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The Monocle Daily
Germany leads the way for Europe’s rearmament. Plus: The legacy of Chinese architect Kongjian Yu
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- [00:00]
A
You're listening to the Monocle Daily, first broadcast on 24 September 2025 on Monocle Radio.
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B
Germany rearms, which is good. Now the latest offering from Donald Trump's medicine show and the Korean city where the signs aren't in Korean. I'm Andrew Muller. The Monocle Daily starts. Hello, and welcome to the Monocle Daily. Coming to you from our studios here at Midori House in London. I'm Andrew Muller. My guests, Elizabeth Braw and Rainbow Murray will discuss the day's big stories. And we'll be at the Slow Food Festival in Piedmont to discover what a friend we have in cheeses. Stay tuned. All that and more coming up right here on the Monocle Daily. This is the Monocle Daily. I'm Andrew Muller and I am joined today by Elizabeth Braw, senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council, author of the upcoming title Undersea War, and by Rainbow Murray, professor of Politics at Queen Mary University of London. Hello to you both.
- [01:13]
C
Hello. Hello.
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B
Elizabeth, you have come from Eindhoven, which is not a sentence I believe I have ever uttered before.
- [01:20]
C
You soon will.
- [01:21]
B
Well, I just have. That box is now ticked. What were you doing in Eindhoven?
- [01:27]
C
I was visiting asml, which is a chip company, so. As in computer chips. And it's an indispensable part of modern economies and that's what makes it so crucial. And yet to most it's totally unknown because who among us knows a lot about what chip pieces look like? But asml, mark my words, you will hear about it. If it, if it were to happen that its products were not to be available, you would know about it.
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B
What actually goes on at a chip factory? Can you actually see anything once you get there?
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C
Well, so the way chips are manufactured is that it's like a space age sort of arrangement. And by the way, the factories are very expensive to build, which is why there are so few of them. But it looks like nothing you have ever seen in any other manufacturing plant. It looks more like a science laboratory. But, but this is, I think it's safe to say, the most crucial component of modern economies. And yeah, we have a European company.
- [02:36]
B
See, I was wondering, because, speaking as somebody with no practical skills whatsoever, it may be why I find factories so mesmerizing. But in the recent edition of the Entrepreneur's, our annual supplement, which I think is still on the newsstand near you, I did go to the BIC factory near France where they make almost all the BIC pens in Europe, and it is kind of weird to watch the material go in at one end and thousands of pens just come spewing almost literally out of the other.
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C
Andrew, if I can add one more thing. The reason you don't know anything about manufacturing is that your school system probably didn't make it mandatory for high school students to do work experience in different fields. In the school system that I attended, you had to. So I have worked in a factory and I've worked in an old people's home and I've worked in a supermarket and I think, you know, at the time I thought it was, it was silly, but now I realise it's quite useful to have a bit of a better understanding of the hard work that goes on in areas that we may not be interested in.
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B
Rainbow pivoting seamlessly on the subject of career changes, you are witness to one in your household at the moment?
- [03:47]
A
Apparently I am. I am currently supporting someone who is going through a Midlife Career change, 20 years in academia and decided to do something different, which ironically enough involved going back to university, but as a student rather than a lecturer, which is an eye opening experience to be on the other side of the lectern.
- [04:09]
B
Have they gone full student? Are they sleeping till 3 o' clock in the afternoon and listening to a lot of angry music made in the Pacific Northwest?
- [04:15]
D
Haha.
- [04:16]
A
Well, this course is actually pretty intensive, so he's going to be working hard, probably harder than he actually did at the other end. His first.
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B
Everyone says when they have someone in their families go to university, this will be hard work.
- [04:30]
A
Ah yeah, well I mean they've, they've timetabled stuff for pretty much the entire day, all day, every day. So I think it's going to be a good shock to the system.
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B
Well, we will start at least there. A seamless pivot shock to the system. To this probably actually because we're going to start with Germany and its plans to swiftly and dramatically rearm. And yes, we can enjoy the irony that in 2025 most of Europe is actually pretty delighted by this. Germany, until very recently regarded as something of a foot dragger on military matters, is now pitching itself as lead nation on Europe's general and generally overdue commitment to tooling up. In recognition of the fact that while the member states of the European Union may have evolved to a post imperial phase, Russia most certainly has not. Germany now wants to lead the EU on joint arms projects. This is ahead of the publication of a roadmap on how to get the EU fully ready for further Russian nonsense by 2030. Elizabeth 2030, given recent occurrences involving Russia, Russian Drones in estonia, Poland, Romania, etc. Does seem like quite a long way away. Shouldn't Europe be? I mean, I know you can't fix this overnight. You can't make up for decades of underspending and complacency in a week, but is 20, 30A soon enough timescale?
- [05:53]
C
The good thing to say about that is that it exists and yes, it is five years from now. But to get to it, you obviously have to start pretty much now. And that's what's happening. And what is fascinating to see is that the defense manufacturers in Europe, their order books are full, they are working around the clock in factories that look a bit more like traditional factories than do chip fabs. But they work without, I shouldn't say around the clock, that's not always the case. But their order books are full, they work full steam and they are cranking out as much weaponry as they can. But the other thing to remember is no amount of weaponry will make any difference if you don't have enough manpower. And that includes men and women. And so that's why having a goal, a timeline set for equipment, in essence is fine because you will have to match that with enough men and women in the armed forces. And you can't just hire big time because you need trainers to train those new soldiers. So unfortunately it's taking some time, but it's happening in parallel. And as you say, Andrew, it's in some ways led by Germany, or at least Germany is bringing a lot of energy to this new development.
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B
The question has to be though, Rainbow, does Germany actually mean it this time? Because for, of course, for the entire post World War II period, everybody sort of understood that Germany was going to be a bit anxious and unhappy about military related matters for obvious reasons. And I don't think most of their European partners were terribly upset that Germany was anxious and unhappy about military matters. I think we can remember at this point that the first NATO Secretary, General, Lord Ismay, said that the whole point of the alliance was to keep the Americans in, the Russians out and the Germans down. But after, after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, we did hear from then Chancellor Olaf Scholz. You know, things have changed, Germany must change. And then there was a certain amount of, ah, but are we really going to do that? So do we think this new government is actually more serious?
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A
Yes, I think it is. I mean, there's two things to bear in mind when we hear that Germany are rearming. The first is that unlike the now distant historical threat that Germany posed, Germany is not Arming against Europe. It's arming with Europe. And this isn't offense, it's defence against a common enemy that Europe feels a very pressing need to defend against, namely Russia. And it comes in a context where. And you're talking about, you know, America in, Russia out. Well, now we're not entirely sure whether America is still in and in the absence of America, we need to rearm. And I'm fairly certain that if Europe is, you know, up to full military strength by 2030, we can expect another speech from Donald Trump taking all of the credit for that by saying, well, I pulled out of Europe and made them get on with it.
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B
He'll be halfway into his third term by then.
- [09:01]
A
But another thing to bear in mind is that Europe now is not the Europe of ten years ago either. The UK has left the European Union and so that now leaves France as the sole nuclear power within Europe. They've offered to extend their nuclear umbrella across Europe. And I think Germany is now looking at its French compatriots who normally sort of co lead Europe and is seeing them as sort of the, the sole leaders on this one and thinking, well, we need to get back in there as well and take a little bit of ownership of this, but also spread the responsibility around.
- [09:32]
B
Well, on that thought, I was wondering, Elizabeth, about the internal dynamics of Europe and how they might be unbalanced by this. Because as Rainbow points out, once the UK left the eu, I think France kind of liked the idea and it had reason for thinking this, that we are now the default leaders of Europe. We are the only nuclear armed power that is in the EU and NATO permanent 5 of the security Council. Obviously we are now in charge. They are going to already, I think they can anticipate a certain amount of challenge to that idea from Poland and certainly Ukraine when or if it joins both of those blocs. But is France, deep down where it lives, really happy about the idea of Germany as a military power?
- [10:17]
C
You know, this is part of the miracle really of post war Europe that it's. That Germany as a military power just doesn't spook anyone, including the Poles, who have suffered more from German aggression than almost anybody else. They are strongly supporting Germany strengthening its military capabilities. So it is, I can't think of any country in the history of, well, in modern history at least, that has had a certain experience and drawn such profound conclusions from it that the risk of whatever happened before happening again is just not on anybody's mind. Russia has certainly not drawn those conclusions. It has had many opportunities for itself to conclude that it has acted in ill advised ways over the decades and generations. It has just never drawn any conclusions from its aggression vis a vis other countries. And it continues to harm other countries to this day. Which is of course why Germany has to step up and take this more important role in European defence.
- [11:31]
B
Although just finally on this one Rainbow fun scenario. Germany gets almost all the way to fully rearming, becoming a military superpower. And at the election in 2029 they elect alternative for Deutschland.
- [11:49]
A
I mean that's, that's a scenario to send Charles down the spine, I won't lie. But they are doing this not, I mean to reiterate, they are not doing this as a solo actor, they are doing this very, as part of a coordinated European effort. And so we need to see their militarization within the European context as opposed to a purely national context. And they want to collaborate in the production and use of those arms. And so we wouldn't necessarily see them as a sort of German military state, but as a German contribution to a European defence system.
- [12:31]
B
Well, to the United States now, and to one pronouncement in particular from the especially rather bountiful banquet of balderdash served up this week by President Donald Trump. In between telling a memorial service that he hates half his fellow citizens and complaining about malfunctioning escalators to his fellow world leaders, Trump has informed America's parents and parents to be apparently at the behest of US Health Secretary and whale beheading bear corpse dumper Robert F. Kennedy Jr. That there is a link between the consumption of paracetamol due during pregnancy and autism. To be clear, there isn't Rainbow Always a difficult question where Donald Trump's various utterances are concerned. Why do we think he's saying any of this?
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A
He has never had the strongest relationship with science, Fact, truth, women. So I am not entirely flabbergasted that he could get this one so fundamentally wrong. May I remind people of his rather ill informed notions of how to deal with COVID such as injecting bleach. But this reminds me in other ways of COVID and the fear that some people had of vaccinating. I strongly recall people who were pregnant during the height of the pandemic who were being urged by doctors to get vaccinated against Covid because Covid placed them at particular risk during pregnancy. And instead they heard the rumours that the vaccine could cause damage to their unborn child, which was actually the exact opposite of the truth, and refused to get vaccinated People are susceptible to these messages. People are sometimes suspicious of what they see to be authority or the elite establishment out to get them. And so if someone says something that confuses them or contradicts what they've been told, they don't necessarily go, well, that must be wrong. Sometimes they go, ah, maybe I've been lied to and I need to do something different now. And that's why it's so dangerous, because.
- [14:53]
B
For all of those reasons, I think, Elizabeth, there is a big overlap, isn't there, between enthusiasm for health misinformation and any kind of conspiracy political extremism? And this is, this is on both right and left, though we have seen in the UK today, Nigel Farage, the leader of Reform uk, nodding and winking to Trump on this particular one. It's a demonstration, I think, anyway, that people who believe one variety of conspiracy theory will tend to believe all of them.
- [15:28]
C
Yes. And it's extraordinary that this development is taking place in America. So both of my children were born in America, and it was just there was never any question that among anyone that I knew, and certainly not in my family, that they would get the vaccinations offered to them simply because those vaccinations help protect against illness. And there was never any question that if something is recommended by the doctor or advised by a doctor as safe to take during pregnancy, that you would then challenge the doctor on his or her knowledge of medications. And remember, in the United States, when you're pregnant, you're not seen by a nurse, you're seen by a gynecologist. So it's the highest level of knowledge available. But even so, these conspiracy theories have taken hold and as you say, Andrew, both on the left and the right. And I think it has to do with not so much medicine, but people trying to explain things that are unexplainable or inexplicable. And coming down on the side of conspiracy theories, there may be things in life that we can't explain, for example, why some children get autism. And so.
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B
So.
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C
To many people, it seems like a reasonable conclusion to then say, well, the science must be wrong, rather than there are just things that can't be explained. And that is a worrisome thing, because if that is your answer, how many other truths are you then willing to challenge?
- [17:17]
B
Rainbow, you mentioned earlier Donald Trump's suggestion during the COVID epidemic that people could help themselves by injecting bleach. And that did necessitate, in the 21st century, serious authorities in the United States feeling it necessary to issue Statements saying, don't inject bleach. It's really quite bad for you. Is it unreasonable for anyone to feel, how to put it, an absence of sympathy for anybody who pays any attention to the pronouncements of Donald Trump or indeed Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. And makes medical decisions accordingly?
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A
I don't think you can say an absence of sympathy for things that affect children because even if we question the judgment of parents, it's the children that sometimes pay the price. And we have seen since Robert F. Kennedy has been blasting out these anti vaccination messages that some parents have stopped vaccinating their children and we are actually starting to see children die of curable diseases or preventable, I should say diseases such as measles. And clearly the parents have made a mistake of judgment, but it's the child that pays the price. And that's pretty devastating. I also think we need to ask ourselves what has led people to be so distrusting of the society in which they grew up that they are willing to reject established medical knowledge?
- [18:58]
B
Just finally on this one, Elizabeth, a statement like this does prompt questions for the news media in that, as is annoyingly often the case, you can't really not report what the President of the United States says because they're the President of the United States and anything they say because of that tends to matter. But how, how disrespectful the word, how can this be framed? Do you just print headlines saying president Trump spouts loads of mad drivel about vaccines, autism, Tylenol, paracetamol, injecting bleach. Don't listen to him, he's insane. Or do you try to tiptoe around it and sort of ask those questions like, well, is there anything in it?
- [19:44]
C
Well, that's the thing you shouldn't do. So if you put a headline in your newspaper or indeed on a radio show asking whether Tylenolol is harmful if taken during pregnancy, then you give that notion validity, Right? So instead, if you're going to mention it, then do it as a statement saying that Tylenol is not harmful if taken during pregnancy. But it's interesting. So well meaning journalists and publications have tried to play that really crucial role of informing the public. And I've so Many Q&As printed and sort of information columns about this and often it starts with a question. And that again, I think gives validity to a notion that should be corrected as often as possible.
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B
Well, moving on to a suggestion that perhaps the devolution of 21st century humanity into a somnolent legion of screen dazed troglodytes isn't all bad news. New research by boffins at Oxford Economics has concluded that British content creators at large on YouTube contributed 2.2 billion quid to the UK economy last year and supported 45,000 jobs. At least partially in recognition of this, an all party parliamentary group of MPs is to convene to represent the interests of creators and influencers. Elizabeth, through gritted teeth, do we have to admit that this is a real job?
- [21:25]
C
I have to laugh in between having my teeth gritted. Yes, it is extraordinary. I guess people with the mindset of me and probably you, Andrew, would look down on influencers and I would and I do. Content creators are of course a wider category than influencers, but nevertheless, these are jobs that we would just a few years ago not have considered real jobs. But they do exist and they do create jobs. What I would flag up though, as it were, is that they also clog up a whole lot of bandwidth in the undersea cables that connect the world. So. So if there were to be any damage to any undersea cables, they would immediately. If they were to be. If there were enough damage to undersea cables, they would immediately be out of a job.
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B
And are you aware, Elizabeth, by any chance, of an upcoming book that might discuss this urgent security question?
- [22:43]
C
I am. And it's coming your way a year from now called Undersea War.
- [22:48]
B
Seamlessly, seamlessly done. Rainbow Are we gathered around this table at this point? A bit the equivalent of sort of, you know, bewildered high court judges circa the 1960s trying to understand that rock and roll music was actually a thing that people were making a living at.
- [23:05]
A
Well, you know what? I'm gonna do a shout out for content creators. I'm gonna stand up for them. We were told that video killed the radio star, but here we all are talking on the radio. Radio's still going strong. Are still going strong. And I think there is room for the Internet as well and streaming into the Internet in this economy.
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B
It's a fact.
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A
But I mean, content creators are more than just influencers. I mean, if someone is doing a video of themselves doing something utterly banal from which no one learns anything, you could say, well, what is the point of that? But some content creation is creative, it is informative. I'm going to give the example of recipes. We see a lot of people now who make a living out of recipe blogs and cooking tutorials on YouTube, and one could argue that that is actually a lot more engaging and constantly reinventing itself compared to picking up a recipe book. And I do think there is space in this world for people who do that. I do think it is a genuine career in the sense that it is work that goes into it and there is benefit to society that comes out of it. So I would not tar the entire world of content creat with a negative brush. I would say maybe we have room for this in a modern thinking economy.
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B
I will acknowledge at which point, Elizabeth, that one of my lockdown era sanity savers were in fact the recipe videos of an Australian content creator called Nats what I reckon, who was a tattooed heavy metal drummer I believe, who stood in his kitchen and swore a lot while flinging ingredients around that actually made it all look like tremendous fun and.
- [24:49]
C
Became fun repeating it at home, became.
- [24:52]
B
A superstar the process and good luck to him. So I was going to ask you both, are there any actual youtuber content creator slash influencers whose work you would admit to consuming?
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C
You're among friends, Elizabeth. I'll tell you what I watch on YouTube. This will sound terribly elitist, but it's the documentary.
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B
Oh, I think that ship is by.
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C
Arter, which is a French, German, German public service television channel and they make the best documentaries in French and German. So if anyone out there speaks French or German, that's what to watch on YouTube. But if I can add another aspect to the issue of work creation resulting from this, I think what we will see, given the labor market for young people, young graduates and others will see more of them turning to online content creation as a way of having something meaningful to do while applying for work for jobs. And that is a long process these days. And if they don't get a job they like or any job they may find that they actually can gain can conduct gainful employment creating content on the Internet and more power to them.
- [26:17]
B
Well Rainbow, finally on this I I mostly use YouTube for the purpose that I'm sure God intended, which is looking up highlights of decades old Australian Rules football games. But do you have any particular YouTube content creators of which you are a fan and whose works you would like to encourage others towards?
- [26:38]
A
I'm probably more a user of other media than YouTube if I'm perfectly honest. But I would, I would definitely say recipes and also comedy. And it's not just YouTube as well. I think TikTok is where a lot of good comedy is at. It has created a platform that has enabled people to move away solely from stand up and expand their audiences by doing videos that are normally not not the sole purpose of the person doing it, but part of a portfolio career that enables people to make a name for themselves that then perhaps leads into more traditional employment as well.
- [27:20]
B
Well, to South Korea now, specifically Suwon, where cafes, shops and other small businesses are having to be bribed by the local government to render their signage in Korean. Said businesses have defaulted to English script. But in a pilot program, up to 2 million won, or about €1200, will be made available to a small number of business to repaint everything to use the Korean Alphabet instead of or as well as the English one. Elizabeth this should be, shouldn't it? The risk of sounding like an Ayn Rand reading libertarian crank. This is surely up to the businesses. The market has spoken.
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C
The market has spoken. But we all have a responsibility for keeping our languages alive. And if we don't take that response or assume that responsibility, then languages other than English will decay.
- [28:11]
B
Because that would make the world an awful lot more convenient for me personally.
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C
And it would also make the world a lot less interesting. And you see countries with smaller languages, think of Estonia, for example, they spend a lot of effort to keep that language alive, to make sure more people learn that language, because it is so easy to just turn to English, especially if you're a small country and you have a lot of visitors who invariably speak English because it is the lingua francas, or is it whatever the equivalent English expression is these days. So more power to the Koreans. And I have to say, I wish Germany would do the same. The Germans are getting lazy when it comes to new words. They have so many options in creating new words. Instead, they use English words they should learn from the South Koreans.
- [29:16]
B
Rainbow is this a potentially especially dangerous trap for those countries whose language is not written in the Roman Alphabet? They feel obliged to put something up for tourists, business visitors, et cetera, in a way that maybe European countries don't. Because if I go to Europe, if I go to Germany or Spain or Italy, I don't speak German, Spanish or Italian. But if I look at, say, a menu in German, Spanish or Italian, I've got a fighting chance of, like, ordering something I want to eat. If I'm given a menu which is just in Korean or Chinese or Japanese or in fact, even Greek or Bulgarian, I have almost no idea, in fact, exactly none.
- [29:54]
A
Bear in mind, though, it also depends where in a country you are, you'll see that certain touristy areas are much more likely to have things in international languages because it's fundamental to their economy that people are able to go there and understand enough to spend money and so it's easy for us to say, well, everything should just stay in its own language. And speaking as an enthusiastic linguist, I have a lot of sympathy for that argument. But I also think that if people are trying to promote a tourist economy, it can be quite difficult to do that in a language and as you said, also an Alphabet that people don't necessarily understand. But I would also say that.
- [30:39]
C
Whilst.
- [30:40]
A
Korea might be trying to accommodate certain Western tourists with signage in English, they are also doing quite a good job at the moment of cultural exports. An example being that in my local large shopping center there is now a Korean beauty store which my K Pop loving tween dragged me to. And it turns out that this is generally targeted at people with a Korean complexion and wasn't particularly suited to my blond haired blue eyed child. But she was so enchanted by K pop that she wanted to experience anything that was related to Korean culture. So there is some take, but I think there is also some give and that's arguably a good thing. Thing.
- [31:34]
B
Well, on that equivocal note, Rainbow Murray and Elizabeth Bro, thank you both for joining us on today's show. Next if you were in Northern Italy over the weekend, you might have smelt a pungent whiff as the 15th edition of Cheese Slow Foods Biennial festival dedicated to raw milk cheeses from all over the world took over the hill town of Bra. Slow Food is an international movement created in the 1980s by way of protest against the growing fast food culture in Italy. Promoting good, clean, fair food and defending biodiversity and tradition. Chees has become one of its most popular events. This year 400 exhibitors from Italy and 13 different countries bought thousands of wheels for visitors to discover, taste and buy. Monocle contributor Danny Mitzman was there and sends this report.
- [32:22]
E
I'm in the Northwest Italian Piedmont region in the city of Bra. Every two years the Hilltown's picturesque streets and piazzas are transformed into a channel giant fair for cheese lovers. The four day event hosts cheese producers and sellers from all corners of the globe and features tasting workshops, conferences and fun activities for all ages. I've been talking to Slow Foods Francesco Sotila about the history of cheese.
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F
We are in love with this event because the event is in Bra. Where there is the headquarters of Slow Food, there is the history of Slow Food and so many people is attracted to be here and to celebrate with us farmers and products. But I would say communities. It's not just an exposition of many, many communities. This is just one big community.
- [33:21]
E
One of the ways Slow Food works at protecting Traditional foods and production methods is by creating Presidia Presidium status being a recognition of quality and authenticity. There are now over a hundred dairy Presidia, more than any other food type. And at Cheese there's an entire street dedicated to them, Via DEI Presidi. That's where I found the artisanal Somerset cheddar stand.
- [33:46]
G
I'm Jamie Montgomery and we make a very traditional cheddar cheese in some Somerset, the home of cheddar. And my family been doing it for, since 1911 when they were looking for their first round of international non Italian Presidia. The concept of 100 years ago there were 400 cheesemakers in Somerset making cheddar and then we were three. They grabbed hold of that and thought, hang on, we're gonna have to do something here.
- [34:14]
E
The amount of people here today swarming around your stand to taste real cheddar.
- [34:19]
G
It is relentless on the stand and it's, it's brilliant. It's just as soon as someone leaves, there's someone in that place, it's great. Fantastic.
- [34:29]
E
On the stand with Jamie is Morgan Trethowan, who's been making pitchfork cheddar since 2017.
- [34:36]
H
It's been going great and it's really, really good to be part of the Cheddar presidio with Westcom and Montgomery. And I like the fact that us cheddar makers come together to work together at the event. Interesting for us, but it's interesting for the public to try all these different cheeses that are of the same age but can taste so different.
- [34:54]
E
So the ones that we've been tasting.
- [34:55]
H
Today, they're all 15 months. We made that decision to bring the same aged cheese to give people that comparison then to see how different it can be. And then it's interesting to see how cheddar is viewed by the rest of the world.
- [35:08]
E
How is it viewed in your opinion?
- [35:09]
H
Well, I mean, everybody knows it, so that's great. And if people want to try it and then we can teach them more about it.
- [35:16]
E
Just a few stands along is a brand new Austrian Presidium which Dorothea Ertel's been telling me about.
- [35:22]
I
The Geltall. I'm Kese. Geltal is the valley where we live. Alm is the mountain. Kase is cheese.
- [35:30]
E
It's produced high up in the alps by just 13 producers who each have a mountain hut where they make a it on site during the summer months from the milk of around 400 cows. Local breeds which graze exclusively on the alpine grasses and flowers which give the cheese its Unique flavours.
- [35:48]
I
The Brasilio is for us special because people now around the world, they will know us, they maybe will come sometimes to our hut and then we have our good cheese with the good quality and they will taste it and can taste it here at Prague and maybe that we can get a network and maybe we can sell the cheese to Italy or to England or to, I don't know. And we also want to show what it means to live in a mountain, to work with the cows, with the nature.
- [36:24]
E
But there aren't just producers here at Cheese, there's also a whole area dedicated it to those who mature it.
- [36:31]
D
We're in the Afanage alley, Afoneur alley. And that was something, a concept to bring all the Afanau together to highlight what the Afanaughs do as opposed to the producers or the wholesalers, but specifically those who are maturing cheeses.
- [36:48]
E
Sarah Stewart's the managing director of Neil's Yard Dairy in London.
- [36:52]
D
It's really great for us, as aforementioned, to see other Afanas and there's a lot of synergy from that. And I think for a consumer, you know, the customer who's come to buy cheese, it's nice for them to walk by and sort of see what different things are doing. And also for us, as with our trade customers, you know, they can walk down a road and see, you know, lots of people that they're buying from. So yeah, it's a great place to meet a lot of people.
- [37:18]
E
Sarah's been coming to Cheese for over 20 years and believes Slow Foods decision to focus exclusively on raw milk cheeses was the right one.
- [37:27]
D
The flavour that you get from, from the cheese is really incredible. You can make incredible cheese with pasteurized milk, but probably the best cheese ever will be raw milk. And there really is a threat to raw milk cheese continuing to be produced. And for slow food to really back that and put a sort of a line in the sand as to this is what we feel is important is, you know, is super important for us. And also, you know, taking that choice away from the individual seems very unfair. So having a festival that highlights the value of Royal Milk is pretty incredible.
- [38:08]
E
While there are serious conferences ranging from modern day shepherding to landscape protection to innovative uses for wool, there are also plenty of fun tasting workshops pairing cheeses with wines and beers, or even more bizarrely with dates.
- [38:23]
C
For example, in England they do eat a lot of cheese with apple, so.
- [38:29]
E
It'S a fruit and whatever you choose to taste or do. Francesco Sotila says visitors always leave cheese With a new awareness, you will know.
- [38:38]
F
Everything about that product because the farmers are eager to transfer the experience, to transfer the story, to transfer the cultural, to transfer the territory. So it's a different way, different approach to sell a product. And we are very proud about that because it is what we have been trying to develop for many, many years. In this event, in the other events we organize, and many of us, I'm the first, we consider that this is the best event that Slow Food organizes every two years.
- [39:15]
E
For Monaco in Bra, I'm Danny Metzman.
- [39:19]
B
Thank you, Danny. That is all for this edition of the Daily. Thanks to our panelists today, Elizabeth Braugh and Rainbow Murray. Today's show was produced by Monica Lillis and researched by Danielle Lebro Smith. Our sound engineer was Steph Changu. And we'll end the show with a tribute to Beijing based and architect and urbanist Kyongjan Yu, who has died aged 62. Yu was traveling in Brazil to film for a documentary when his aircraft went down over the Pantanal wetlands. Yu gained global attention as an architect after the Chinese government adopted his concept of sponge cities which use nature based solutions as opposed to concrete to address flooding in urban environments. The founder of the College of Architecture and Landscape at Peking University, Yu is remembered for his passionate contributions to sustainable urbanism and ambitions to conserve biodiversity. Last year Monocle's editor in chief Andrew Tuck spoke to him about his concept for the Urbanist on Monocle Radio. Now tell me where abouts could we come and see some of these interventions in action. Give us an example of a city that has begun to change and to implement the policy.
- [40:25]
J
So the first city which fully following the concept of sponge city is Hainan island in Sanya city we do which was a city suffering monsoon flood seriously because it is a very south tropical city. It's only a few of these tropical cities and suffer most the monsoon flood. So than we did a mass plan the sponge city planning for the whole city. We dechanalize the river and we turn the green space into sponge park and we transform the conventional road system into a sponge road. So it become very systematically implement the sponge city idea from regional scale to community scale to individual sponge parks. And it only take one year actually. And you will see today the city used to be very flood prone city, now become a very water resilient city and become a tourism attraction for the whole nation. And its property value quadrupled in those areas which have this sponge park or sponge river system.