World Food Day 2008
Posted by admin, October 15th, 2008 - under Books, News.
Tags: Food & Farming
Tomorrow is the United Nation’s “World Food Day” and the focus is on the pressing need for the world to adapt to climate change. But even before “climate change” became a political concern, the poor have been unable to deal effectively with drought, storms and flooding.
Now government programmes in the name of climate change have already had terrible results – more than US$ 11 billion worth of subsidies were used to turn food crops into biofuels last year. This contributed substantially to the rise in food prices that helped push 75 million more people below the hunger threshold.
There is a case for government to provide flood defences and other collective goods, but most adaptation will occur at a much more local scale and as such is best left to individuals.
In a new report, world-renowned agricultural economists Professors Douglas Southgate and Brent Songhen point out that farmers will likely adapt to global warming by switching crops, and adopting new technologies and farming methods – just as they have done for centuries.
The launch of the report, Weathering Global Warming in Agriculture and Forestry by Douglas Southgate and Brent Sohngen (November 2008, International Policy Network), coincides with World Food Day and can now be downloaded here.
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A calf drinking from a nearly full farm dam: Photograph taken just south of Oberon, Central Tablelands, New South Wales (Australia) by Jennifer Marohasy, October 14, 2008.
Predictable US-centric viewpoint. Gee and haven’t our own farmers adapted so well. So we can look forward to the abandonment of future EC really soon ?
Given how easy adaptation is …
EC (Exceptional Circumstances) Assistance is a creation of government that has many perverse outcomes including the continual proping up of unviable farmers. Yet another reason to support policies of reduced government intervention.
And ofcourse in Australia, governments have significantly hampered the ability of farmers to adapt to natural climate change by introducing bans on new crop varieties.
Perhaps - but we’ve spent billions ongoing over 30 years or more - EC supports whole regions Jen - not just unviable farmers. No wheat crop means no purchases from the machinery dealer, means no spare parts sales means etc etc ….
and the theme here by our optimistic economists is how massively adaptable agriculture is - ROTFL !
and Aussie farmers are among the best in the world in many areas - e.g. cotton, rice.
So what grows in dust? GMO issue is marginal.
Adaption to natural climate change is sensibly to work out what the climate odds are - then either don’t farm there - or if you reckon can make enough money in the long term - when the rains fail - go to the beach, don’t plant and destock
The hard won experience is actually fighting the seasons! Fighting back usually means more good money sunk in after bad, more stress, etc. Stoicism and perseverance may actually be the seed of economic collapse.
Now if your odds of good and bad seasons are changing - well that’s the whole point isn’t it …
The Kyoto ethos of expensive but ineffective renewable energy will not provide a higher SOL for the 3rd world.
If these people are going to survive under this mantra they will need more assistance than ever, in ever more difficult to understand technology.
However, what they’ll mainly need is more of Luke’s “stoicism and perseverance”.
What a solar panel is more complex than a diesel generator?
Spanglers - Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way.
when it comes to yaks - Sell’em or smell’em.
Take any diesel generator work out the KWH it will generate per hour. Multiply that by 24 to get a day. You can go out buy it install it and there you go complete. Lets go solar there are 5 generating hours in the day. Cells cost $1000 per 90watts then have to connect them point them at the sun make sure they are not shaded so cut down any close trees. To be self sufficient an average house costs about $80000 for cells connected to the grid. To equal the diesel generator you need batteries lots of them which my guess is puts your simple system well over $100000. Then you have the complex wiring plus the large amount of maintenance, cell cleaning, battery electrolyte levels etc. Your pride and joy then takes 40 years to pay for itself, a pity since expected life is 25 years. That is unless a hail storm or lightning doesn’t get it first. For simplicity in all aspects the generator wins hands you just do not understand the complexity of “alternative” energy. An oxymoron if there ever was one.
When did you ever have a solar panel that replaced a diesel generator?
Quiet desperation well describes the woman who walks for miles with a baby on her back to gather green firewood.
Governments of Australia do not have clean hands in the food crisis issue.
Tax incentives for forestr have led to loss of agricultural, food producing land being removed from the food production cyce and turned into forests, so that people seeking tax reduction can bebefit.
The carbon credit system will eventually mean that carbon credits will make it more cost effective to grow timber on food producing land than to grow food.
Governments are still buying food producing properties, removing them from the food production cycle and turning them into parks.
We have had a biofuels industry for a long time, and govenments are madating minimum biofuel content of petrol.
So let’s sort out our own mess first before we poke the finger at the USA.
Luke,
In the 3rd world they need mainly cooking energy. Wind and solar don’t supply this unless you get incredibly complex, expensive systems that the 1st world does not yet effectively have.
The 3rd world needs gas and coal technology.
To use Luke’s simplistic logic on drought assistance we should also halt funding to 2nd and 3rd generation welfare recipients.
And what about urban public transport? This sector has been continually dependent on massive subsidies for many decades so, on Luke’s logic, we should scrap that too?
Well, no. You see, these ecotrogs only ever want to apply the principles of economic darwinism to farmers who happen to own land that the greens would like to confiscate.
So out comes the same old sleazy double standard where the urban punters get to ride to work on their hopelessly subsidised train or bus to their hopelessly subsidised departmental job with their 3rd generation basket case mates while demanding ruthless “make it or break it” policies in the bush.
Same old, same old.