Food Shortage

Perhaps this is just a sign of people's immediate response to the issue of the price of food. I supposed with the training that has been given, it is natural for many to just start squawking for the govt to help them. I do think that if a real crisis comes, or this one deepens, many will just pick themselves up by the seats of their pants and get to work- so to speak.

I think it is my responsibility to be a voice for the alternative choice - "put in a garden and grow something for yourselves." If I were still a master gardener, I would certainly try to get some newspaper space or radio time and promote just that.

Yes, another large rock might strike Earth within the next 80 million years.

Without planned ZPG or better yet NPG, the human race might be pretty much extinct within the next 80 years. Whether its planned or not, a very sharp NPG is going to occur and soon. People are talking of 'peak' this or that. I think the world is now pretty much at 'peak human population'. We shall see why the numbers cannot go much higher.

Planned NPG would be a lot less rude than the unplanned NPG event soon to unfold due to blind market and natural forces.

This is the great I.Q. test for peoplekind. Will we choose to live in prosperity for hundreds or even thousands of more years

or

will we choose to nearly all suffocate in our own wastes over the next few decades?

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Population keeps on breeding
Nation bleeding, still more feeding economy
Life is funny, skies are sunny
Bees make honey, who needs money, monopoly
...
World pollution is no solution

so hows this zpg or npg is going to work or implemented? the gouberment going to tell who can have kids and who can't?(just what we need, more government in our lives.) limit the number of kids you can have?(works well in china, oh dang, another girl, well the hogs will be happy.) have a lottery, dna test, by iq. why don't we just leave the kids alone and they will do the job for us.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23358982

It would be better for individuals to choose to limit their own propagation than to have the imposition of government mandates.

If enough individuals and couples worldwide do not so choose, then death-rates (due to famine among other causes) across all age-groups will rise to remedy the problem.

Any livestock grower knows if 30 times too many animals are placed on a given a tract of land, almost all will quickly die.

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Population keeps on breeding
Nation bleeding, still more feeding economy
Life is funny, skies are sunny
Bees make honey, who needs money, monopoly
...
World pollution is no solution

I don't know about an actual food shortage but I do know that we pump more than enough aid into third world countries to feed them many times over but the corruption of most of the governments in those countries results in very little of that money going to feed the people as most of it ends up in government pockets or into the military.

As for gas shortages, there is absolutely no shortage. There is more oil yet to be discovered than has been discovered to date. The oil companies only produce enough to keep the demand and prices high. The oil companies are an example of the worst case of market manipulation in history.

As I mentioned on another thread, the most stable civilizations in history were the ones made up mostly of small farms, 2-5 acres. Early Rome and China were two of them. The people were healthy and their military was feared because it was mostly made up of farmer/warriors who were tough from working the land. If more and more people took to homesteading it would solve both of these problems, There would be food for everybody and we would drive less, reducing the need for oil.

As for population control, that's what is needed in a lot of third world countries. They have no food, sanitation, health care, etc. and they're pumping out babies like there's no tomorrow, many of whome die very young. I know if I can barely afford to feed myself, I"m not going to bring a child into this world that I can't support. Why are they?

Earth human population 1750: 791,000,000
Earth human population 1999: 5,978,000,000
Earth total surface 1750: 196,940,400 square miles
Earth total surface 1999: 196,940,400 square miles

Martin

Trucking guy..........why are they "pumping out babies" in 3rd world countries?

For one.........there is no birth control available to them (they don't have access to medical care or even antibiotics...let alone monthly supplies of birth control pills)
For two.........show me a man who doesn't want sex with his wife
For three......yes, the infant mortality rate is very high due to starvation, illness, unsanitary conditions, and so they continue to procreate in order to keep their tribes, families going
My youngest son is in the Peruvian Amazon right now.......and yes, among the indigenous tribes there......infant mortality is high.......but it's how they live.
The plus side is these people truly care about each other.......they take care of each other......including the orphans (they aren't shuttled off to orphanages) They are VERY family and tribe oriented .......which my son finds extremely refreshing when compared to the majority of people in the USA.
Some of the best aspects in people can be found in 3rd world countries.

Getting that oil from Point A to Point B and eventually to Point C is one major problem. With only one of our 5 major foreign suppliers being via pipelines, getting the crude to the refineries doesn't happen with a simple turn of a valve. At this very moment, there's a big pipeline being laid through Wisconsin to allow more Canadian crude to get to the Chicago area refineries. But when it does get to the refineries, they are all old and limited in their capabilities. Everybody agrees that more refineries are needed but that same "everybody" shouts NIMBY and everybody knows that NIMBY rules in this country.

Martin

There won't be any corn bread on the table if all the corn is used for fuel. Todays grain prices have not doubled or trippled because of folks buying it for food but because of using it for fuel. You won't see exporting grain to poor countrys for food because the cost of helping the poor just got too expensive. Next fall when you walk through Wallyworld you won't see Deercorn bagged forsale, because them deer ain't going to be eating that high on the hog. I just hope we can find a bag of meal and be able to afford to buy it. Eddie

An interesting fact is that 25% of all cropland in 1920 was used to produce "fuel". 22% was for horses and mules on the farms and 3% for horses employed in cities and mining operations. Does anyone have the current figures on "fuel" acreage?

Martin

I don't dispute that these are good people and I believe they do care for each other. My intent was not to put them down, my point was that I think it's very unwise to bring children into a situation where they can't support them. I get bombarded with shows on tv about starving orphans all over the world and it breaks my heart to see them starving and alone. Now, if these shows are way off base and are just propaganda for organizations wanting more money for some underhanded agenda please tell me. If they are true, and I think most of them are, then we have a huge problem all over the world, a situation that I would not want to bring another child into until the situation was fixed.

There are organizations who are now trying to introduce safe sex to many of these countries, mostly to reduce AIDS but also to reduce unwanted pregnancies. Of course men want to have sex with their wives but we're not rutting animals, we have to be wise in everything we do in our lives.

Unfortunately, until wars are stopped and corrupt goverments are properly dealt with, these problems won't go away and will continue to affect the rest of us. We can only take care of ourselves and make sure we are as stable as possible to allow us to better assist others in getting back on their feet.

They already are. The idea is taking off like a rocket.
http://www.revivevictorygarden.org/
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/victorygarden/If land prices come down, maybe we'll see a revival of the back to the land movement.

People should have been buying farms instead of McMansions. There are tons of small farms around here rotting away, complete with barns, pens, and outbuildings. The last owners died of old age, and the kids/grandkids weren't interested.

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Did anyone see this?

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/bestoftv/2008/04/22/beck.food.fears.cnn
Nothing most of us didn't already know, but when it gets in MSM, it's suddenly major breaking news.

Another one tonight:

http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/glenn.beck/index.html

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Alot of different views on this? How space travel got involved??? I don't believe we are in an actual shortage. If we were to ever be in one things would be chaotic. The point was raised that urbanites are so far removed from the farm that they just don't understand. I say i agree to a point but i don't have enough to feed them all so they may be in trouble. We do have urbanites on these boards who only have a few tomato plants. I say what difference would it make in a real shortage if everyone had some food storage instead of living literally hand to mouth? This isn't just for urbanites though i know many people who live in rural areas that don't garden and don't store food, they may only have a couple weeks supply at any given time. Many of them respond if food gets short i'll hunt. Good idea when food gets short everyone go hunting and wipe out the game population over a week then what?

I think you hit the nail squarely on the head. More crop ground for food is being taken out of production for fuel every year, which, in the long run will make food scarce. Especially in the third world countries.
Sad to see that we value fuel over feeding our world. To me, something's wrong with that picture.
There was an article on the news this morning about the amount of corn that needs to be harvested to fill up one tank of gas. The same amount would feed a human being in a needy country for a year. So, in other words, we'll starve a person for a tank of gas; actually we'll starve them for larger profits.
There are so many ways to reduce our fuel consumption, but I never hear them being discussed on a larger scale. Allowing many employees to work from home, cutting work weeks to four days instead of five. These two options would significantly reduce our need for fuel, but I seldom hear it being discussed. The only thing I hear is, buy a new car that gets you better fuel mileage.
Money, greed, it's at the bottom of it all. It's a sinking ship we're all on, and nobody, but a few, want to change the course back to shore, back to our roots.
OK, I'm off my soap box now!

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Joy at Secretplace Farm

I totally agree.

But.

(don't you hate 'but's' )

WARNING>>>>>>>>> GENERALITIES coming...

The folks doing the most breeding (for the most part... not talking about any HT families) will never get off this 'rock'... a lot of them will never do anything, but breed more of the same. People eeking out a living, eating mud cookies, don't have the time to think about quantum mechanics...

The folks who have the smarts to actually think us off this rock, are the most likely to never reproduce. AntiDarwinism in action. The smarter a person is, the less likely they'll reproduce. People thinking about quantum mechanics all the time, don't have the time to think about sex, drugs, and rock and roll.

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Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity. Seneca
Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival. W. Edwards Deming

Joy, I agree with you...

On the sinking ship analogy... few folks want to jump off the sinking ship... personally I'd stay on the ship as long as possible... better than jumping into the water with the sharks.

The general populace wouldn't last long, on a 'back to our roots' scenario. Can you imagine white collar workers, out in the baking sun, with a short handled hoe, weeding a corn patch...? Soccer moms harnessed together, being used as plow mules, to plow a field? (Remember the pictures of the Mennonites? out in W Canada, breaking ground, using females in place of draft animals?)

There are very very few 'positions' available on a subsistence farm... no need for bookkeepers, accountants, mid level managers, secretaries, vp's, CEO's, CIO's, etc. Can you use a shovel, a hoe, and an axe? For 12 hours a day, out in whatever weather? If so, the job is yours. Perks? Get to eat, at least once a day... free gym, free health care, free burial plan (last two plans are closely tied together )

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Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity. Seneca
Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival. W. Edwards Deming

Children are starving in China

and- doesnt this topic belong in general chat?

IMO, this topic should be discussed on almost every forum here.

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Now back to the grasshoppers and the ants. The big oil companies are the grasshoppers and everybody else are the ants. Until the ants figure out how to keep the grasshopper from controlling the farmer ants,then the factory ants, then the trucker ants, then the grocery ants, us just plain ants are going to have to pay everybody elses grasshopper fuel bill when we go in the grocery to buy some ant food. All us ants have to stick together and knock that dang grasshopper off the top by whatever means we can. He's been in control tooooo long. LOL Eddie