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On Gandhi's Path
Blog post
Food Crisis on the Way
Posted Oct 15, 2008 by Richard Heinberg
A perfect storm is brewing in the global food system, and North Americans and Europeans may not be spared this time.
Contributing factors:
The economic crash is still unfolding (no need for explanation here, just pick up any newspaper). It is inherently deflationary in nature because trillions of electronic dollars and euros are simply vanishing on a weekly basis. Efforts by central banks and the US Treasury to re-inflate the system are so far proving ineffective. This ultimately means less money in the pockets of consumers. If things go badly, it will mean NO money in the pockets of a great many would-be consumers.
Meanwhile input costs to farmers are at an all-time high, despite the recent fall in oil and natural gas prices. Moreover, farmers need loans in the course of their normal operations, and loans are hard to get now. That means many farmers just won’t plant as much as they ordinarily would. Many will decide they just can’t afford their hobby any more and go looking for work that actually pays.
On top of this we have the trends that have already led to high food prices in recent months—biofuels mandates, weather impacts (and crop failures) due to climate change, and higher transport costs for farm inputs and outputs.
Meanwhile, farmers’ incomes are not rising—just the opposite. Even though food prices are leading the inflation index, none of the expanding portion of the food dollar is finding its way into the pockets of the people who make the whole system go.
Michael Pollan’s excellent article in the most recent New York Times Sunday Magazine describes what we should be doing to avert a looming food crisis. Every nation and every state and region needs to be formulating a food plan along these lines.
Otherwise, we will be leaving our food system to the vagaries of the market, as we are doing with our energy system (see my previous commentary). The consequences are likely to be similar: less food to go around, extremely volatile prices, and farmers dropping out just when we need more of them.
The time available for the formulation and implementation of an effective policy response is very brief indeed.
Time to start planning next year’s garden.
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Reader Comments
7 comments
How soon and where?
From: Tadhg C., Oct 17, 2008 03:17 AM
My assumption is that Richard is talking about the US as much as anywhere. So how soon could this happen in the US and in Europe?
There appears to be multiple factors coming together that could result in food shortages everywhere within the few months and not just in "vulnerable" countries such as Iceland where its already happening.
http://www.dailynewscaster.com/2008/10/14/iceland-facing-food-shortage/
Those factors are:
1. Lack of credit, shipping companies, truckers, gas stations, manufacturers all require credit to buy fuel and ship product. This is already happening: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=alFFUQ8a.WZM&refer=h...
The inadequate response by the Fed/Government to confront the cause and instead prop up failed banks and bad debts is making this worse.
2. Low gasoline reserves. These are apparently the lowest since 1967. Add the disruption caused by Hurricanes Ike and Gustav and I believe US was down by 3million barrels in production. Due to these disruptions to supply in the GoM this means drivers in the southeast etc. have been using up a closed supply. Are we back at full production in the southeast, if not how big are the shortages and delays in supply of gasoline throughout the system?
3. Possibility of an agreed drop in OPEC oil production
4. Rising costs of farm inputs and high market prices for staple grains.
So can anyone update me on those issues? Are these likely to lead to disruptions in food supply in the US anytime soon? I know nobody has a crystal ball, so just give it your best shot.
From Fast Food Back to the Garden of Eatin'?
From: Chris S., Oct 17, 2008 03:10 AM
As the future America becomes more like the Mexico of today, people will need to grow their own gardens and participate in labor-intensive community agriculture again. This will not "pay" very well and won't provide much of a 401k. Get use to it --this is how your ancestors lived for 10s of 1000s of years. There were never any guarantees that life would be comfortable and safe. All the TV sparkle, internet dazzle, and paper confetti was just an illusion.
Farming and gardens aren't as easy as some posters suggests
From: Charles S., Oct 16, 2008 04:48 PM
Hi,
Two summers ago a very bright and hardworking friend lost about 8,000 dollars trying to break into small scale farming.
He rented a parcel of land 10 miles inland in Manitowoc County along the west shore of lake Michigan.
He worked his buttocks off trying to make the thick clay soil produce organic veggies for high end restaurants. The carrots looked like radishes. The onions were small and bound by the soil. He actually lost 20 pounds that summer.
The rains came late and then in torrents. Many of his greens died from the constant dehydrating winds.
Had he and his wife had to live on their output, they would have starved.
Yes, we all need to start gardening. But it takes a couple of years to figure out what works best with your land. Maybe it is good for greens, maybe it is loose enough for carrots and onions, or maybe you need to just put in gooseberry bushes and fruit trees. And the problem is, we may not have time to sort it out.
Start now.
Charles
P.S. I wonder if anyone saved information from the Victory garden program of WWII on what grew best where.
We need to get this on the news
From: Stephen Hinkle, Oct 16, 2008 03:43 PM
The problem is that many are oblivious to the problem. With too many of us in city life and used to going to the supermarket when they need food, many are not aware of the farming issues. We need to relocalize the food production and get a major campaign on for people to plant gardens and supermarkets to carry food from homeowners gardens in their own area instead of from huge commercial farms far away. I predict that if everyone in the suburbs of america planted a garden and grew their own crops, the quantities might add up to a commercial farm for many crops and be able to be sold at the supermarket saving us a lot of fertiziler and oil.
Additionally, I feel that you may be right with farmers incomes dropping, supplies diminishing, and honeybee colony collapse disorder, we need to change agriculture for good.
Get your own garden growing
From: william martin, Oct 16, 2008 08:57 AM
hi,
Since we first became aware of these issues, I left my high-paying job in the seminar world and started an heirloom seed preservation company. We now steward over 600 varieties of seeds and offer 48 to the home gardener and small farmer. let us know how we can help anyone get their own backyard food garden growing. www.ediblegardens.com
Get growing!!!
Thanks Richard and Post
From: Matt Stevens, Oct 16, 2008 08:30 AM
Thanks Richard and Post Carbon for your continuing effort to provide accurate and timely prognostications.
To those of us who are paying attention: it's time to move from practicing our gardening skills to expanding our gardens to subsistence scales and start planting!
Matt
Food Corps
From: Jerry McManus, Oct 16, 2008 08:27 AM
At one point in the distant past of my wasted youth, shortly after High School, I was on my own and on the brink of homelessness and destitution. At the last minute, literally, I was saved by a federal program called Job Corps that paid me a stipend to live on a campus with fellow wayward souls and learn a marketable skill in the trades. Six months later I was back on my feet, back in the city, and getting jobs that paid the rent.
Need 50 million farmers? I'll bet that if you offered to pay people to live on a campus for a few months that teaches small-holding farming and self sufficiency skills, coupled with the opportunity to lease a piece of productive land or work on an established farm upon completion of the program, you would get millions of recruits.
Maybe not today, people are still largely in denial about overshoot and collapse, but when unemployment hits 25% for the first time since the last depression people will line up for blocks. I know I would.
Cheers,
Jerry