Comments on naked capitalism: Food Crisis Fuelling Global Instability

Bio fuels started out with some idiot using vegeta...

2008-04-15T21:30:00.000-04:00

Bio fuels started out with some idiot using vegetable oil from Mc Donalds to run his truck. The next thing you know its the policy of the United States to divert food for fuel. War, oil and food shortages. Please someone explain the power of the invisible hand.

Excellent Yves! I only wish I could pen my though...

2008-04-15T17:54:00.000-04:00

Excellent Yves! I only wish I could pen my thoughts as well as you are able to do.

Animals breed unrestricted but ultimately, they are always constrained by the food resources available to them. If they over-breed, those that cannot find food will die young. There will also be more sickness. Nature gives and nature takes.

Humans also breed unrestricted in most of the world (excepting China perhaps, which I believe still has their one child rule). If humans keep reproducing unrestricted, at some point we are going to run out of resources to feed an ever increasing population.

Humans are "supposed" to be smarter than most other animals. So why do we breed without control in many instances, particularly in 3rd world countries which are already constantly short of food and adequate medical care? There are many reasons, some of which as Yves notes.

One aspect that I have never seen discussed is that children have no choice in their birth, whether they are blessed to being born into a wealthily family that can provide them with adequate food, care, education and opportunity or be constrained to live a hardscrabble life, forever hoping to pull themselves out of a fate of poverty, hunger and/or low opportunity that they were born into without consent. I think that parents should have to demonstrate that they can provide fully for a child before they have one or more.

Sending food across the world to attempt to alleviate starvation doesn't solve the problem. It contradicts Nature and encourages ever more breeding.

btw: here is a link on estimates for the total number of humans that have lived and died since the beginning. The number is around 106 billion. Of course the number is a gross approximation.
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=764806

Agreed completely that no one is yet willing to di...

2008-04-15T14:44:00.000-04:00

Agreed completely that no one is yet willing to discuss the real issue, which is too many people, all of whom want first world lifestyles. This problem was evident back to the unfortunately-discredited Club of Rome. Biologist E.O. Wilson has been talking about his for at least a decade and a half, when he ascertained that humans were consuming 20 to 40% of the planet's food energy. That wasn't sustainable even then, and it's vastly worse now.

Now if the first world were a a good deal more environment-sensitive (more people living in apartments in cities which allows for lower heating costs and greater use of public transport; a willingness to convert to diets that were less meat intensive), we could accommodate more people living at this level, but the basic conundrum is still here.

And it is fundamental. We have the religious element, from the Catholic that intervening in reproduction is sinful, to the more generalized Judeo-Christian "be fruitful and multiply" edict. Many ethnicities and countries view any attempts to restrict childbearing as a form of genocide.

And we have the practical elements. Most societies are set up presupposing growth. Look at the much lamented demongraphic crisis hitting Japan and European countries with low birth rates, such as Italy. The obvious expedient is to encourage the able-bodied middle aged and elderly to continue working, yet there is considerable bias against that (I know of many very talented people 45 and older who simply can't find reasonable work, and that was in a supposedly robust economy. The predisposition is to have someone young and supposedly hungry, even though the new 20-somethings actually want tons of praise and fast promotions. Prejudice dies hard).

And we do not have good alternatives for care of the elderly ex families. Even if one had the means to afford a high standard of care, there is no assurance you will get it unless someone is watching. In a hospital, having your own private duty nurse can keep you from being neglected, but otherwise, an elderly person with no/few visitors is almost guaranteed to get less attentive care than one with a lot of traffic and family members pestering the doctors. It's the squeaking wheel phenomenon, and it operates in retirement homes too.

If I figure correctly, with shelled corn at 56 lbs...

2008-04-15T13:00:00.000-04:00

If I figure correctly, with shelled corn at 56 lbs/bushel Converting kg to bushels,it takes about 9 corn bushels per kid per year

Now the USDA projects
the U.S. ethanol sector will need 4 billion bushels per year by 2011—roughly twice as much as it consumed in 2006.

So in 2006 ethanol fuel takes a years worth food away from 200,000,000 kids and 400,000,000 in 2011.
Those of you in NY think the lotto ads thats two hundred million kids, thats two hundred million kids

If we are willing to pay ever increasing amounts f...

2008-04-15T12:27:00.000-04:00

If we are willing to pay ever increasing amounts for oil, this will be the result, subsidies or not. It is inevitable.

My latest webcomic is on this topic. The costs ass...

2008-04-15T12:02:00.000-04:00

My latest webcomic is on this topic. The costs associated with biofuels.
http://facebigelow.blogspot.com/2008/04/face-bigelow-62-economics-of-ethanol.html

Food aid to countries that immediately institute d...

2008-04-15T11:35:00.000-04:00

Food aid to countries that immediately institute draconian population control policies, nothing for anyone else?

I mean, how long does anyone think we can keep doing this? There need to be 50-90% fewer people on Earth if we all want to live developed world lifestyles. It's that simple.

I mean, Malthus has to be right eventually, even if we make it to a Dyson sphere level of technology first. Exponential population growth is a bad, bad thing.

-Walt

"Last I heard we don't make ethanol from soybeans....

2008-04-15T09:17:00.000-04:00

"Last I heard we don't make ethanol from soybeans."

You heard wrong; turns out we do. Visit NPR.org and go to "All things considered" edition of the 10th of April.

Pritchard:"Goldman Sachs says the cost of ethanol ...

2008-04-15T09:07:00.000-04:00

Pritchard:
"Goldman Sachs says the cost of ethanol from corn is $81 a barrel (oil equivalent), with wheat at $145 and soybeans $232. It is built on subsidy."

You like to quote Prichard. Pray tell, what does this little jewel mean?

Wheat at $145 a barrel? The barrel is apparently built on a subsidy. Hope we don't have subsidence!

Last I heard we don't make ethanol from soybeans.

Pritchard is an hysterical fearmonger writing to fetch maximum effect with least fact.

And his writing style is right up there with Pirsig. Now there's a combination.

Zen and the Art of Food Hysteria.

http://quotes.ino.com/chart/?s=NYBOT_CICONTINUOUS ...

2008-04-15T05:46:00.000-04:00

http://quotes.ino.com/chart/?s=NYBOT_CI

CONTINUOUS COMMODITY INDEX

http://quotes.ino.com/chart/?s=NYBOT_DX&v=d12

US DOLLAR INDEX

Most of this is much like Gresham's law is commonly stated: "Bad money drives out good." Add the MOMO investors because the price is going up along with the number one US being dollars and it is not very hard to see what is the cause and also who will ultimately pay the price.

People are starving, More will starve if the first...

2008-04-15T04:56:00.000-04:00

People are starving, More will starve if the first world and rapidly developing third world countries don't curtail their consumption of animal and fish protein and get off the biofuel kick.

Nowhere do I see any mention of birth control! If there isn't enough food to feed your population, then you need to create less population and live within your available food resources.

Starvation is nature's way of telling you that your population has outgrown nature's ability to sustain it.

If you ascribe any credibility to the conspiricy t...

2008-04-15T03:50:00.000-04:00

If you ascribe any credibility to the conspiricy theories of Alex Jones then this is nothing more than part of the plan to depopulate the globe to bring population into line with available resources. At minimum it brings in more forex with which to pay for oil imports.