For a minute there I thought I had to get off my couch, when all the while the fact is we don't have to do anything much but keep things afloat for just a few decades more! In fact, we'd best shut up about PO, because if our offspring finds out we knew about it all along, they'll turn and wring our necks come 2036!
Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 9:59 am Post subject: Re: Food Depletion and Peak Oil
Peak oil and peak food on msn? The end is really nigh. Anyone who can buy stores of non-perishable food should do so now. We live in a golden age where a weeks wages can buy a years worth of food which can be preserved for several years.
Joined: May 13, 2005 Posts: 2615 Location: The Urban Village
Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 10:06 am Post subject: Re: Food Depletion and Peak Oil
The article asks
Quote:
Could we really run out of food?
and
Quote:
The very idea that the modern world could run out of food seems ludicrous, but that is the flip side, or cause, of the tremendous recent increase in the cost of raw wheat, corn, rice, oats and soybeans.
I would just quote Lynch or Yergin or one of those fine fellows and say that the stone age didn't end because we ran out of stones. and so the human race will not end due to lack of food. It will end because.. oh, wait... that doesn't work
Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 10:50 am Post subject: Re: Food Depletion and Peak Oil
Ainan wrote:
Peak oil and peak food on msn? The end is really nigh.
I love this stuff! If I said a few years ago that mainstream news
would be talking about peak oil and even use the word famine, just a
few years ago that would have been crazy talk! Oh how the times
are changing...
Quote:
Empty global cupboards
Shortages are real. The Financial Times reports that rice stocks
have fallen this year to about 70 million tons, the lowest level in 25
years and less than half the total held in global inventories in 2000.
Wheat inventories, called "carry-overs" in the trade, are at 30-year
lows even though world wheat production was actually up 1% last
year. In the past year, reports show, wheat inventories in the
European Union have plunged to 1 million tons from 14 million tons.
A leading Canadian fertilizer executive told analysts recently that
according to his company's calculations, global grain reserves are
"precarious," at just 1.7 months of consumption, down from 3.5
months of reserves as recently as 2000.
I've been talking about this one for a while, it's interesting other people are noticing this too.
They save the worstbest stuff for page 2
Quote:
Could we really run out of food? Page 2
Now the really bad news is that we might actually have been lucky
in the past few years, as global warming has lengthened growing
seasons in the American Plains, sometimes called the Saudi Arabia
of corn. BMO's Coxe notes that the U.S. Midwest has enjoyed 17
straight years without significant crop failure, the longest winning
streak on record. If this fortunate run ends soon, we'll likely face a
worldwide crisis.
Some researchers, including climatologist Elwyn Taylor of Iowa
State University, believe it could happen this year, as La Nina
conditions are emerging at a time when the Midwest has become
vulnerable due to a drought creeping up from the South.
Food prices are already way up in America but not as much as feed
prices because manufacturers, processors and retailers such as
Wal-Mart Stores (WMT, news, msgs) have found ways to hold the
line by cutting expenses. But they can dam up the flood of food
inflation for only so long. Just this week, Procter & Gamble (PG,
news, msgs) announced it was raising prices on many of its foods
products, including Folgers coffee. J&J Snack Foods said it would lift
prices by as much as 12% in April to offset costs, and local
newspapers have been rife with stories about pizzerias both raising
prices and cutting back on crust thickness and cheese quantities.
...If global famine is one bad crop away, then surely there is
an investment angle.
...Coxe's solution: As a first step, shut down all ethanol plants
immediately. "It's criminal to burn corn for fuel when we are out of
food," he said. In a particularly pernicious development, he noted
that a big boost in demand for soybeans for use as biodiesel in
Europe has driven up the price of palm oil in Southeast Asia, where
it is the main source of protein for the poor.
Ethanol and biodiesel are dead ends or end in death, that shouldn't
come to a surprise to anyone here. Pretty heavy stuff for a mainstream
news article. Good find Utopia.
Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 9:45 pm Post subject: Re: Food Depletion and Peak Oil
I just heard on the public radio station that China might stop exporting fertilizers because supplys are running low and cost is way up and they need it all for there farmers,, heard that Europe is there biggest buyer and they will be in a big hurt if they stop selling to them,, it also went on to say that crop production with out fertilizers can drop 1/3 yield,, This just cant happen this fast all of a sudden,, Whats Happening,, Did we peak a couple years ago or what...
Posted: Fri Apr 18, 2008 12:18 am Post subject: Re: Food Depletion and Peak Oil
dinopello wrote:
(...) the stone age didn't end because we ran out of stones. and so the human race will not end due to lack of food. It will end because.. oh, wait... that doesn't work
Can I add that lines to my signature? _________________ anagami.net
Joined: Sep 04, 2005 Posts: 362 Location: central MA, USA
Posted: Sun May 04, 2008 7:00 pm Post subject: Re: Food Depletion and Peak Oil
Ainan wrote:
Peak oil and peak food on msn? The end is really nigh. Anyone who can buy stores of non-perishable food should do so now. We live in a golden age where a weeks wages can buy a years worth of food which can be preserved for several years.
What good does it do to store a year's worth of purchased food, if you can't grow the next year's worth when it runs out?
Joined: Jun 13, 2007 Posts: 3345 Location: Minniesotuh
Posted: Sun May 04, 2008 7:09 pm Post subject: Re: Food Depletion and Peak Oil
FoolYap wrote:
Ainan wrote:
Peak oil and peak food on msn? The end is really nigh. Anyone who can buy stores of non-perishable food should do so now. We live in a golden age where a weeks wages can buy a years worth of food which can be preserved for several years.
What good does it do to store a year's worth of purchased food, if you can't grow the next year's worth when it runs out?
That year will give you time to learn to eat other things-bugs, weeds, etc! _________________ "RRrrruuuunnnn!!!" ~Apocalypto
Joined: Dec 27, 2004 Posts: 12009 Location: zombie horde wonderland
Posted: Sun May 04, 2008 7:53 pm Post subject: Re: Food Depletion and Peak Oil
FoolYap wrote:
What good does it do to store a year's worth of purchased food, if you can't grow the next year's worth when it runs out?
Many people find life precious enough they would very much enjoy one more year of life versus dying right away. _________________ "...powerdown so soft and fluffy you'll think you're living in a pillow..." - jboogy
Posted: Sun May 04, 2008 8:44 pm Post subject: Re: Food Depletion and Peak Oil
Ludi wrote:
FoolYap wrote:
What good does it do to store a year's worth of purchased food, if you can't grow the next year's worth when it runs out?
Many people find life precious enough they would very much enjoy one more year of life versus dying right away.
I never understood why so many people on this site have a bizarre fixation for the long term storage of food. There must be somebody from Paris reading this forum laughing to themselves: "those silly Americans." BTW it's considered "normal" to buy bread twice a day in Paris in small quantities: once in the morning and again in the evening. That way you're guaranteed to have "fresh" food. This is a standard practice from a country that has a GDP per capita of 30% less than America.
To clarify my position, I believe in the die-off scenario (in the long term) but I never never never understood people who hold food in storage for so long. To each his own but seriously folks, I think a more reasonable response to PO is to simply eat lower on the scale. Cooking your own food from raw ingredients instead eating out and buying frozen dinners and other packaged foods. You'll save enough money to survive PO, IMHO.
Posted: Mon May 05, 2008 12:14 am Post subject: Re: Food Depletion and Peak Oil
Ferretlover wrote:
FoolYap wrote:
Ainan wrote:
Peak oil and peak food on msn? The end is really nigh. Anyone who can buy stores of non-perishable food should do so now. We live in a golden age where a weeks wages can buy a years worth of food which can be preserved for several years.
What good does it do to store a year's worth of purchased food, if you can't grow the next year's worth when it runs out?
That year will give you time to learn to eat other things-bugs, weeds, etc!
...or humans. There must be a timer of how much a thread lasts without talking of canibalism... what was the other common subject? was it doom? _________________ anagami.net
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