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6 billion and counting

If something gives, we'll see mass death. We have very little reserve capacity.
Ruud Dirven

I am reading all these stories on people growing their own food, in the expectation this makes a difference.

This is LUDICROUS.

Growing food, not even talking about raising animals, on an individual basis, in our overpopulated modern diversified cities, is impossible. Sure a few people can create a garden and two or three times a year can extract a harvest. The idea that the average westerner can start growing a wide selection of greens that are actually going to feed a substantial amount of people - affordably so, without causing envy, theft, whole sections of the populace being sustained in useful work cannot be taken seriously. It will not happen. Without industrialized agriculture,  we cannot sustain 6 billion on this world (of which a billion in rich countries eat more than the 5 billion poor in the other countries. If we have the insane idea we can, people will die, period. After our modern society collapses and our levels of civilization drop back to the equivalent of the 1870s.

Which will be regarded as unacceptable, at any cost, by the vast majority. People will not accept not having access to a diverse meal. People will not accept a substantial reduction on living standards to early industrialized conditions.

The majority will go to war. Kill their neighbour. Plunder the countryside. 

Face it people, many scenarios of people suddenly becoming happy hobbits working on their land  - it is a fantasy. A very dangerous fantasy. 

>>  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3buPtzmfIu4&feature=related <<

Oct 19


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  • weathergeek
    Oct 07
    It sounds like what you\\\'re saying is either way we are going to die. Period. Either from hunger or by our neighbors. I have to ask, what would your plan be?
  • Pamela Cash
    Oct 07
    You\\\'re right-- on a global scale, many nations just dont have the land or climate to grow food. In order to maintain prosperity, governments will absolutely lead countries to war, even if to say it\\\'s for another reason. The answer isn\\\'t that simple. Which is not a reason to NOT grow your own food. It\\\'s just a reason to keep growing stuff-- and keep thinking.
  • Raven2019
    Oct 07
    Mixed agreement. It\\\'s not THE solution, but I can tell you that we can provide a lot of our own foods in our culture if we give up our lawn fetish. Even raise some small animals like rabbits and chickens. Depends a lot on what the climate does. We could take a significant load off the larger picture by turning 50% of lawns, maybe even parks, into growing areas.
  • agroman
    Oct 07
    Urban farming is definitely not going to be *the* answer to solving our global food problems, but it is going to be one potential solution in a portfolio. Included in that will also be crop yield increases, food waste reductions, and eating lower on the food chain. Also, a re-shuffling of where crops are grown in order to match crops with the best growing conditions and soil might have to be implemented.
  • Steve Puma
    Oct 07
    What about the new vertical farms that are popping up everywhere? These are farms built into a high-rise structure...
  • braininabox
    Oct 07
    Genitecally engineered plants that can live on sea water cause the creation of huge pumping stations to water former deserts. The middle east becomes a breadbasket with cheap oil for the pumping stations. Global food shortages are averted.
  • braininabox
    Oct 07
  • moenz
    Oct 07
    An illusion, so right! A dry season, locusts all over you\\\'ll all die. We have to invent a new future. Not a place for romantics, hippies or Armish people
  • rakdaddy
    Oct 07
    Oh, noes! No one can grow enough food! WE\\\'RE ALL GOING TO DIE! How is this post rave-worthy? Urban and suburban America taking responsibility for its own food supply is not dangerous nor a fantasy. John Jeavons and his Ecology Action have been teaching methods for sustainable small-scale agriculture for decades (http://www.growbiointensive.org/), with plenty of positive results. Uncoupling ourselves from the illusions of modern agribusiness makes sense and is about as grounded in reality as you can get.
  • Aruspex
    Oct 07
    If I grow 10% of my diet at home, and generate 25% of my power at home, then the transportation savings alone are significant! Ok, so let\\\'s not talk leaping tall roof-gardens in a single bound... let\\\'s talk about the steps we can take to sustain our population, and give people back some feeling of control over their own lives. Gardeners rarely start wars.
  • thaleni
    Oct 07
    There is a problem with that manner of thinking about this predicament. I understand that desperate times may call for desperate measures. But the moment that we refuse to believe that there is a solution, then... WE LOSE.
  • Ruud Dirven
    Oct 08
    Sure, so what if decentralized \\\"mom&pop\\\" agriculture is going to provide some extra greens to 10% of the people. What about the other 90%? To those who make do this way, and make it all work, more power to them... BUT IN THE BIGGER PICTURE THIS IS ALL TRAINSPOTTING. It is no solution. It doesn\\\'t solve anything. People who can\\\'t grow their own food will simply DIE (or be compelled to steal from those who do). We are with too many people. So if you can afford growing your own food, go right ahead, I am not stopping you. But society is better off making sure everybody gets a decent meal, and society (or a state) has to do whatever it takes to make sure that happens. Again, the CLAIM that decentralized agriculture is a SOLUTION is a LIE. People claiming it makes a difference are romantics, hippies, libertarians who\\\'ll probably have more guns than shovels, or plainfaced liars.
  • DarkOptimism
    Oct 09
    Well it\\\'s feeding my family. Agreed it hasn\\\'t solved the problem of starvation in the world, and yes, that was a very probable consequence of our foolish population growth over the past couple of centuries. But to say that just because something is only part of the solution it is a deceit is foolish. We need a great diversity of small-scale solutions. You seem to be arguing that just because millions are dying right now around the world anything anyone does FAILS TO BE THE SOLUTION and so is worthless. It\\\'s a strange position. Even in the worst of times there are better and worse courses of action - why be so negative towards those who are taking the better ones and improving their local conditions? I understand the desire to wake people up, but slamming those activities that do actually help seems an unproductive way to go about it.
  • Der Heckser
    Oct 09
    Eating less meat will be unacceptable under at any cost? Eating like Italians will be unaccpetable for Germans or Britons? I think quite the oppsite, that simple market price movements that make meat disproportional expensive with rising oil prices will create the incentives to do the right thing. 1871 41 million people lived in Germany.If growing food at home made any sense at all then, it will make sense in 2050 with maybe 60 million people, unless there is a massive increase in immigration. I don\\\'t expect internationally good cooperation, but inside relatively rich countries, I don\\\'t see civil war or something like that. Cynically speaking, I even guess the threat by the hungry hords of the south, will be a propaganda tool to calm the population to work together.
  • TMLutas
    Oct 09
    The idea is much more reasonable in the US where we\\\'ve 1/9th the population density of the EU. It\\\'s also more reasonable because we have a lot more guns to defend our possessions. We\\\'re not going to lose industrialized agriculture in the US because we\\\'re the Saudi Arabia of coal and can make Fischer Tropsch fuels at $35/bbl for a century or two. The time necessary to make your money back on the plants is ~15 years. Until 2007, the EIA (US govt energy price forecasting unit) was predicting that prices would drop below that level years before such plants hit breakeven. This already happened once before during the Reagan administration. Once the EIA gave cover to CEOs in the form of a >$35/bbl forecast for 20 years, FT plant plans were announced on a wide scale.
  • jwiv
    Oct 09
    The concept of living roofs and urban gardens is a step - not a solution. In theory at least, the concept is to decrease food miles (and the associated impact thereof), and to supplement a family\\\'s diet (an economic benefit).