows to the agricultural system that serves as life support for affluent, industrialized society. As existential threats loom, the continued allure of purely symbolic disputes suggests that agricultural law remains content, quite literally, to bet the farm

'I loved and hated place': Painting on the edge of a public housing precinct undergoing urban renewal

In this creative practice-led research project, I set out to explore how painting and drawing, in combination with ethnographic methods, can contribute to understandings of a contested place. The site of my research is Canberra's public housing precincts as they were undergoing urban renewal. As a long-term Canberra resident, I am driven by a desire to understand these significant changes in my city. During my field research, I often found myself looking in from the outside, which became an uncomfortable position to reconcile. However, as the project developed, I recognised the edge of place as a dynamic zone of engagement and transformation. Consequently, a primary focus of this research became the role of the edge, or liminal zone, in my creative practice. In this exegesis, I discuss the creative processes used in producing a range of artworks and how I extended my painting practice with found objects, site-specific installations and video. I argue that a reflexive and expanded approach to representational-realist painting provided insights into the complex emotions around the urban renewal project. As the tenants were displaced and the buildings left to deteriorate before being demolished, the meanings of the housing precincts and my relationship to them shifted. These transformations led to parallel transformations in my art practice. I address how I kept returning to painting, searching for new ways to open up the physical and metaphorical frame, in order to engage with place. I argue that integrating a situated and multi-modal painting practice enabled me to recast the ambiguities of the insider-outsider position as productive