Food Price Riots Popping Up Around The World

[Ridgerunner]

Thanks, I liked the following paragraph from that article:

“A growing middle class in the developing world is demanding more protein, from pork and hamburgers to chicken and ice cream. And all this is happening even as global climate change may be starting to make it harder to grow food in some of the places best equipped to do so, like Australia. In the last few years, world demand for crops and meat has been rising sharply.”

"

Strong belief in global warming is somewhat discouraged by the experience of this past winter and coldish spring. But regardless, (and not being an expert on Australia) it is my impression that Australian weather is very strongly related to the El Nino/La Nina oscillation cycle, and Australian farmers and ranchers pay a great deal of attention to it. Interestingly, the effect there is basically the opposite as the effect here. When the warm mass is in the western Pacific, Australian rain is generous and ours is not. When the warm mass is in the eastern Pacific, the exact opposite is true, though not in the whole U.S. The effect seems to be stronger there than here; something that conversation with Australian farmers and ranchers has confirmed for me, right or wrong. They study and base plans on that cycle more than any other single thing.

Since the size and strength of the warm water mass bears a direct relationship to the amount of rainfall, one could argue that global warming, if real, may actually be helpful to agriculture, at least in some places. No one really knows, of course. But it does not seem unreasonable to believe that a warmup of equatorial waters in both the western and eastern pacifics could be beneficial to agriculture in the temperate zone land masses adjoining the Pacific.

 

[vern_humphrey]

What you’re saying is that hay has so little value that its cost is mainly the cost of moving it to where it’s needed. So it’s not the same as corn or rice which have more value, and the cost of shipping is a smaller percentage of its total cost.

Actually, the cost of shipping is a major cost factor in all agricultural products. Corn, for example, is not like diamonds – you can carry millions of dollars worth of diamonds in a briefcase. Corn, on the other hand, requires a huge bulk and tonnage to rise to that level.

Oil hasn’t gotten THAT expensive. The cost of moving a shipload of rice from around the world is very small compared to what the rice actually costs.

Actually, it isn’t – rice, per se, is worth very little in the field. It’s the cost of harvesting, processing and shipping it (plus the cost of oil-based fertilizer) that makes it so expensive.

Ask yourself this – what are the cost factors in rice? It isn’t the manpower – with modern machinery a couple of men can do all the work necessary to plant and harvest thousands of acres of rice.

 

[ribozyme]

“Nuclear power has long been to the Left what embryonic-stem-cell research is to the Right–irredeemably wrong and a signifier of moral weakness.”

I found that quotation from someone’s signature at www.peakoil.com . I actually think it is correct although I support nuclear power.

 

[drpmjhess]

I found that quotation from someone’s signature at www.peakoil.com . I actually think it is correct although I support nuclear power.

Ribozyme, opposition to nuclear power by the left is based as much on ignorance as is opposition to population reduction by the right.

Petrtus

 

[Neil_Anthony]

Actually, the cost of shipping is a major cost factor in all agricultural products. Corn, for example, is not like diamonds – you can carry millions of dollars worth of diamonds in a briefcase. Corn, on the other hand, requires a huge bulk and tonnage to rise to that level.

We’re using numbers like “mostly” “huge” etc. because we don’t have the real numbers. Obviously the more valuable a cargo is, the less transportation will factor into the final cost. I’m guessing that with hay, transportation might be 50% of the cost, with diamonds less than 1% of the cost, and with grains, around 20% of the cost. If you have some real numbers please post them

Actually, it isn’t – rice, per se, is worth very little in the field. It’s the cost of harvesting, processing and shipping it (plus the cost of oil-based fertilizer) that makes it so expensive.

Ask yourself this – what are the cost factors in rice? It isn’t the manpower – with modern machinery a couple of men can do all the work necessary to plant and harvest thousands of acres of rice.

Lots of rice is harvested in ways that use lots of manpower. I think the cost isn’t so much the issue here as the price, which is determined by supply and demand.

 

[vern_humphrey]

We’re using numbers like “mostly” “huge” etc. because we don’t have the real numbers. Obviously the more valuable a cargo is, the less transportation will factor into the final cost. I’m guessing that with hay, transportation might be 50% of the cost, with diamonds less than 1% of the cost, and with grains, around 20% of the cost. If you have some real numbers please post them

Since it’s all guesswork, I suspect the numbers will be hard to find – but let me try.

Lots of rice is harvested in ways that use lots of manpower. I think the cost isn’t so much the issue here as the price, which is determined by supply and demand.

In the United States, which has a rice surplus, there is virtually no traditional rice farming. I know rice farmers who farm thousands of acres in the Delta (which is what we call the Mississippi River bottoms.) You wouldn’t believe how automated and high-tech rice farming is.

 

[Neil_Anthony]

Since it’s all guesswork, I suspect the numbers will be hard to find – but let me try.

In the United States, which has a rice surplus, there is virtually no traditional rice farming. I know rice farmers who farm thousands of acres in the Delta (which is what we call the Mississippi River bottoms.) You wouldn’t believe how automated and high-tech rice farming is.

Are we talking about the United States or about less developed countries? I’m not concerned about the rising price of food for north americans, I’m worried about people in poor countries living on $10 per day and the price of the food they eat in a day has gone from $3 to $6.

Of course the rice goes on the world market where the prices are balanced between the costs of mechanised farming vs the low cost of labor in countries that grow rice the old fashioned ways. The costs are different but the end price is the same in a global market.

 

[vern_humphrey]

Are we talking about the United States or about less developed countries? I’m not concerned about the rising price of food for north americans, I’m worried about people in poor countries living on $10 per day and the price of the food they eat in a day has gone from $3 to $6.

The poor nations you are talking about are net food importers. They eat American rice all over the world.

Of course the rice goes on the world market where the prices are balanced between the costs of mechanised farming vs the low cost of labor in countries that grow rice the old fashioned ways. The costs are different but the end price is the same in a global market.

And what was formerly the cheapest rice – that grown in America by high-tech means – is now much more expensive than it was.

 

[vern_humphrey]

A quick search for food transportation cost numbers turns up this – and several thousand more hits.

dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=559724&in_page_id=1770&ct=5

Transport costs rise by record 7% as food prices soar at fastest rate for 17 years
Last updated at 18:33pm on 15th April 2008

• Food bills rising fastest since 1991
• Families must find extra £1,500 a year to stand still
• Official figures show inflation held steady at 2.5 per cent
• Crude oil hits new record high
Families already struggling to cope with the credit crunch face huge increases in food and transport bills, official figures have revealed today.

The ONS figures showed the highest upward effect on inflation coming from transport costs, mainly due to rising air travel prices on European and long-haul routes.

The annual rate of increase for transport costs reached 7% - the highest since records began in 1997.
Food costs are also rising faster than at any time since 1991 and the average shopping bill is likely to go up by £600 a year.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Passingly interesting but perhaps not important to anyone’s argument:

Tyson Foods (world’s biggest protein producer) sustained a heavy loss in 2Q 2008. However, but for writeoff costs for closed plants, unusual equipment replacement, etc, it would have been profitable.

Nevertheless, its feed costs, fuel costs and costs of other grain products (cooking oil, breading, etc) went up a billion dollars over last year.

On their own, beef was profitable and pork was profitable. A bit surprisingly to me, chicken was not.

Vern and Neil may have some interest in knowing the following. Chicken growout facilities put wood shavings or rice hulls on the floors between each flock. The purpoose is to keep the place clean and absorb the ammonia, of which chicken manure has a lot.

When they clean out all that, the “mixture” is usually used for fertilizer, either as it is, spread on farm fields, or reconstituted and sold as bagged fertilizer at places like Walmart.

Interestingly, though, it can also be used as cattle feed. Both rice hulls and wood shavings are cellulose-bound sugars and proteins. The ammonia helps the cow’s digestive system break it down. Lots of strange things out there.

However, the quantities are so large that it is difficult to find places to go with it, strange to tell. Here and there “pelletizing” plants have sprung up to turn it into a commercial product, but there aren’t nearly enough of them. The phosphate and potash levels build up so quickly in farm fields near growout facilities that you can only do so much of that. Unlike organic nitrogen, both persist in the soil for quite some while, and you can get “too much of a good thing” if you aren’t careful.

Unfortunately, organic fertilizers of this sort are extremely bulky, and it doesn’t pay to transport them very far, and never was. It’s strange to think that “factory farming” of this kind could be beneficial in many ways in the “third world”. However, they take a lot of infrastructure, particularly power and rail transport for grain. If you look around the world, the “corn belt” is pretty small relative to the total land surface. Other grains will work, particularly milo, but product quality suffers if you substitute completely.

I recall a very odd thing from a few years ago. At a point, big integrators like Tyson’s thought they could develop a good setup in Europe; farms, plants, marketing and all. But it didn’t work and they abandoned it. Even though Europe has all the necessary “ingredients” (water, transportation, power, nearness to markets…corn is a bit harder to come by, but not horribly so), the eating habits of Europeans doomed it to failure.

Europeans evidently prefer to shop daily or nearly so, and don’t buy a lot of highly-prepared products. When they buy chicken, they buy them whole or even alive (processed, then, in the local shop) They don’t even like to buy cut-up chickens, let alone Tequila Wings, cordon bleu or fajita mix. Chicken is a lot more expensive in Europe than it is in the U.S., because poultry production is so inefficient there. But cultural factors keep things the way they are. The U.S. companies don’t like to produce whole chickens because they are less profitable than “value-added” products. So that was that.

Interestingly, big poultry integrators in the U.S. sell vast amounts of highly-prepared product in the Far East, where they evidently don’t like to boil or roast whole chickens, but want products even more minutely processed than do Americans. U.S. integrators have very limited facilities in the Far East, though, because corn is very limited there. It’s cheaper to make the product here and ship it there (high value cargo) than it is to make it there, labor costs notwithstanding.

 

[vern_humphrey]

Vern and Neil may have some interest in knowing the following. Chicken growout facilities put wood shavings or rice hulls on the floors between each flock. The purpoose is to keep the place clean and absorb the ammonia, of which chicken manure has a lot.

When they clean out all that, the “mixture” is usually used for fertilizer, either as it is, spread on farm fields, or reconstituted and sold as bagged fertilizer at places like Walmart.

The primary agricultural products in this county are cattle, hay, timber, and chickens.

Yes, indeed chicken litter is used for fertilizer, and has been for more than half a century (remind me to tell you a story about a neighbor of mine back in the '50s.) It is also used for livestock feed – primarily for swine.

And I know of instances of it being used in various ingenious ways to produce gas and electricity.

 

[Ridgerunner]

The primary agricultural products in this county are cattle, hay, timber, and chickens.

Yes, indeed chicken litter is used for fertilizer, and has been for more than half a century (remind me to tell you a story about a neighbor of mine back in the '50s.) It is also used for livestock feed – primarily for swine.

And I know of instances of it being used in various ingenious ways to produce gas and electricity.

Let’s hear the tale about the neighbor.

 

[vern_humphrey]

Let’s hear the tale about the neighbor.

My neighbor raised chickens and cattle. He would fill his manure spreader with chicken litter and spread it on his pasture.

A manure spreader has continuous belts with steel “fingers” that continually rake the manure as the spreader is pulled behind the tractor, evenly raking it out onto the field.

He had three small children – ranging from about 8 to about 3, and they liked to work in the fields with daddy. They were sitting on the forward edge of the manure spreader as he towed it around the field with the tractor.

Then he hit a bump, looked back, and the children were gone!!

As he watched, the tractor kept chugging on, and one after another, the children came out of the manure spreader – covered with you-know-what. His girl (now in her 50s) still has a little scar on her forhead where one of the fingers raked her out.

 

[Ted_in_Charlott]

When I met my Filipina wife in October of 2004 she was making about $120/month. She is a college graduate and speaks 3 languages fluently (English, Bisaya and Tagalog) and speaks 2 partially (Mandarin and Spanish). She was an executive secretary for a Chinese Contractor working in Cebu. She had been treated very well by them and was making exceptional good money. She helped out with her family’s business (boarding house). When I sent her a little extra money to help out it really could go a long way: a large bag of top rice costed about $80 and could help feed her mom, pop, 2 brothers and niece and nephew for a whole month. They were pretty well off comparatibility.

On the outskirts of her city were acres and acres and acres of families living in cardboard boxes, under bridges, on sidewalks, etc. The begging children would mob Americans trying to get spare change. I had a couple jump in the cab with us. My heart is broken when I think of the filth, conditions, food, exposure, no clean drinking water, no medical care, no dental care, no education. I have begged God to help my wife and I to go back when I retire and help these destitute people, to give them a little hope. I don’t know whether we will go through the local diocese or Missionaries of the Poor or whatever, but I want to help.

Remember how we all felt as Americans after 911? How we wanted to help each other and the victims? Why can’t we feel this way for the poor, the hungry, the sick? Do we need another Katrina, 911, Sunami? Do we need a great depression, a plague, a meteor

Or are we going to go around saying “But Lord, who is my neighbor?” trying to justify yourself.

I can’t change anyone’s conscience, I can’t make you want to help, I can’t pour my love for the poor into your heart. I don’t know if I would want to to, it is a burden to care for them, it will break your heart to care, you will cry more, you will pray more, you will have rely on God more.

It’s very hard on me reading some of the posts here. I would only hope my cry for compassion, mercy and love is listened to. God loves those people just as much as He loves you. We are to love our neighbor as ourself. If you cannot love your neighbor who you have seen then how can you love God who you have not seen? How can you talk to people about God if they are hungry? Jesus came into this world poor and left poor, what makes you think you are due anything except death and hell? Aren’t we all miserable sinners in the hands of a merciful God? Doesn’t the story of Rich man (Dives) and Lazarus scare you?

 

[Ridgerunner]

When I met my Filipina wife in October of 2004 she was making about $120/month. She is a college graduate and speaks 3 languages fluently (English, Bisaya and Tagalog) and speaks 2 partially (Mandarin and Spanish). She was an executive secretary for a Chinese Contractor working in Cebu. She had been treated very well by them and was making exceptional good money. She helped out with her family’s business (boarding house). When I sent her a little extra money to help out it really could go a long way: a large bag of top rice costed about $80 and could help feed her mom, pop, 2 brothers and niece and nephew for a whole month. They were pretty well off comparatibility.

On the outskirts of her city were acres and acres and acres of families living in cardboard boxes, under bridges, on sidewalks, etc. The begging children would mob Americans trying to get spare change. I had a couple jump in the cab with us. My heart is broken when I think of the filth, conditions, food, exposure, no clean drinking water, no medical care, no dental care, no education. I have begged God to help my wife and I to go back when I retire and help these destitute people, to give them a little hope. I don’t know whether we will go through the local diocese or Missionaries of the Poor or whatever, but I want to help.

Remember how we all felt as Americans after 911? How we wanted to help each other and the victims? Why can’t we feel this way for the poor, the hungry, the sick? Do we need another Katrina, 911, Sunami? Do we need a great depression, a plague, a meteor

Or are we going to go around saying “But Lord, who is my neighbor?” trying to justify yourself.

I can’t change anyone’s conscience, I can’t make you want to help, I can’t pour my love for the poor into your heart. I don’t know if I would want to to, it is a burden to care for them, it will break your heart to care, you will cry more, you will pray more, you will have rely on God more.

It’s very hard on me reading some of the posts here. I would only hope my cry for compassion, mercy and love is listened to. God loves those people just as much as He loves you. We are to love our neighbor as ourself. If you cannot love your neighbor who you have seen then how can you love God who you have not seen? How can you talk to people about God if they are hungry? Jesus came into this world poor and left poor, what makes you think you are due anything except death and hell? Aren’t we all miserable sinners in the hands of a merciful God? Doesn’t the story of Rich man (Dives) and Lazarus scare you?

Some years back, I worked on H1A and H1B visas to get medical personnel here and in place. Lots of them were Filipinos and Filipinas. Some of the best people I have ever met. I was appalled to learn how limited opportunities are there, even for an educated person.

I also learned (though I can’t attest to the truth of it) that Chinese own all of the marketing outlets and Japanese own all of the factories. Neither thinks much of Filipinos and neither treats them at all well. Anyway, that’s what some of my “green carders” told me, and consistently.

Never have I understood why the U.S. is not massively more generous to the Philippines than it is. It was once a U.S. possession. Filipinos are pro-American. Most are Catholic, not muslim or some other hostile thing. They’re hard workers, and some of the most polite, gentle people I have ever had the pleasure of meeting. I don’t know what, if anything, the U.S. can do about foreign ownership of assets over there, and exploitation by other orientals that seems to follow it. Rampant corruption could be daunting. But the U.S. could, by treaty, admit Filipino and Filipina workers here liberally. At least they could send earnings back home, as the Hispanics so characteristically do. If it was up to me, any wor-capable Filipino or Filipina could get a green card just because of where they’re from. Of course, that would be “discriminatory” and might be struck down by U.S. courts. If so, more would be the pity.

On the other hand, Philippine policies regarding U.S. bases don’t seem to wise to me. They have cut off a lot of revenue by limiting U.S. presence there.

I would say that the U.S. government needs to do everything it can do to encourage U.S. businesses to set up enterprises there. I would also say that the Philippines has a corruption problem it simply has to address adequately.

 

[Ridgerunner]

My neighbor raised chickens and cattle. He would fill his manure spreader with chicken litter and spread it on his pasture.

A manure spreader has continuous belts with steel “fingers” that continually rake the manure as the spreader is pulled behind the tractor, evenly raking it out onto the field.

He had three small children – ranging from about 8 to about 3, and they liked to work in the fields with daddy. They were sitting on the forward edge of the manure spreader as he towed it around the field with the tractor.

Then he hit a bump, looked back, and the children were gone!!

As he watched, the tractor kept chugging on, and one after another, the children came out of the manure spreader – covered with you-know-what. His girl (now in her 50s) still has a little scar on her forhead where one of the fingers raked her out.

Scary beyond belief! And lucky. Lots of those old machines were mankillers. No question about it. Some of the modern stuff is too, but at least some attention is paid to safety now.

 

[vern_humphrey]

Scary beyond belief! And lucky. Lots of those old machines were mankillers. No question about it. Some of the modern stuff is too, but at least some attention is paid to safety now.

Those old machines don’t wear out - my tractor is a diesel from the 1950s, and runs like a top.

Farm work is dangerous – you may recall a story about ten years or so ago of a teenager working on the farm who had both arms pulled off by the machinery, and managed to dial 911 by holding a pencil in his teeth.

 

[MugenOne]

I was also crushed by my New Holland tractor for doing stupid stuff. I was going fast and trying to make a sharp turn at the same time. That’s a no-no. I learned my lesson. The old tractors are very dangerous.

Anyway, about the Philippines, the people who rule the country, rule it like the Spaniards. They are only out to protect their interests. They also listen to the Chinese unknowingly, their decision affects them today. The Chinese “invasion”, however, goes back centuries to an era when often impoverished Chinese, mostly from the southeastern region, began arriving in search of jobs, trade and money. They were often in cahoots with the Spanish, who ruled the Philippines for more than 300 years until the Americans drove them out in 1898. The Americans, as colonialists, fostered the same comfortable relationships with a ruling elite dominated by the same wealthy Filipinos with Chinese and Spanish ancestry.

It was in this cozy environment that Chinese became the masters of the economy, so much so that a law banning foreigners from owning property in the Philippines is really aimed more at aggressive Chinese than at foreigners from elsewhere. “Without that law, we would have Chinese owning all the shops and homes everywhere,” said one Filipino.

As it is, Chinese have controlled the rice trade since the Spanish era - and managed to tighten their grip while Marcos was in power. Chinese control makes them a target of leftist revolt, as seen in an attack last weekend in which guerrillas from the communists’ New People’s Army torched two trucks and a shop belonging to a leading rice trader on Panay island.

The government fears violence will spread as millions go hungry. To offset the threat, it recently had to sign another contract to import 1.5 million tons of rice from Vietnam, which also has obligations to ship rice to China and elsewhere. That, however, will not be enough to cover the total import needs of more than two million tons, which makes the Philippines the world’s biggest rice importer.

The widespread view that Filipino-Chinese merchants, who are known to control the import and distribution of rice, are hoarding supplies plays into the deepest anti-Chinese sentiments of a country perceived locally to be dominated by “rich Chinese” in just about every area of business and finance.

That age-old view gets at the heart of the complexes of downtrodden Filipinos, who tend to blame “the Chinese” for all their problems, professionally and economically. The fact that millions of Filipinos have Chinese blood somewhere in their near or distant ancestry hardly deters them from singling out those more identifiable as Chinese, from their well-known monosyllabic names to the owners of vast shopping centers, hotels, airlines and other big businesses.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Those old machines don’t wear out - my tractor is a diesel from the 1950s, and runs like a top.

Farm work is dangerous – you may recall a story about ten years or so ago of a teenager working on the farm who had both arms pulled off by the machinery, and managed to dial 911 by holding a pencil in his teeth.

It really is a shame that newer machinery and vehicles are difficult to keep in shape. Lots of complicated things that can go bad. I purposely bought a 1989 Chev PU because you can replace everything on it without a lot of trouble, which is a lot less expensive than buying new pickups that are breathtakingly expensive and provide only marginally greater comfort or utility, but which have a lot of expensive “bells and whistles” that can go bad. Zero electronics. Uncomplicated wiring. Power steering and brakes only. As long as I don’t hit something and ruin the frame, I can go on forever with it.

On the other hand, I have a 1948 Case tractor. All mechanical steering and brakes can try a fellow’s soul in the right circumstances, and I really ought to weld a roll bar on it.

I have never been seriously injured, though I have been in life-threatening situations more than once. But a lot of it is the luck of the draw. A cousin of mine who has raised hogs for decades got rushed by a boar a couple of years ago. Severed his femoral artery with one bite. By sheer good luck, his daughter happened upon the scene, tied his thigh and took him to the ER. He had lost nearly half his blood. The doctors were astounded that he lived. Recovered and still raises hogs. Not sure I would have.

 

[vern_humphrey]

It really is a shame that newer machinery and vehicles are difficult to keep in shape. Lots of complicated things that can go bad. I purposely bought a 1989 Chev PU because you can replace everything on it without a lot of trouble, which is a lot less expensive than buying new pickups that are breathtakingly expensive and provide only marginally greater comfort or utility, but which have a lot of expensive “bells and whistles” that can go bad. Zero electronics. Uncomplicated wiring. Power steering and brakes only. As long as I don’t hit something and ruin the frame, I can go on forever with it.

On the other hand, I have a 1948 Case tractor. All mechanical steering and brakes can try a fellow’s soul in the right circumstances, and I really ought to weld a roll bar on it.

I have never been seriously injured, though I have been in life-threatening situations more than once. But a lot of it is the luck of the draw. A cousin of mine who has raised hogs for decades got rushed by a boar a couple of years ago. Severed his femoral artery with one bite. By sheer good luck, his daughter happened upon the scene, tied his thigh and took him to the ER. He had lost nearly half his blood. The doctors were astounded that he lived. Recovered and still raises hogs. Not sure I would have.

I’d carry a big stick in the future.