A warm feeling of joined-up government and coordinated departmental strategic thinking flooded over me when reading Defra's Five Year Strategy Delivering the Essentials of Life. The document states that for the first time, one department will bring together the interests of the countryside, farmers and food production and the environment. Sustainable development will be achieved by integrating economic, social and environmental objectives which will be championed as the way forward for government. The integration includes references to energy, climate change, rural housing, planning, deregulation and reducing red tape, eradicating social exclusion and the environment, including recycling and local environmental quality. That is a comprehensive strategy and it will be a huge challenge to integrate all those key areas.
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