Demand for venison

The placing on adjacent pages (6 June) of the Focus on Food campaign aimed at promoting healthy eating in school children, and the article on the problems caused by wild red deer may have been coincidental, but there is a link.

It is widely recognised that venison is a healthy meat. It has less fat than chicken and the fat it does have is of a healthier composition; it has less cholesterol and twice as much available iron as other red meats. It is recommended by doctors for those with cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and anaemia.

As we find at our farm shop, through our website, and at the Edinburgh farmers' market, and as seen by growing imports of New Zealand farmed venison, demand continues to grow. However, wild venison prices remain on the floor, due to high procurement costs, significant wastage due to bullet damage, seasonal fluctuations, etc.

The best solution to safeguarding Scotland's environment, including our nation's health, is to eat more venison.

(DR) JOHN FLETCHER, Reediehill Deer Farm, Auchtermuchty, Fife

No wonder there are fewer subscribers to healthy food in schools than we would like (your report, 8 June); the standard of institutional food is revolting. Cheap and nasty ingredients, as Jamie Oliver pointed out, make for chubby, underperforming children.

My solution is that all councillors, MSPs and MPs should have to take their lunches in schools, or at least in public and eating food prepared at a local school. At a stroke this would serve three purposes - the restoration of public confidence in the food, and in the integrity of the politicians, and ensuring the monitoring of the quality of the food we provide to children.

MIKE SIMPSON, High Street, Aberlady, East Lothian