"Some People Worry about Peak Oil. I Worry More about Peak Grain."

Was Malthus right?:

Worry about bread, not oil, by Niall Ferguson, Commentary, telegraph.co.uk [via]: ...Thomas Malthus ... published his Essay on the Principle of Population. [in 1798]... Malthus's key insight was simple but devastating. "Population, when unchecked, increases in a geometrical ratio," he observed. But "subsistence increases only in an arithmetical ratio." In other words, humanity can increase like the number sequence 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, whereas our food supply can increase no faster than the number sequence 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. We are, quite simply, much better at reproducing ourselves than feeding ourselves.

Malthus concluded from this inexorable divergence between population and food supply that there must be "a strong and constantly operating check on population". This would take two forms: "misery" (famines and epidemics) and "vice", by which he meant not only alcohol abuse but also contraception and abortion (he was, after all, an ordained Anglican minister).

"The vices of mankind are active and able ministers of depopulation," wrote Malthus in an especially doleful passage... "They are the precursors in the great army of destruction; and often finish the dreadful work themselves.

"But should they fail in this war of extermination, sickly seasons, epidemics, pestilence, and plague advance in terrific array, and sweep off their thousands and tens of thousands. Should success be still incomplete, gigantic inevitable famine stalks in the rear, and with one mighty blow levels the population with the food of the world."

I wish I could have a free lunch for every time I've heard someone declare: "Malthus was wrong." Superficially, it is true, mankind seems to have broken free of the Malthusian trap. ...

The conventional explanation for our seeming escape from Malthus is the succession of revolutions in global agriculture, culminating in the post-war "Green Revolution" and the current wave of genetically modified crops.

Since the Fifties, the area of the world under cultivation has increased by roughly 11 per cent, while yields per hectare have increased by 120 per cent. ... Yet these statistics don't disprove Malthus. As he said, food production could increase only at an arithmetical rate, and a chart of world cereal yields since 1960 shows just such a linear progression...

Meanwhile, vice and misery have been operating just as Malthus foresaw to prevent the human population from exploding geometrically. On the one hand, contraception and abortion have been employed to reduce family sizes. On the other hand, wars, epidemics, disasters and famines have significantly increased mortality.

Together, vice and misery have ensured that the global population has grown at an arithmetic rather than a geometric rate. Indeed, they've managed to reduce the rate of population growth from 2.2 per cent per annum in the early Sixties to around 1.1 per cent today.

The real question is whether we could now be approaching a new era of misery. Even at an arithmetic rate, the United Nations expects the world's population to pass the 9 billion mark by 2050.

But can world food production keep pace? Plant physiologist Lloyd T Evans has estimated that "we must reach an average yield of four tons per hectare. to support a population of 8 billion". But yields right now are ... just three tons per hectare. And a world of eight billion people may be less than 20 years away.

Meanwhile, man-made forces are conspiring to put a ceiling on food production. Global warming and the resulting climate change may well be increasing the incidence of extreme weather events as well as inflicting permanent damage on some farming regions.

... At the same time, our effort to slow global warming by switching from fossil fuels to bio-fuels is taking large tracts of land out of food production. According to the OECD, American output of corn-based ethanol and European consumption of oilseeds for bio-fuels will double by 2016. ...

Some people worry about peak oil. I worry more about peak grain.

The fact is that world per capita cereal production has already passed its peak, which was back in the mid-Eighties, not least because of collapsing production in the former Soviet Union and sub-Saharan Africa. Simultaneously, however, rising incomes in Asia are causing a surge in worldwide food demand.

Already the symptoms of the coming food shortage are detectable. The International Monetary Fund recorded a 23 per cent rise in world food prices during the last 18 months. ...

"The great question now at issue," Malthus asked more than 200 years ago, "is whether man shall henceforth start forwards with accelerated velocity towards illimitable, and hitherto unconceived improvement, or be condemned to a perpetual oscillation between happiness and misery."

For a long time we have deluded ourselves that "illimitable improvement" was attainable. As the world approaches a new era of dearth, expect misery - and its old companion vice - to make a mighty Malthusian comeback.

Comments

[Bruce Webb]

More heat than light here. In particular the charge that population increases have been kept in check through increases in mortality rather than changes in fertility could use some sourcing. Outside of sub-saharan Africa I can't think of any region where the former is potentially more important than the latter.

And while I am sure Lloyd T. Evans is a perfectly fine plant physiologist I fail to see why we should accept him as an expert on potential grain yields. We are just exiting (if that) an era where the Federal Government paid farmers to keep acreage out of production and where wheat exports are still heavily subsidized.

And the whole ethanol crowding out food argument is overblown as well. The reason we are using corn to make ethanol is not because it is ideal for the purpose, because it isn't, it is because corn prices were dangerously low because supply was too high. In the transition period soy and cotton acreage are getting squeezed. Well I am not aware of any particular shortage of either. It is always amusing to me that Free Traders will endlessly push Ricardian CA while remaining willfully blind to the biggest violation, which is to say agriculture. Get rid of sugar tariffs and allow free import of sugar cane based ethanol and the adjustments will be made.

Finally arguing from a single-year increase in food prices to prove what if true is a multi-year phenomenum is so logically lame as to cause one to bang one's head on the wall.

All in all a very weak piece.

[Jim Harrison]

Since food production requires huge amounts of petroleum-derived fertilizer, peak grain and peak oil are intimately connected.

[Ivan Kitov]

1. "whereas our food supply can increase no faster than the number sequence 1, 2, 3, 4, 5."

Precise definition. Real GDP per capita growth exactly with a constant increment, not constant rate. This is a statistically consistent observation (not assumption):
http://ikitov.blogspot.com/2007/05/modelling-real-gdp-per-capita-in-usa.html

2. “For a long time we have deluded ourselves that "illimitable improvement" was attainable. As the world approaches a new era of dearth, expect misery - and its old companion vice - to make a mighty Malthusian comeback.”

Effectively, this outcome means the end of “economic” behavior, i.e. market exchange of capabilities to create something. In essence, it will be a big fight for survival not for extended leisure. I would guess that computers and outsourced soft will not s help much. What is important now is to learn (invest) some more physics and chemistry. These hard science the only who can move further "illimitable”.

[notsneaky]

The conventional explanation for our seeming escape from Malthus is the succession of revolutions in global agriculture

I don't think that's the conventional explanation. He's confusing supply with demand. The conventional explanation is that people stopped having so many damn kids once they got rich enough.

[lonesome moderate]

More heat than light here. In particular the charge that population increases have been kept in check through increases in mortality rather than changes in fertility could use some sourcing.

I don't believe that Ferguson said that. As best as I can tell, he made no attempt to quantify how much was "vice" and how much was "misery" at all.

[dale]

What Malthus and our present writer call vice are actually virtues- the freedom to use contraception and the freedom to choose to carry an embryo to term. If we expand these freedoms of choice via sane foreign aid and international family planning policy we will help diminish the chances of widespread vice in terms of preventable starvation and want.

Malthus' fallacy has always been a call to ignore the requirements of morality in economic matters. To see the world of abundance and hope in terms of scarcity, want and fear.

And then there is the case that so much of our grain is used to feed livestock. If there is ever a shortage of grain we can start to use it much more effectively and efficiently via direct human consumption instead of via the consumption of grain fed animals. Not all increases in productivness require scientific-technical breakthrough. Expansion of human freedom and a humane common sense can be of equal importance.

[anne]

When last we met Niall Ferguson, he was telling us of the pleasantries of war and beauties of empire, the British of old and ours of the future. Me, I am just adjusting to loving war and empire and here we have Fergy telling us of the end of the world I was so hoping to rule. Oh heck.

[lonesome moderate]

My problem with pieces like this is that many people were saying roughly the same thing thirty years ago, and the case for Malthusian Holocaust was at least as strong then as now--not only were we facing exploding populations and limited resources, but economic stagnation that seemed to make it impossible to grow our way out of the problem. It seems to me that strong economic growth has been underrated as one of the factors that saved us--farmers are, after all, able to spend a lot more money growing crops if consumers have a lot more money to buy it.

Maybe this time is different. Who knows?

[Peter Schaeffer]

As a preface, I don’t think anyone familiar with my posts will accuse me of being an incurable optimist…

However, Niall Ferguson is way off on this one. There is no evidence of any global shortage of grain. Nor is their likely to be any time soon. A quick check of table B-101 (Economic Report of the President) shows that agricultural prices (CPI-U adjusted) have fallen astoundingly since 1975. All farm products are down 58%, crops are down 64%, and livestock 52%.

Note that this is spite of the recent runup in food prices. Peak oil won’t change this by as much as people think. Apparently, agriculture uses about 1% of the fuel consumed in the United States.

I don’t have the longer-term data handy. However, constant dollar grain prices were apparently even higher after WWII and in 1900.

[robertdfeinman]

Actually the looming shortage is in water. In many places in the world the ground water is being depleted faster than it can be renewed. In parts of the western US the water table has dropped as much as 100 feet in the past century.

Poor land use policies are just making this worse. Not only are an increasing number of people moving to the desert in the US, but they are bringing their temperate zone expectations with them. This means green grass and water-intensive crop cultivation. Why do we allow growing of rice in Texas, for example? Last I checked it wasn't known for its swamp-like environment. Florida grows sugar cane, another crop which is poorly suited for its location.

The situation is worse elsewhere. China already has insufficient clean water and many communities are using contaminated water for domestic purposes. Much of the conflict in Africa can be traced back to resource shortages brought on by water scarcity.

If some of the long-term drought conditions that we have been seeing throughout the world turn out to persist there will even be larger problems. Australia has no good options currently.

Overpopulation eventually leads to a resource shortage. Sometimes it is hard to predict what the bottleneck will be, but there will always be one. In England at one time it was wood for fire wood; the commercialization of coal came along just in time to prevent an economic collapse. Unfortunately water is not a commodity where one can apply the ideas of substitutability.

[2slugbaits]

As a quick sanity check, this is what Wikipedia claims for cereal production from 1961 to 2005. Maize, wheat and rice account for 87 percent of worldwide cereal grain production. Those three grains grew at an annual rate of 2.33 percent per year, which is not only higher than current world population growth of 1.1 percent per year, but also higher than the 2.2 percent growth rate that Fergie seems to believe is the Malthusian rate.

Still, Fergie probably does have a point about the potential effects of global warming on grain production. That is something to worry about.

This article is typical of a lot of Niall Ferguson's writings; sometimes his best points are found in the asides and footnotes and not in the main body. For example, his book "Colossus: The Rise and Fall of the American Empire" has a certain tea & crumpets, triumphalist Whig history whiff about it, but every now and then you will find some interesting tidbits that you cannot help but think wouldn't have driven him to a different conclusion if he would have pursued them further.

[2slugbaits]

Here's the wiki link on cereal production:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cereal

[RW]

Lester R. Brown's, "Who Will Feed China? Wake-up Call for a Small Planet," provides a far more comprehensive overview of the issues involved even if it is over a decade old.

Things that stand out for me are:

Protein demand - economic expansion means more people able to afford higher quality protein but that typically means meat which is further up the food chain and that is, rather dramatically, a less efficient use of available resources (by roughly an order of magnitude).

Loss of potable water and arable land - economic expansion typically diverts more water to industry and also converts land to more lucrative industrial or residential uses making drinkable water generally less available and more expensive; ditto for land

Transportation - global in particular as increasing numbers of countries become net importers of grains (interesting scenario of N. America as the breadbasket of the world); in addition the world is decidedly not flat (pace Friedman) when it comes to things like container ship ports.

IOW despite technological advances in food production and transportation it's probably going to become increasingly expensive to feed people. In fact I think inflation in food and energy is the 'big story' with the former potentially greater in impact than the latter over the next few decades.

In that context I am reminded of David Hackett Fischer's (1996) book, "The Great Wave: Price Revolutions and the Rhythm of History." Beginning in the middle ages, Fischer tracks long, slow waves of increasing prices, from 80 to 180 years in length, that eventually lead to crisis. It is fascinating to see how similar the pattern is, century after century, wave after wave. It begins quite normally as increases in productivity and economic stability naturally enough lead to increasing population. The first signs of trouble are what initially appear to be relatively modest year-over-year increases in the nominal price of food and fuel which never completely revert and, more critically, outpace wage increases. The next phase is characterized by a growing disparity between the wealthy and wage earners -- it is always the wealthy who are first to demand relief of course and typically get it thus accelerating the trend -- and so it goes until the crashing finale decades later.

Intriguing stuff and, regardless of what one thinks of the thesis, not a bad parable for our times.

[Peter Schaeffer]

Robertdfeinman,

"Why do we allow growing of rice in Texas, for example? Last I checked it wasn't known for its swamp-like environment."

Actually, the part of Texas that grows rice is a swamp. Take a look at

"Texas' rice belt facing decrease in production, price" (http://www.countryworldnews.com/Editorial/SCTX/2004/sc093004rice.htm). A quote

"In Texas, most of the rice is grown in what is called the "rice belt," and that area stretches from Orange County down to the Gulf coast and on to Victoria and Calhoun counties"

Note that the article is from 2004 and the decrease in production was from too much rain. To put this in perspective, Houston was received 10 inches of rain this month and 40 inches this year. Normal is 2.88 inches and 27 inches.

By contrast, rice in California is grown using irrigation (but not groundwater).

[im1dc]

In pursuit of information about FRUCTOSE I ran across this factoid recently:

The US produces over 3900 calories of food per person a day annually for every American.

1800 calories per person a day is needed to maintain weight/health/well-being.

So the American food industry produces more than twice the number of calories needed and Americans are eating them.

That is one part of the reason Americans are overweight and becoming more-so.

The above calorie ratio represents THE BIG PICTURE, i.e., the one that encompasses all the relevant facts at issue.

No Economist slice and dice just to come to the wrong conclusions--again.

Malthus was and remains wrong.

End of story.

link: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/healthreport/stories/2007/1969924.htm

[happyjuggler0]

Show me a drought and I'll show you a place where water has been seriously underpriced. A drought is usually defined as something like "not enough rain to replenish water at replacement levels". That was a bit of a clumsy quote, but it focuses on only one side of the supply/demand calculus. The problem isn't lack of rain, or too much heat (heat by the way isn't inconsistent with rain. Think "tropical rainforest". The problem is often too much wasted water use due to Communist style pricing.

I suggest that everywhere ought to price water no lower than what it costs to truck it in as bottled water. Put all the "excess profits" into a "permanent dividend fund" such as Alaska has for oil, and evenly divide it amongst each man, woman and child in that water district. People will cheer for the price increases with the divedend fund, although farmers will agitate against it. I don't care, let's grow food where water is plentiful instead of where it is scarce.

Water usage would fall dramatically without paternalistic calls for using water on only odd days or even days or whatever. The beauty of it is that when people got used to the higher prices they'd be much better prepared for the eventual (hopefully several decades away) where we need to use desalination plants, which by the way are falling dramatically in price. The world has more than enough water, the problem is the cost. Economic growth will help with the cost as well, so delaying that day is helpful anyway.

As far as grain yields and land usage are concerned, here is a chart for those who are visually inclined. The rearview mirror is hardly alarming, and ought to be rather reassuring to those brought up on tripe like "The Population Bomb" and who don't realize how good the status quo is regarding food production. The real issue is the future though, not the rearview mirror.

Finally, here is an interview with Nobel Prize winner Norman Borlaug, the "father of the Green Revolution" who was in large part responsible for members of the fear industrial complex such as Paul Ehrlich having egg on their collective faces with regard to starvation. It is a long article and interview, but well worth reading in my opinion. He skewers a lot of ill-infomed ideas from various sources. Lest one think all is rosy from my previous paragraphs, he says it is not preordained that we'll be able to feed everyone in the medium term future, we need to keep up the agricultural research that has gotten us this far.

As others have pointed out, we have two safety valves if food productivity slips for a while. First, the amount of obesity in the US means we could cut way back on food consumed and still be fine. Second, all of us meat eaters make for another great safety valve. If grain starts running short we can all cut back on meat. But without those safety valves we'd have less time to pull a DNA hat out of our asses that would save us from starvation for millions if we suddenly come up short due to a growth glitch in research.

So in the meantime don't feel guilty about pigging out, or about eating meat. You are actually doing the world a favor by maintaining a "strategic food reserve", at a profit no less.

[robertdfeinman]

Just because Malthus got his mathematics wrong two hundred years ago and just because those in the 1950's failed to anticipate the green revolution doesn't mean that there isn't a looming crisis now. One cannot argue by historical analogy.

The issue of water use in the US southwest is not just one of pricing. There is inefficient use (and I still maintain that Texas rice growing is one of them), but local governments are already taking steps to control such use. Farmers are now being paid for their water rights, for example. However, at some point demand will exceed (local) supply. Just look at Australia. No amount of conservation is going to fix their regional problems. They are looking into sea water desalinization which is very energy intensive. At some point the cost of living will become too high in such regions and people will leave. In some places they will have another place to go. In most of Africa they don't.

As for the claim that we grow twice as much food as we need, this is an oversimplification. Much of what we grow is exported. Furthermore it doesn't take much excess consumption to gain weight. It takes about 3500 calories to gain one pound. If you consume 200 excess calories per day you will gain two pounds a month. This only requires drinking a Coke you didn't need per day.

The world is divided into the pessimists and the optimists. The optimists say technology will find the way. The pessimists say the end is nigh. The prudent pessimists say: "shouldn't we act as if the worst will happen and take steps to prevent it instead of hoping for a solution which doesn't yet exist?"

The population of much of the rust belt has dropped by half since its peak. If the residents could move to the desert they can move back. Cleveland has nice tree-lined streets and affordable housing (or space to rebuild).

[evagrius]

Ferguson is just worried about the price of English ale going up.

[realpc]

"Meanwhile, vice and misery have been operating just as Malthus foresaw to prevent the human population from exploding geometrically. On the one hand, contraception and abortion have been employed to reduce family sizes. On the other hand, wars, epidemics, disasters and famines have significantly increased mortality."

The obvious answer is family planning, which he includes under "vice." Yes, Malthus was right, the virus-like expansion of our species has to reach some kind of limit. But we can always choose abortion and contraception over war, disease and famine. Yes some Catholics still object, but eventually they'll have to admit that vice is better than all-out misery.

[realpc]

And most of us don't consider contraception a vice anyway. Maybe abortion, but it's hard to argue that there is anything immoral about a condom.

[im1dc]

robertdfeinman says "As for the claim that we grow twice as much food as we need, this is an oversimplification. Much of what we grow is exported."

Wrongo, Bobby boy (If I may address you so with no slight intended).

The 3900 calorie figure encompasses both EXPORT and IMPORT of what we eat. The pluses and minuses are summed by the food indusrty.

The recent food scares from China's food imports makes that perfectly clear.

BTW, the USA is not unique imo, many countries produce more than what they can use and then export it, but they use the currency thus gained to buy things and some of what they buy happens to be FOOD to consume.

That's David Ricardo's Comparative Advantage at work in today's global marketplace.

China is a food EXPORTER. The Chinese people (as a nation) are no longer starving, instead they are well fed today.

However, many Mexicans are now facing starvation that weren't before the NAFTA trade treaty with the US. Today millions of Mexican farmers no longer can make a living growing corn at home (can't compete with the price of imported corn).

Something like $40 Billion a year is sent back to the villages of Mexico from Mexican immigrants working here in the USA.

Confusing isn't it.

[ken melvin]

Dwindling resources (water, oil, top soil, fish, ...), too many people, global warming, failed governments, failed economies, ..., sounds like an approaching train wreck to me. If cutting back CO2 is too difficult try thinking of how to reduce population on short order. Suppose the Himalayas melt and cease to bring the monsoon; whose will take in hundreds of millions. Crass, I know, but nuclear war between India and China wouldn't even make a ripple. I do like the trade off between energy and food. Any other similarly fine choices await?

[vorpal]

World grain reserves have been shrinking for most of past decade. If the current trend continues, reserves will run out sometime before 2015. Mass starvation would then be a significant possibility in some parts of the world, or for the most vulnerable strata of society.
http://www.earth-policy.org/Indicators/Grain/2006_data.htm#fig5

[John Morrison]

"Peak Grain" depends on "Peak Oil" simply because it takes energy to plant the crops, fertilize them, harvest them, transport them, and so forth. This can be done intensively, using lots of humans, or extensively, using machinery and energy resources.

I believe that we can do a lot in food production, and there are plenty of new discoveries yet to be made. Nevertheless, there are certain fundamental limits that we cannot surpass regardless of the economic incentive. For example, we are not going to get more than 1400 Watts per square meter of solar power from the sun -- no matter how much profit there would be in getting more. As a second example, there is no way anyone will get more energy from burning hydrogen than would be required to extract hydrogen from water. As a third example, no amount of carbon or oxygen will substitute for a single hydrogen atom in a carbohydrate molecule.

That last example should be clue to those who view atmospheric carbon dioxide as a source of life or a wonderful fertilizer.

We will discover plenty of new things, but nothing we discover will alleviate the need for energy to produce our food and power our lifestyle. Nothing will remove a hard lower bound on the energy that each person needs to survive, or the much higher lower bound on the energy per person needed to have a reasonable standard of living.

We may find new energy resources that we haven't thought of, but that takes research. And research takes energy. Research is exploration into the unknown, and that means taking numerous false turns. Much more resources are required than if we knew which way to go in our research.

What happens if we cross Peak Oil, and supply crashes too fast to leave enough energy for further research into newer and hopefully more plentiful sources?

Regarding population growth, some people don't have any concept of exponential growth, or are innumerate in comprehending large numbers. They may know what a doubling time is, but they don't comprehend the logical consequences. Unfortunately, some of those have PhDs in fields such as economics, or have lucrative positions in organizations of spurious research -- otherwise known as Think Tanks. Malthus and later researchers in population dynamics were fundamentally correct, even if they were wrong about the timing.

In "Time for the Stars," Robert Heinlein wrote about a future where the earth's population was around eight billion, and increasing by ninety million every year. A couple decades ago, we were at four billion and increasing by ninety million every year. Our population growth rate was twice Heinlein's value.

Sometimes I give the following (strongly hypothetical) example of exponential growth: someone is wrongfully executed and the state is ordered to resurrect him. The state is subject to a daily fine, starting at a dollar but doubling every week, until the person is resurrected.

After ten weeks, the fine is over $1000 per day. After twenty weeks, the fine is over $1,000,000 per day. What is the daily fine after a year?

[baileyman]

The next layer in this is, surely those ambitious enough to seek higher office understand the predicament, so how will they manage the problem? That is, will they manage for more energy/food, or will they manage for fewer people?

[Alex Tolley]

The assumption that Malthus was wrong is typical confirmatory bias as a result of the successes of the green revolution. Which is not to say that the benefits will not continue or when we really will hit the limits. In the US, just cutting back on meat production would be very helpful to extend calories.

As Diamond has suggested in "Collapse", past societies often collapsed due to agricultural exhaustion and shows plenty of similar examples occurring in current post-industrial and agricultural societies.

We are rapidly hitting water limits (e.g. the US midwest rapidly drawing down the main aquifers), soil loss due to erosion (all parts of teh world including the US), GW induced rising sea levels impacting water supplies (Hansen is now saying 25 meter rise +- 10 meters by end C21st) and changing climate patterns. Monocultures are likely to result in random catastrophic crop failures - "Black Swan" events.

If we are lucky, the natural reduction in birth rates dues to educating women about birth control and better health care might just happen in advance of peak crops - I certainly hope it does. But before then we are likely to see local and regional food shortages, plus associated warfare in a number of places around the world, much as we saw in the middle of teh last century before the green revolution.

Malthus may yet have the last laugh (if you can call it that).

[Brenda Rosser]

I haven't time to read all of the comments right now but will try later. So please excuse me if I'm repeating someone else's point.

The story of agriculture goes hand-in-hand with the story of oil. You can make clear links with the increasing price of oil - and the use of oil-dependent machines- to the demise of family farm incomes and the depletion of the living soil.

In Australia corporate farming practices, which entail absentee owners, has absolutely devastated the fertility of the soil and polluted the drinking water with toxic pesticides and fertiliser runoff. The water bodies are, at the same time, depleted because the agribusiness trees drink up so much water. 10% or more of Tasmania (with increasing areas in other Australia states) are being covered with a monoculture tree crop for woochip for papermaking and biofuel (The trees have mostly replaced rainforest and most of the biomass is actually piled up and burnt on 12 year harvest, adding massively to CO2. so does burning and ripping the soil of previous old-growth forest).

The paradigms in place if not changed rapidly will cause famine/death on a scale unimaginable.

The solution to climate change, oil depletion, water depletion and food depletion is the same. Get people onto the land growing sustainably. Permaculture paradigms. No corporate land management.

1989 - More farmers facing an INCOME CRISIS began to use low-input sustainable agriculture (LISA) techniques to decrease chemical applications and respond to low commodity prices and escalating input costs. “Recently, many producers in prairie agriculture have moved towards sustainable, low-input farming practices. This trend has been accelerated by the cost/price squeeze as grain farms
continue to be face low commodity prices, escalating input costs, increasing dependence on off farm inputs. In the midst of the income crisis most grain farmers are finding that they can no longer make a good living by relying solely on conventional, high external input approaches to
production. Recognising the need to rethink Canadian agriculture, many farmers are considering options beyond traditional production systems and are exploring low input agricultural practices that may be more sustainable, economically, socially and environmentally, in the long run. Evidently, a need exists to support the development of these trends.

At the forefront in terms of sustainable low-input agriculture is an increase in the adoption of organic farming, pesticide-free production practices, a widespread use of pulse crops, an increase in forage/pastures, and zero/reduced tillage (i.e., elimination of summerfallow acres). Many institutions have acknowledged these alternative production practices and have thus engaged in
some research, education and promotion. However, there has not yet been a systematic approach to this. In other words, not enough co-ordinated effort has taken place for successful industry development and adoption of low-input agricultural systems that are suited to prairie conditions…”

… 4.2 Barrier Identification
In identifying the needs for future low-input agricultural systems development, a number of barriers were recognised as impediments to this development:
· ß The lack of a clear definition for low input sustainable agricultural production systems has created some antagonism and intolerance to the understanding of such systems.
· This lack of a clear definition has also hindered communication flows and partnership developments from occurring in the industry.
· ß Psychological and mental barriers (from all participants including farmers, civil servants, and academics) have created some hostility between parties to accepting change and the adoption of new systems.
· ß The lack of accessible information and technology transfer has hindered some producers from developing and/or adopting low input sustainable agricultural practices.
· ß Time and financial constraints also serve as barriers to low input sustainable agriculture development.
· For many experts in the industry, it is difficult to devote significant amounts of time to communicate and train other industry partners, as much of this is done on a pro-bono basis.
· ß For the organic industry, the lack of an internationally recognised system of Accreditation/certification to a national standard has impeded development for this industry.

… Without the private sector’s support and assistance, the dissemination of low-input agricultural technology is limited and often difficult, thereby creating technology transfer gaps.

[From: Sustainable Low-Input Agriculture Gap Analysis
Rhonda Lindenbach-Gibson and Richard Gray. A report prepared by the Centre for Studies in Agriculture, Law and the Environment, University of Saskatchewan.]

1910 – 2003 and beyond. Escalating energy costs on the farm. 5% 1910 to 30%? 2008

[BJ Feng]

The world isn't even close to full agricultural productive capacity. Just a small example, my friend grows tomatoes and other vegetables outside his apartment. I'm also thinking of growing some food just for fun. Think of all the water and resources we use just to keep our lawns green, edible food could easily be grown in its place if need be. Food is so cheap that most people don't even consider growing it on their land.

As for water, we have the technology to get fresh water from the sea. The process is just very expensive and so far only a few places find it worthwhile to produce fresh water that way, but there's no reason why we couldn't in the future.

I believe we have the capacity to support many more humans on this planet if need be. The good thing is that there seems to be a natural leveling off of birthrates once a society achieves a certain level of wealth. As someone else mentioned, children become a luxury because they need to be endowed with a minimum level of human and other capital in line with society. Morality does enter the equation. No responsible, decent parent would raise their children as beggars while they live it up.

[Jeroen]

Actually what we are witnessing is bioflation...

[Brenda Rosser]

"I believe we have the capacity to support many more humans on this planet if need be. "

Yes, but only if it's an entirely different type of agriculture than the one we have now and many, many more people engage in it. I can't see how a city like New York would have enough space to feed the bitumen and concrete population there.

[reason]

BJ Feng...
have you actually tried to do this and noticed how long you can feed yourself this way (as against the occasional snack). You learn lots about aphids, mildews, root rot, drought, soil fertility etc as a bi-product though.

All, there was a very interesting article in the Scientific American (the last one I got not sure of the month) about replacing grain crops with perennial versions. It has substantial advantages (particularly as some form of perma-culture), but I was appalled to read that the author expects results in 25-50 years. I don't think we've got that long.

I don't care what people say about "Malthus was wrong" - his fundamental point about resources being finite and population potentially infinite is simply a mathametical truth. Fortunately, he didn't forsee falling birth rates as a consequence of social security and the pill. (I must admit, I find it curious that Ferguson omitted to mention the most obvious vice limiting population, WAR).

[Brenda Rosser]

Governments have been involved in actively encouraging population growth. Prime Minister John Howard is handing out baby bonuses everywhere. For many decades Australians were denied access to information about contraception and abortion was illegal. How many other national governments have or are pursuing the same idiotic policies?

[spencer]

The above quote that grain output is growing faster than population is the first step in the analysis. It implies there is no problem and it is partially right. As long as the world population does not change its diet grain output exceeding grain consumption assures low prices. But what we have is new segments of the world population in Eastern Europe, Asia and even the Middleeast are experiencing strong real income growth and are changing their diets to consume meat on a regular basis. But shifting from a grain based diet to a meat based diet is highly inefficient and generates a very large surge in grain demand -- it takes several pounds of grain to generate one pound of meat. So yes the use of corn for fuel is creating price pressures on ag products, but the real long run problem is a problem of spreading prosperity not one of Malthusian starvation.

Historically, every time a major new segment of the world population starts eating meat regularly the world experiences a temporary surge in grain prices until the system has time to adjust and grain prices fall back to their long term trend. The last time this happened was with the Soviets in the late 1960s - early 1970s. So from this perspective the recent rise in grain prices is more a signal of the success of the system, not of problems.

[reason]

Spencer,
on a world wide scale you are correct. However, Malthusian crises can and do occur locally (as Jared Diamond speculated was behind the Tutsi massacres). There are worries about long term food sustainability related to moniculture, pests, desease, pesticide, fertiliser, soil erosion, climate change and water.

What has happened in Africa, mankinds birthplace, must worry the most panglossian of pundits.

We are not (world wide) in desperate trouble with regards food at the moment, but it would be silly to claim that no severe problems are possible. As the worlds population increases, the safety buffer we have must become more strained.

[robertdfeinman]

im1dc:
I usually don't respond to trolls, but I'll make an exception this time.
Your condescending reply to me needs to be called out. Wrongo, Bobby boy (If I may address you so with no slight intended).
I'm not six years old, and you absolutely intended a slight. If you have something to say then let's hear it.

Unlike you I post under my real name, I provide a link to both my web site and email address and I stand behind what I write. You, on the other hand, are a coward. You hide behind an anonymous screen name and take pot shots rather than presenting meaningful arguments. If you are unwilling to put your name to your remarks why should anyone pay any attention to you?

There is such a thing as good manners. That it has become rarer in the blogosphere doesn't mean that it isn't something that should be adhered to. Grow up.

[oops]

veal yummy. kill those cows before they can eat much of my grain.

RF- not sure where you get your opinion on TX. but Houston is basically a city built on a swamp. A lot of rice farmland just outside the city has been converted for development. As cities grow we'll lose more acreage to development everywhere but as far as TX goes, remember it borders LA. East TX is a big swamp. West TX is big dry.

If Loyd Evans is right then we've finally found what the Middle East, with their youth bulge, will need from the rest of the world. Grain. Maybe that oil card of theirs isn't quite so valuable after all cause they still gotta eat.

[Barry]

anne says...
"When last we met Niall Ferguson, he was telling us of the pleasantries of war and beauties of empire, the British of old and ours of the future. Me, I am just adjusting to loving war and empire and here we have Fergy telling us of the end of the world I was so hoping to rule. Oh heck."

Our biggest fundamental problem is listening to fools, scum and liars long after the only question is which category a particular individual falls into the most.

I would call Ferguson a disgrace to Harvard, but that assumes that Harvard can be disgraced. Any reference to him should be immediately hit by his g-d Iraq war empire worship.

[Dirk van Dijk]

Apparently the world needs a lot more vice.

[btgraff]

i never read malthus, but i always thought he was oversimplifying things - in the age of the "frontier" - food growth could grow exponentially.

land is finite - so when the frontier runs out - each person means less land per person, and more land for things other than agriculture

in terms of productivity, productivity is not necessarily exponential but subject to short bursts as new technologies are introduced or become cost effective.

i do think that peak grain and peak oil are the same - read richard manning, autho of "the oil we eat"

as for calories. much food is wasted in various ways. even so, the big problem is that subsidies and trade barriers means that muost of the overproduction is in corn and sugar.

people trying to survive on low incomes find that processed foods high in starch and sugars are the cheapest - fruits and non-starchy green vegetables are expensive. i am sure that studies would show that obesity is probably inversely proprotional to income.

[Laura Andros]

Right on, Ms. Brenda Rosser:

"Governments have been involved in actively encouraging population growth. Prime Minister John Howard is handing out baby bonuses everywhere. For many decades Australians were denied access to information about contraception and abortion was illegal. How many other national governments have or are pursuing the same idiotic policies?"

Well, as we all know, the United States of America is ruled by belligerent goons who want to privatise everything but women's uteruses--they need more kid-customers who grow up to buy their SUVs.

But that depends on whether or not all those 'precious' little kiddies can grow up at all without the nutrition they need due to strains on our resources due to human overpopulation. Not to mention the lack of support for kids' healthcare needs in this country.

Bush's hatred of women and the very planet which sustains him are shameful; just when we need more people the least, his plan is to force more women into involuntary servitude/motherhood which is unconstitutional at its root.

A better more timely policy, given that the American lifestyle is so environmentally devastating (it would take FOUR planet Earths to sustain the current world population if it behaved like Americans living at just the poverty level), is one of zero population growth, or sustainability, starting ten years ago when there were one billion fewer people in the world.

Even Mexico City has started to allow legalised abortion, perhaps they have started to make the connection that overpopulation tends to degrade labour/job earnings, healthy air quality and all those things we think are out of our hands--but they are in our hands, most notably by choosing not to make any more humans.

Other solutions besides birth control, abortion, and sex education would certainly include tax incentives for child-free persons. Right now, they've got it backwards. We all need to learn some new math: how to pay for social services without depending so much on a continuous population growth curve.

[reason]

Laura Andros...
with respect, I don't think is any particular plan of Bush's. Ask say Pat Robertson about it.

As for incentives for increasing the birth rate, the issue is complicated because we share one world, but democracies will act as if they are independent (because politically they are). A too steep decline in population can bring with it severe adjustment problems, regardless of what that means on a world wide scale.

[Alex Tolley]

You don't have to slur politicians of any stripe regarding population growth. One of the HUGE issues facing growth based western populations is what happens when the growth rate slows and the life span increases. Japan is n the grips of this now, with Europe not far behind. It has major consequences on tax based social welfare, such as pensions and healthcare. Population growth eases this problem. China's "one child" policy would make this a nightmare for them if they had developed nation support systems.

Peak grain is NOT attached to peak oil. Yes, energy is used in fertilizer and farming, but it is quite a small input relative to the main uses of oil. The constraints are more linked to available arable land, which is diminishing as poor farming practices have drawn down water supplies, salinated soils, and depleted soils due to soil erosion. No one has much idea what effects GW will have in this regard, but almost certainly agricultural patterns will change. California is currently one of the the most productive ag areas in the US, but climate models suggest that severe droughts are in the offing, even apart from the known drought cycles in this region.

despite ideas such as permaculture mentioned by Brenda, the fact is that it takes a very long time for agricultural patterns to change. Just look at 2 examples in the US. Tobacco, a plant with arguably no socially redeeming qualities is still grown and subsidized despite decades of evidence to its harmful nature to users. Politics and business plays a big part in delaying phase out. We grow sugar in Florida under protective trade tariffs keeping its US price above world markets, and that has directly caused the [possibly harmful] growth in the use of HFCS as a food sweetener. The Japanese are even crazier with their rice supports.

becuase water is traeted as a common resource in the US, expect farming to continue as is until the aquifers running dry cause a collapse, much as marine fisheries collapsed with overfishing. The recent fight over Klamath river water in Oregon [farmers vs Salmon] is just a taste of the future. Are farmers in Oregon seriously considering how they are going to have to change to different farming patterns and methods in the event of continued or unpredictable water supplies?

For economists to argue Malthus is wrong is just a matter of short term perspective. Living organisms have always been constrained by food supplies, that is the key driver of natural selection. Humans have been no different. Our transition to agriculture ~ 8K years ago - changed little. We have had barely 250 years of industrial civilization, a very short time, and already we are in danger of messing up badly. Despite all out knowledge, all our technology, we are not even close to creating sustainable patterns of food production on a global basis. Much of what we do is still either habitat destruction for new farmland (tropics and sub-tropics), resource depletion (esp. water in the US) and energy inputs via N & P fertilizers to increase crop yields. Only the last, if energy generation is from renewables is sustainable.

[im1dc]

robertdfeinman posts to im1dc
"I usually don't respond to trolls..."

Oops! I will know better in the future than to call you "Bobby boy."

But you are still "wrongo".

I'm not a troll either. Ask 2slugbaits, he's known me a long time.

Besides having no sense of humor you provided no substance in answer to my post that you took exception toward.

I suppose you just don't like being corrected.

You failed to notice that in my first post, the one that you got the 'caloric' factoids to dis, I DID post a link to my source.

That makes YOUR rant about my skills in logical argument childish churlish nonsense as well as erroneous.

I bet everyone here wonders what other glaring errors you have made on this blog.

I suggest you take a chill pill pal, then work on your reading comprehension as well as your factual rebuttals, b/c you offered no facts that rebut mine and provided only vitriol, hyperbole and hot air ad hominem.

That sir, is no way to earn respect in an intellectual environment.

SCORE

robertdfeinman 0

im1dc 1

[Alex Tolley]

im1dc:

This is perhaps a better link than the one you provided. Certainly has pretty diagrams.

Of the total food production, around 25% is wasted, so that reduces final delivery to the stomach.

It is certainly not clear to me that final availability includes the import/export balance of packaged food products rather than raw and semi-processed (maybe that is trivial?).

What is clear is that the US does have an abundant food supply, that since ~ 1/2 of crop production is converted to animal protein with ~ 10:1 conversion ratio, food availability is quite flexible in the US through shifting the grain & fruit : animal protein ratios. This is nice for us, with only 300 million people in a big space, but not nearly so funny for EU, Japan with large populations in a small space (EU is self-sufficient) and China, India with huge populations in large spaces.

Except for massive crop failures, as seen in former USSR, I don't expect food shortages anytime soon, but that is not the same as saying that we have a sustainable food production system for the next 250 yers.

[robertdfeinman]

Breaking my rule a second (and last time) im1dc.
You are still a coward hiding behind a anonymous screen name. You are still engaging in ad hominem attacks and you are still bad mannered.

I don't consider a reference to another anonymous blogger a character reference.

Say whatever you want to justify your behavior. I'm done. The sign of the true troll is their continual need to attack others personally while denying that they are doing anything improper. (And please, don't give me that "you are doing it too, so there" argument.)

[reason]

Alex Tolley...
Very good posts, everybody should read them. I would like economists to take seriously the NEED for moving to sustainability, and think about the economic environment that would provide the right incentives.

[im1dc]

robertdfeinman

Oh my, I believe you have become unhinged and all for nothing really.

Let me explain and clarify.

As I told you originally I meant no slight by taking the liberty of calling you 'bobby boy'.

I live south of the Mason-Dixon line and assure you that the formal "Robert" would be translated in my rural area as "bobby boy" by those inclined to be friendly/neighborly/collegial.

In regard to this "I don't consider a reference to another anonymous blogger a character reference" I must correct you yet AGAIN.

The link is to the July 9th, 2007 Australian Broadcasting Corporation's "The Health Report" radio program by Dr. Norman Swan, M.D. of Dr. Dr Robert Lustig, Professor of Pediatric Endocrinology, University of California,
San Francisco in regard to FRUCTOSE and Dr. Lustig's theory of the Obesity epidemic.

Dr. Lustig is a medical researcher in the area of the obesity, which includes the biological effects of FRUCTOSE.

The 'caloric' FACTOIDS I shared are Dr. Lustig's.

Although I can source where I got my information, I cannot source where Dr. Lustig got his information.

I assume its good information given his professional and scientific credentials. I have no reason to doubt him.

The INTERVIEW is archived at the link and you can read them for yourself or you can LISTEN to the show by clicking "Listen".

Here is a link to the GOOGLE page search for Dr. David Lustig: http://tinyurl.com/ypwrvz.

Here is the link to Dr. Lustig's UCSF biography: http://chc.ucsf.edu/COAST/faculty_lustig.htm

I hope the above helps to clarify the issues you mentioned for you.

I encourage you to read or listen to Dr. Swan's Interview of Dr. Lustig and to explore the notion/theory/hypothesis of Fructose 'toxicity' on humans.

That link, once again, is: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/healthreport/stories/2007/1969924.htm

[im1dc]

Alex Tolley

"im1dc: This is perhaps a better link than the one you provided. Certainly has pretty diagrams."

I did not find the link you referenced in your post.

Will you please repost it?

Thanks for your informative and reasoned input.

Its a breath of fresh air--considering bobby boy's apparent wild eyed rage at being corrected.

[Andrés Vernon]

Facts show that Mr. Ferguson is just the latest Malthusian Chicken Little.

-Yes, food prices have risen over 20% over the last 24 months (IMF commodity prices). But they're only 8% above what they were in 1980. In real terms, that means they've fallen nearly 40% since then.

-According to FAO data, between 1979-1981 world grain production rose only 32%, versus a rise in global population of 45%. But meat production jumped 72% and fruit and vegetable output rose 92%. This is a sign of affluence, not hunger.

Of course, global warming will bring challenges and there should be more investment in research to improve tropical agriculture yields. But Malthus will be just as wrong in the next 200 years as he's been in the past 200 years.

[Brenda Rosser]

Alex Tolley said: "despite ideas such as permaculture mentioned by Brenda, the fact is that it takes a very long time for agricultural patterns to change..."

That has much more to do with Governments than people. In Tasmania we are prohibited from building more than one dwelling on a rural block. Regardless of how unsuitable for agriculture any particular building site may be.

In Australia the Federal Government provides 100% tax writeoffs for investment in tree plantation corporations (about 6 or 7 only). They are busy converting huge swathes of Australia's best agricultural land to monoculture tree 'farms' that deplete the water and soil very quickly. Management entails heavy appications of pesticides and herbicides in many many town and city drinking water catchments. The recent drought has exacerbated the problem of toxicity with farmers in Werribee in Victoria now seeing their foods crops killed off by pesticide-contaminated recycled water.

This is a program of genocide.

[Gil]

Muhahaha! You know that Thomas Malthus' warning to be true! A similar law is the Law of Dimishing Returns. Namely doing the same thing will only get you so far. To say that technology and habits will solve all misses what Malthus was saying. Actually Malthus lived in a time period where technology was improving and he made note of it. But he knew as we know that such technological improvement only raises the bar (or extends the deadline if you prefer).

There are two solutions to the problem. One? Create a circular society where people live within the means of their land. Problem is it may have to be low-tech as not to endanger the environment. The people who have lived consistently over the millennia are unfortunately are simple hunting-gathering folk. Two? Create the mystical warp-drive which allows at least for easy interstellar travel (or better yet easy intergalactic travel!) whereby land, water and mineral resources are super-duper-abundant! This would be the perfect highest-tech solution but unfortunately is too elusive. :(