Like the illusion of Wall Street, with its vast and powerful investment banks, now shuttered, China too is an illusion perpetuated by the Globalists that gave us the 15,000 mile Caesar salad, poisoned cat food and lead based paint on babies' pacifiers. Like the illusion that money would come from thin air to always push housing prices higher, China has spent a generation pursuing its illusion. Pursuing an unattainable dream to be like the West, while 6000 years of its carefully shepherded top soil blows into the sea.
A decade ago, the grain used for livestock from the US alone would've been able to feed nearly 20% of the population of the world. Include waste from spoilage and whatnot and we're at nearly another ~2 billion. Toss in grain use for livestock world wide and we're probably at ~50+% of current food production. That's a pretty big excess IMO!
We could probably double food production and we would still have people starving. It's not about lack of food, it's about greed and waste, which has been around for decades wrt the farming revolution. Besides, how can you condone stuff w/ absolute headlines like what the OP linked?
And I will still be eating grain fed beef and throwing my leftovers to the chickens while many others are starving. I case you have not noticed we do not live in a just world. You can hate the fact or you can embrace it, the fact, however, will not change.
Yup. Peopel need to come up with solutions based on how things are, not how they dream things could be in a perfect world. _________________ "The era of procrastination, of half-measures, of soothing and baffling expedients, of delays, is coming to a close. In its place we are entering a period of consequences…"
Sir Winston Churchill
Posted: Thu Jun 26, 2008 1:40 pm Post subject: Re: You. Will. Not. Be. Able. To. Get. Food.
Drifter wrote:
In a perfect world, less grains could be given to livestock and instead used for human consumption. But the problem is that we don't live in a perfect world. It's never going to happen. People want their meat, no matter what. Same with driving cars. I'm so tired of idealistic-minded people saying that alternative technologies and conservation are going to make everything ok. It won't because that's not the way the real world works. The real world is not a controlled laboratory experiment. The real world is full of unpredictable, selfish, and greedy people who will never voluntarily give up what they think they need.
Ditto for overly optimistic scenarios, and the same goes for those predicting huge "die-offs". However I think they are both useful as possible courses that could be taken as well as illustrations of the most basic human characteristics. Along those lines, people probably aren't starving simply because of fossil fuel price increases, or even starving for the most part due to them, since they've been starving for a long time. They're starving because groups in America and Africa, or whoever, are greedy. Sure, a population already stretched to the brink by a corrupt regime who was starving in the first place is probably going to be hit harder by rising food prices. But that was just the straw on the camel's back. The problem is that their living in a hell hole on a minimal, or worse, diet, for the jollies of some other group. _________________
Posted: Thu Jun 26, 2008 2:10 pm Post subject: Re: You. Will. Not. Be. Able. To. Get. Food.
What about if people stopped eating meat and converted to vegetarianism. How much more food would we be able to grow ? Could that solve the food problem, at least for a few years. _________________ We are the Borg. Resistance is futile. Your culture will adapt to service ours. We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own.
A decade ago, the grain used for livestock from the US alone would've been able to feed nearly 20% of the population of the world. Include waste from spoilage and whatnot and we're at nearly another ~2 billion. Toss in grain use for livestock world wide and we're probably at ~50+% of current food production. That's a pretty big excess IMO!
We could probably double food production and we would still have people starving. It's not about lack of food, it's about greed and waste, which has been around for decades wrt the farming revolution. Besides, how can you condone stuff w/ absolute headlines like what the OP linked?
And I will still be eating grain fed beef and throwing my leftovers to the chickens while many others are starving. I case you have not noticed we do not live in a just world. You can hate the fact or you can embrace it, the fact, however, will not change.
Yes people will be starving around the globe while I am still throwing away unwanted portions from McDonalds. Last Time I checked there is no way to transport that food without spoiling it.
Yes people will starve while producing nations are rolling in excess production. If we shipped off the excess that would reduce local supply and we would vote bums into office who would institute policies to reduce exports and keep the price low at home (a' la the rice exporting nations which stopped all exports in order to keep the price of rice down at home).
It isn't about shipping off the excess or trying to transport leftovers from Micky D's, but thanks for the strawmen. It is however about grossly inefficient use of food and capital for greed while others starve when they don't have to. Sure, we can't transport leftover hamburgers to Africa, but we could simply not raise an excessive amount of meat and have more than enough additional grain for those who are in need. That being said, if we decide to use our excess in certain ways because we are greedy, that's fine. But I wouldn't think for a second that we don't have plenty of excess wrt food or that fossil fuel prices would result in some basic inability to produce enough food to feed the world. We're simply greedy and would rather have grain fed livestock and/or Ethanol and/or etc than to do something about those starving. But, again, that isn't about the significant effect of fossil fuel prices on food, as was seen with people starving for the past century w/ much lower FF prices, it's about greed.
wisconsin_cur wrote:
Can we measure the point where all of those things will break? Of course not, right now we just have the projections for consumption and production that we have... and in a world populated by over 6 billion people a few million tonnes is not much of an excess.
A few tonnes isn't, however the amount we waste due to greed/apathy is. _________________
Posted: Thu Jun 26, 2008 9:04 pm Post subject: Re: You. Will. Not. Be. Able. To. Get. Food.
Tyler_JC wrote:
1. The United States is the world's largest food exporter by a huge margin. . . .
2. The US is attacked at the UN every year because it produces too much food. . . .Basically, I'm not worried. I'm so not worried about it that I'm literally betting my life on it by ignoring the advice to run off to the countryside and start a farm.
But isn't the idea that we only produce so much food *because* of ff? Without cheap ff we won't have nearly as much production. Right? _________________ ~Laura
"If you weren't smart enough to plan ahead then Doom on you!" ~Dodo bird
Posted: Thu Jun 26, 2008 9:06 pm Post subject: Re: You. Will. Not. Be. Able. To. Get. Food.
wisconsin_cur wrote:
Yes people will be starving around the globe while I am still throwing away unwanted portions from McDonalds. Last Time I checked there is no way to transport that food without spoiling it..
LOL, but didn't you see Supersize Me? Those fries last FOREVER. _________________ ~Laura
"If you weren't smart enough to plan ahead then Doom on you!" ~Dodo bird
Posted: Thu Jun 26, 2008 9:15 pm Post subject: Re: You. Will. Not. Be. Able. To. Get. Food.
The United States is the Saudi Arabia of agriculture. In fact, in economic terms as food goes up in price, its one compensating factor in the world economy favoring the U.S.
As others have written, grain prices will have the balancing factor of substitution away from livstock feed as the prices grow. Look to more grass fed beef and even lamb in the meat diet.
I feel the worst thing that will affect the American consumer from high prices may be a trend away from excess meat consumption. And, that will be a blessing in disguise.
Joined: Jun 20, 2008 Posts: 67 Location: Quebec/Ottawa, Canada
Posted: Thu Jun 26, 2008 10:40 pm Post subject: Re: You. Will. Not. Be. Able. To. Get. Food.
Denny wrote:
The United States is the Saudi Arabia of agriculture. In fact, in economic terms as food goes up in price, its one compensating factor in the world economy favoring the U.S.
Ummm, but food prices don't just magically re-appear in peoples pockets, nor either the farmers in most cases.
Point is, food prices are going up because oil is going up, so it's the oil producers/owners who are reaping the benefits of higher food prices.
Joined: May 10, 2007 Posts: 3352 Location: Resiliency Farm
Posted: Thu Jun 26, 2008 11:06 pm Post subject: Re: You. Will. Not. Be. Able. To. Get. Food.
yesplease,
greed, apathy as well as tribalism are part of the human condition. For the species as a whole there is no getting away from them so they must be part of our calculations. Pretending they are fungible, or worse yet negotiable, is fantasy and delays the interaction with reality that is needed.
Tribalism will reappear with a vengeance. We will not only not care that others are starving we will assume that they deserved it for either secular (they don't work hard enough or are not as smart as us) or religious (God is punishing them) rationales.
At the same time the causes of our own suffering, whatever it may be, will be externalized (they are doing this to us).
Of course we see these very attitudes in evidence on this board everyday, you do not need to travel very far. Perhaps you hear it at your Thanksgiving table or perhaps when you sit at the local diner.
You, I and St. Francis may be moved by altruism and love, but the Crusade finds more willing hearts than the call to poverty and selflessness. As individuals we do not need to be conformed to the realities around us, but we must come to grips with the realities. _________________ “It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him.”
J.R.R. Tolkien
"The time has come for men to act like men; and for women, well, to act a lot more like men."
-Ma Cur
Joined: May 26, 2008 Posts: 1190 Location: Chicago, IL
Posted: Fri Jun 27, 2008 6:40 am Post subject: Re: You. Will. Not. Be. Able. To. Get. Food.
yesplease wrote:
Sure, we can't transport leftover hamburgers to Africa
Hi, yesplease. Not addressed to you, but since you brought it up, I snort at these comments to send food to third world countries. In my travelings through our beautiful and powerful USofA, I'm often in the most empoverished counties and zip codes in the nation, and between us, it's nasty.
During the Katrina crisis, a relative found it was "less bureaucratic" --real quote-- to get passports, visas, currencies, vaccines, learn foreign expressions, and travel to Georgia (former USSR) to donate money and build a church, then to load a pick-up truck and drive down I-55. Absolute non-sense.
Posted: Fri Jun 27, 2008 4:59 pm Post subject: Re: You. Will. Not. Be. Able. To. Get. Food.
um first world not a big problem, third world really big problem. You'd be surprised how little food you can live on third worlds already there so they dont have wiggle room like we do.
Posted: Fri Jun 27, 2008 8:12 pm Post subject: Re: You. Will. Not. Be. Able. To. Get. Food.
wisconsin_cur wrote:
You, I and St. Francis may be moved by altruism and love, but the Crusade finds more willing hearts than the call to poverty and selflessness. As individuals we do not need to be conformed to the realities around us, but we must come to grips with the realities.
And one of those realities is having a tremendous excess of food. Hell, we could have another Crusade where everyone eats meat from predators who have to eat meat from herbivores who have to eat grain that we grow then whine about how we're going to run into trouble w/ the food supply, but just because we whine about it doesn't make it so. What we're really having trouble w/ would be greed, and in that case fluff like what was posted is just fear mongering. _________________
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It is however about grossly inefficient use of food and capital for greed while others starve when they don't have to. Sure, we can't transport leftover hamburgers to Africa, but we could simply not raise an excessive amount of meat and have more than enough additional grain for those who are in need. That being said, if we decide to use our excess in certain ways because we are greedy, that's fine. But I wouldn't think for a second that we don't have plenty of excess wrt food or that fossil fuel prices would result in some basic inability to produce enough food to feed the world. We're simply greedy and would rather have grain fed livestock and/or Ethanol and/or etc than to do something about those starving. But, again, that isn't about the significant effect of fossil fuel prices on food, as was seen with people starving for the past century w/ much lower FF prices, it's about greed.
