Food Price Riots Popping Up Around The World

[CHCatholic]

I’ll tell you one thing, its driving up the cost of beer, and I DO NOT LIKE THAT.

Since when is it $40 for a 24 pack…talk about ludicrous

 

[ricmat]

I’ll tell you one thing, its driving up the cost of beer, and I DO NOT LIKE THAT.

Since when is it $40 for a 24 pack…talk about ludicrous

What kind of beer are you buying? I get “regular cheap” beer for about 50 cents a can (e.g. Coors, Bud, etc.). For special occasions, I buy Moosehead (which here in California is a long way from Canada), for about 80 cents a bottle.

 

[ribozyme]

I’ll post something “Randall Parker” posted earlier about population:

Bad Catholic Church! Bad! Bad! Bad! Your position on contraceptives is irresponsible. Change your position. Human population growth isn’t going to stop without contraceptives. Continued human population growth is the road to ruin.

Update II: Peak Oil, followed by Peak Natural Gas and Peak Coal, might drive up world food prices so high that current African population trends won’t be sustainable. But I suspect the hunger caused by a peak fossil fuels will be fairly short-lived (granted it will kill a lot of people). We’ll have several tough years until energy substitutes come on line. Necessity is a mother. Well, we are going to go up against a pretty big dose of necessity as fossil fuels supplies decline. So after a period of hunger will once again come the capacity to subsidize African food production and food supplies. We really do need to lower fertility in Africa to stop continued population growth there.

He also made the following recommendations:

The problems in Africa are not caused by socialism. If they were then Sweden would be a hell hole and East Germany would have been far poorer at the time the Berlin Wall came down.

What would help Africa:

1. An end to micronutrient deficiency. This would help brain development and raise cognitive ability. We might see a 5 to 10 IQ point rise.

1. Free birth control.

1. Pay teenage girls to stay in school and avoid pregnancy.

1. Outsource some functions of government to cut down on corruption and improve property rights protection. See if some NGOs could be paid to do the job.

Right now, I am not worried about socialism or redistribution – I am worried about the survivial of our Kardashev 0.7 civilization. Humanity needs to accomplish a feat that was accomplished by evolution about three billion years ago - we need to find innovative ways to use the energy from the sun.

Unfortunately, it seems the population of areas that have the most vulnerable people are likely to decline next decade. However, we do have ourselves to blame for some of this.

The average rich-nation citizen used 7.4 kilowatts (kW) of energy in 1990—a continuous flow of energy equivalent to that powering 74 100-watt lightbulbs. The average citizen of a poor nation, by contrast, used only 1 kW. There were 1.2 billion people in the rich nations, so their total environmental impact, as measured by energy use, was 1.2 billion x 7.4 kW, or 8.9 terawatts (TW)—8.9 trillion watts. Some 4.1 billion people lived in poor nations in 1990, hence their total impact (at 1 kW a head) was 4.1 TW.

The relatively small population of rich people therefore accounts for roughly two-thirds of global environmental destruction, as measured by energy use. From this perspective, the most important population problem is overpopulation in the industrialized nations.

The United States poses the most serious threat of all to human life support systems. It has a gigantic population, the third largest on Earth, more than a quarter of a billion people. Americans are superconsumers, and use inefficient technologies to feed their appetites. Each, on average, uses 11 kW of energy, twice as much as the average Japanese, more than three times as much as the average Spaniard, and over 100 times as much as an average Bangladeshi. Clearly, achieving an average family size of 1.5 children in the United States (which would still be larger than the 1.3 child average in Spain) would benefit the world much more than a similar success in Bangladesh.

dieoff.org/page43.htm

Population control in developed countries is necessary too… let’s not put all the blame on Africa or Asia. Also, we do need to alter the way we live too.

 

[CHCatholic]

What kind of beer are you buying? I get “regular cheap” beer for about 50 cents a can (e.g. Coors, Bud, etc.). For special occasions, I buy Moosehead (which here in California is a long way from Canada), for about 80 cents a bottle.

Wow, I’m moving to your area!
I paid almost $40 for a 24 pack of Budweiser

 

[drpmjhess]

Population control in developed countries is necessary too… let’s not put all the blame on Africa or Asia. Also, we do need to alter the way we live too.

Ribozyme, you’re exactly right. It’s despicably racist for people in developed countries driving their huge SUVs to complain about over-reproducing Africans. The reduction must be across the board, and it must be twofold: (1) reduction in population to sustainable carrying capacity, and (2) reduction in consumption of the goods of the earth to a sustainable rate. Petroleum will go first, in the next decade, but we are reaching Hubbert’s Peak for copper and quite a few other strategic minerals. There may be a centuries’ worth of uranium that could buy us temporary relief from loss of electrical generation capacity, until we master solar collection. Even then, solar, tidal, and wind installations require large (name removed by moderator)uts of fossil fuels to manufacture, transport, and install the equipment, so we need to get going fast while cheap petroleum is still available. The inexorable rise of gasoline prices does not bode well. We are being pinched by declining supply and rising demand around the world; there is only one way for prices to go, and that is up.

 

[rlg94086]

Wow, I’m moving to your area!
I paid almost $40 for a 24 pack of Budweiser

Wow! I sure hope you are talking about Vancouver, Canada. Here, in Vancouver, WA, I can buy a good quality Ale (microbrew) for $6.50/6-pack (I don’t drink Coors/Bud…not into lagers). The only pricey beer I drink is a Canadian Belgian-style brew for $6-7 for 750ml.

 

[latin_rite]

QUOTE=Ridgerunner;3552588] 1. Assuming there is a worldwide food shortage (which is not conceded, but is assumed arguendo) what is/are its cause/causes? It would be best if you laid a foundation for your conclusions, but for now, the conclusions alone will do.

1. Well Assuming that what many different news agencies have quoted truthfully from leading u.n figures. There isn’t much to assume. But to just clarify your first question. Or statement. Are you actually denying the fact there are food riots caused by food shortages or saying that there are “food riots” but they aren’t really rioting over shortages or high prices of food? Because if the answer to either of these is yes, then google food riots. the first few pages should give you all the information you need.

1. As specificallyl as you can state it, what is your solution?.

Well one idea which would benefit all farmers wether they are from wealthy western countries or poorer third world countries. Is to limit the spread of genetically engineered (GE)crops. What I can hear many right wingers exclaiming are you serious?. Why? they must be screaming at their computer screens.
Simple. Take the company monsatos and their GE canola crops/ seeds. These are new seeds which are not fertile. Which means that farmers main cost reduction procedures is taken away from them. They can’t keep seed from the previous crop to plant next years. They must continually buy new seed from the Monsanto company. Even if say farmer A. plants Ge crops and his neighbour (farmer B) plants un-modified crops. Any cross pollination from farmers a paddock onto farmers b paddock will render farmers B crops infertile. Not only that even if a GE seed can be replanted the farmer is not allowed to on sell any of the excess seed. Other wise he will be sued for breach of patent. And this has happened in countries like Canada and the u.s .
Another idea on how to lessen the food prices is to limit the amount of crops destined for bio fuels.
In the short term? Make available more crops seed fertilizer etc. Yes this can be done on a transfer system from countries with excess seed fertilizer etc.

 

[latin_rite]

Good heavens! You called me a hypocrite in one thread and a clown in another, all in the same morning! Am I both, or have I changed?

In order to save everyone from completely morphing into right wing protestants (who, to you, I guess, are uncharitable…a gross misjudgment, but we’ll let it pass to stay topical)

Yes you are quiet right. I said right winged protestants. I meant right wing evangelists. Which as far as I’m concerned are two very different entities. So I apologise to all the right winged protestants who took offence.

 

[drpmjhess]

Yes you are quiet right. I said right winged protestants. I meant right wing evangelists. Which as far as I’m concerned are two very different entities. So I apologise to all the right winged protestants who took offence.

I’m confused – which of the four is a right-winged evangelist": Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John?

Petrus

 

[drpmjhess]

I do not plan to have children so I guess you cannot call me a hypocrite.

Ribozyme, here are four useful books, although Heinberg offers a more hopeful take than does Kunstler.

Petrus

Heinberg, Richard. Peak Everything: Waking Up to the Century of Declines. Gabriola Island, B.C.: New Society Publishers, 2007. ISBN-13: 978-0865715981. This book tells how we might make the transition from The Age of Excess to the Era of Modesty with grace and satisfaction, while preserving the best of our collective achievements.

Heinberg, Richard. The Oil Depletion Protocol: A Plan to Avert Oil Wars, Terrorism and Economic Collapse. New Society Publishers. ISBN: 190557004X.
This book describes a unique accord whereby nations would voluntarily reduce their oil production over the long term, providing a context of stable energy prices and peaceful cooperation.

Heinberg, Richard. * The Party’s Over: Oil, War and the Fate of Industrial Societies*. New Society Publishers, 2005. ISBN: 0865715297.
The world is about to run out of cheap oil and change dramatically. Within the next few years, global production will peak. Heinberg recommends a “managed collapse” that might make way for a slower-paced, low-energy, sustainable society in the future. A riveting wake-up call for humankind.

Kunstler, James Howard. The Long Emergency: Surviving the End of the Oil Age, Climate Change, and Other Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-first Century. Atlantic Monthly Press 2005. ISBN: 0871138883.
Kunstler paints a very bleak picture of agricultural failure and migration and discusses the best places to live. He hopes that a “dazed and crippled America” will regroup around walkable, human-scale towns; that organic local economies of small farmers and tradesmen will replace an alienating corporate globalism; and that our heedless, childish culture of consumerism will be forced to grow up.

 

[drpmjhess]

Overpopulation warnings go back about 250 years – and we still produce more than enough food for everyone.

Vern, not for long. The miracle of the “Green Revolution” was made possible by cheap fossil fuels to supply crops with artificial fertilizer, pesticides, and irrigation. The sustainable number of humans is about two billion. See Dale Allen Pfeiffer, Eating Fossil Fuels: Oil, Food and the Coming Crisis in Agriculture. New Society Publishers, 2006.

 

[rlg94086]

Vern, not for long. The miracle of the “Green Revolution” was made possible by cheap fossil fuels to supply crops with artificial fertilizer, pesticides, and irrigation. The sustainable number of humans is about two billion. See Dale Allen Pfeiffer, Eating Fossil Fuels: Oil, Food and the Coming Crisis in Agriculture. New Society Publishers, 2006.

I hope that is a misprint on your part…2 billion? The current population is over 6.6 billion.

 

[drpmjhess]

I hope that is a misprint on your part…2 billion? The current population is over 6.6 billion.

No, that’s not a misprint. Before the commercial discovery and exploitation of oil in1859, earth’s sustainable population was around one billion. Fossil fuels (for tractors, fertilizers, transportation, and food processing) pushed population to 6.6+ billion. When the oil runs out during this decade, the population will probably collapse back to the pre-oil, solar-sustainable level. Of course, we have more efficient technologies now, so we may be able to sustain twice the 1859 number; optimists them three billion is possible, but that’s the upper level estimate among agronomists working with the petroleum issue.

The challenge for Catholics and other people of faith is how to maintain a voice in the transition back to a sustainable human population. We want to engineer the collapse in the direction of a “soft landing,” so that the more horrific aspects of population control are not imposed upon the world by ruthless dictatorships. That’s why we need to work for education and voluntary family size limitation. If we refuse to do this, Ribozyme is right: nature will take care of the excess population above carrying capacity, in ways we will likely not find very pleasant at all. I hope we’ll find the moral will to exert our voices in this.

Petrus

 

[Filius99993]

OPEC needs to end. They are responsible for everything.

 

[ricmat]

The challenge for Catholics and other people of faith is how to maintain a voice in the transition back to a sustainable human population. We want to engineer the collapse in the direction of a “soft landing,” so that the more horrific aspects of population control are not imposed upon the world by ruthless dictatorships. That’s why we need to work for education and voluntary family size limitation.

“Education” and “voluntary family size limitation” are pretty broad terms. Exactly what methods are you proposing be used?

 

[bekalc]

It seems to me that a big problem is the bio fuels, corn going into cars rather than into people’s stomachs. I suggest it would be a lot easier to limit cars than to limit people. But I suspect that some don’t want to give up the lifestyle they have grown accustomed to.

 

[drpmjhess]

“Education” and “voluntary family size limitation” are pretty broad terms. Exactly what methods are you proposing be used?

Exposing people to the facts about the rapidly approaching end of easy and affordable petroleum. Of course, there will be issues we cannot readily resolve – such as how to convince Muslims to reduce family size as well – but resource wars can sort that out in short order!

 

[drpmjhess]

It seems to me that a big problem is the bio fuels, corn going into cars rather than into people’s stomachs. I suggest it would be a lot easier to limit cars than to limit people. But I suspect that some don’t want to give up the lifestyle they have grown accustomed to.

bekalc – you’re absolutely right. Biofuels have now been shown to be illusory; to fuel just the current US fleet with ethanol-producing grains/grasses would take twice the current total US agricultural acreage, with no land left over for growing food fir us, much less food for export.

So how do you convince people of their Christian duty to sell their gas guzzlers and take bus or train or bike to work, or to telecommute? I don’t know, but the conversation has to begin in earnest soon, or else when gasoline is $15.00 per gallon we’ll really be up **** creek! What would Jesus drive?

Petrus

 

[ricmat]

Exposing people to the facts about the rapidly approaching end of easy and affordable petroleum. Of course, there will be issues we cannot readily resolve – such as how to convince Muslims to reduce family size as well – but resource wars can sort that out in short order!

And when Catholics, Muslims, or whoever ask you “How do we keep our family size limited?” how do propose that Catholics answer that question?

 

[Ridgerunner]

QUOTE=Ridgerunner;3552588] Are you actually denying the fact there are food riots caused by food shortages or saying that there are “food riots” but they aren’t really rioting over shortages or high prices of food?

Well one idea … Is to limit the spread of genetically engineered (GE)crops. Take the company monsatos and their GE canola crops/ seeds. These are new seeds which are not fertile. Which means that farmers main cost reduction procedures is taken away from them. They can’t keep seed from the previous crop to plant next years. They must continually buy new seed from the Monsanto company.
.
Another idea on how to lessen the food prices is to limit the amount of crops destined for bio fuels.
In the short term? Make available more crops seed fertilizer etc. Yes this can be done on a transfer system from countries with excess seed fertilizer etc.

1. I asked what the causes of a worldwide food shortage are, in your opinion. You replied by asking me if I deny there are food riots in some places. No. I don’t. But that’s not the question. In your opinion, what is the cause of a worldwide food shortage, if, indeed, there is one?
2. I understand your point about GE seed. Many hybrid grain seeds have been infertile or will produce only unpredictable “sports” ever since I was a kid. The same is true of many fruits, even wild fruits. What I am not sure of is whether infertility or unpredictability in some varieties of grain is deliberate or simply a by-result of these particular varieties; rather like obtaining the strength and stamina of mules by crossing donkeys and horses, but giving up fertility in the process. Further, I am not yet persuaded this is a significant contribution to any worldwide food shortage, since hybridized “high yield” seed has been around for a long time, seemingly without causing any shortages.

If seed costs are higher now than they were, is that due to idiosyncratic pricing, or is it due to increased fuel and fertilizer costs for those who raise the hybrid seed stock? If so, then we get to the fuel issue.

Your attributing higher food costs to higher fuel costs and the use of grain for biofuels seems quite valid to me, knowing as I do that some things in agriculture (though not all) require a lot of fuel consumption, and that brewer’s grain is not quite a substitute for whole grain. That seems to relate more to the cost of production than it necessarily does to quantity available. If fuel costs are a significant cause of shortages, though, what would be your remedy for that? Rely totally on petroleum, look for non-grain sources of alternative fuels, what?

I don’t know how much of the cost of food is due to obtuseness on the part of government, but I know some is. A friend of mine who processes poultry offal very successfully for pet food discovered, in the course of developing processes for the European pet food market (It has to be human consumable to sell there. American dogs, it seems, can eat, e.g. processed viscera, bruised meat, etc. and live.) realized he could create a tremendously nutritious powdered food ingredient out of wingtips, backs, necks, tails, gizzards, hearts and skin, which Americans won’t eat to speak of, but which are perfectly human consumable, even USDA inspected. Those parts go into pet food now, particularly into the EU. He is a religious fellow and wanted to produce the powder, containerize it, and sell it at cost or even give it away to people in third world countries. But neither the USDA nor foreign governments would allow it to be shipped, because the parts used are considered “offal” in the normal process of poultry production, thus fit, in themselves, only for pet food, despite the fact that you are buying the very same parts when you buy a whole chicken in the store, and because USDA classifications are determined just before the end of the production line at the poultry plant. A little bit of that stuff (and it will make very good broth all by itself) on grain, meal or almost anything, and nutritional value skyrockets. But no, only dogs and cats, mostly in the EU, but here as well, can have it.

The next time you are in any place that sells pet food, look for the “chicken jerky” product. He makes that too, out of human consumable chicken breast meat. It’s surplus production, but it can’t go into the human food chain either.

Far and away the biggest portion of poultry livers goes into the pet food chain, simply because the quantity is so overwhelmingly greater than the domestic market for poultry livers, that they’re diverted from the human food chain into the pet food chain at the plants, in absolutely massive quantities. That’s despite the fact that they, too, can be turned into a highly nutritous powder that ships well, stores well, and can be used for all kinds of things. He turns them into “liver oil”, a highly concentrated oil that’s used to flavor the cheaper pet food brands that are largely made of…you guessed it…grain.

He makes a pet food product out of perfectly good ice cream that is, in the plants, human consumable, but not human consumable when it leaves, and for the dumbest imaginable regulatory reason. The producers pay him to take it away. But that’s a whole other story.

There’s an even weirder story involving perfectly good cattle that can’t enter the human food chain because of the dumbest example of “political correctness” I have ever seen. So they go into pet food too.

The guy is a true genius in the uses of food products, and has made a mega-fortune proving it. Like you, Latin, he thinks ethanol from corn is a crock.

A handful of people like him could make a lot of difference in wordwide nutrition. But governments insist that they know better.

There is a lot in all of this food business that does not make much sense.