When Drought Becomes Famine

As far as I know, the only famines among white settlers in the United States occurred back in the 1600's. The availability of land (just steal it from natives, or buy a parcel from someone who did) and the agricultural techniques available even in the 18th century meant that food was usually abundant and limited only by one's wallet. There were crop failures on a local scale, and lean times, and disruptions from the Revolutionary War and the Civil War, and even the Dust Bowl, but they did not amount to national famines.

That could change, and sooner than you think, if you crunch the numbers. The current drought, spreading over much of the nation, makes it worth thinking about.

The United States is no longer an agricultural nation. The human population is currently around 315 million. Over the last decade the dollar value of U.S. food imports and exports, while fluctuating year to year, has drifted from a surplus of exports to a surplus of imports. While our nation ships a lot of grain to China and other countries, we import a lot of food too, mainly from Mexico and Canada.

This year's drought has hit the corn crop particularly hard. Still, the current estimate is that corn production will be around 10.8 billion bushels. That sounds like a lot, but it is less than 4 bushels per person (a bushel is 8 gallons, or 56 pounds of shelled corn). Usually 40% goes to producing ethanol. Much of the rest goes to feed for meat animals, including exports to China. But a lot goes straight to feed humans in the United States everything from corn chips to corn syrup.

The key figure to watch is ending inventories. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's report on August 10, the ending inventory this year will be about 650 million bushels. That is down over 500 million bushels in a single year.

Now suppose the same thing happens to corn next year. Subtract another 500 million bushels from this years' inventory of 650 million bushels. That would leave an inventory of 150 million bushels. A third year straight of crop failure would mean famine.

Corn is not the only major crop, but drought is not the only problem. Higher temperatures can also lead to higher losses from superweeds (the ones that Monsanto helped create be killing their weaker ancestors), insects, and an assortment of plant diseases.

2012 will, hopefully, go down in history as a particularly bad year, not to be repeated anytime soon. We can't count on that.

Given how fat many Americans are, and that our diet is quite varied, you might still want to discount the risk of famine. After all, under the scenario above, even during the third year of disaster we could get 10 to 11 billion bushels of corn. We might produce less ethanol, and feed corn directly to hungry people, instead of to pigs, chickens, and cows. Maybe Canada, Russia, or Brazil will have a bumper year, and we'll just import corn for our tortillas. Maybe the President will proclaim that gluten-free diets are nonsense and people should eat more wheat products again.

Maybe the relatively affluent, the top 30% or 20% or so, will keep eating meat. Maybe the ethanol producers will put their profit first and not give up their share of corn.

Maybe production of corn will be even lower next year, and wheat will decline too. Why? Because the soil will be dry going into the new year, and irrigation sources will be depleted. And maybe the fat people will take no pity on those who are already lean: maybe they will be strong enough to shove the starving aside when the delivery trucks pull up to the supermarkets.

As the population of the U.S.and the globe increases, and as weather gets more erratic and generally warmer, it might seem like a good idea to have a plan to cope with ugly scenarios. The Free Market won't magically make food appear out of parched fields.

Barack Obama, as usual, is sucking his thumb, moistening it in case he needs to measure the political wind. Instead of turning off the ethanol machine and creating a rational plan to prevent famine in the long run (like: more birth control), he is worrying about getting re-elected. Ditto for Congress. If I had not studied American history I would say this lot is the worst bunch of idiots ever. In fact they are typical mediocrities.
Our only hope is that rains will return, and it will keep on raining until at least 2016, when we might get some better nominees for Congress and the Presidency.

God Punishes Bible Belt with Drought

I could not help but notice the remarkable coincidence between the December 9, 2010 Drought Map of the United States and the 2009 Bible Belief Geographic Index:




It became apparent to me that God must be sending the drought as a message to the Christians of the Bible Belt. But why? Surely no homosexuals, abortionists, or prostitutes live in the Bible belt anymore, not once they can afford a bus ticket out. While surely some people in the Belt don't pray as much as they should, that is even more true of areas of the United States that are not suffering from drought.

I talked to several preachers who claimed in the past earthquakes in California are God's punishment for allowing homosexuals and abortionists to live, but none of them thought the drought was anything other than a natural La Nina related weather pattern.

Then I took a big step. I decided to try to get an interview directly with God.

True, the bureaucracy was daunting. No one seemed to believe that I really wanted to know God's opinion. But I was persistent, and suddenly a void opened before me (I appeared to be in a multi-dimensional quantumized relativistic field space, but more on that some other time) and I heard the voice of God.

"Speak English!" I shouted back at him.

"There, is that better, insignificant germ on an insignificant planet in an insignificant galaxy in a botched universe creation experiment that I had almost forgot existed?"

"So you are saying you did not visit the drought on the Bible Belt of the United States of America on the planet Earth?"

"Not exactly. Let me have one of my minions examine the database. Huh. That drought is a punishment, although it is also a natural La Nina related weather pattern."

"Fine. Then people on Earth would like to know what the punishment is for, so that they can do better and escape punishment?"

"The punishment is partly for being conscious beings who only do what's right to escape punishment. But more specifically, I don't like them attacking people who are Moslems. I'm not all that fond of Islam, but that camel trading artist Mohammed did hear one thing right. I am the one and only God, and I don't like my creation worshipping made-up Gods, including people whose followers claim they are God on earth."

"So no false gods. Anything else?"

"Did I ever say that because the earth is insignificant that humans have the right to destroy it? Start taking care of the environment or I'm cutting off your food supply. Breed less. Open up more Planned Parenthood centers. Use condoms. Use the brains I gave you to make intelligent decisions! Stop reading the Bible and the Koran so much. They are out of date! Didn't people get the messages I sent through Adam Smith, Charles Darwin and Albert Einstein?"

"Well some did, and some did not. A lot of people seem to be hard of hearing in these matters. Especially in the Bible Belt."

"I've tolerated the Bible Belt long enough. I'm turning it into a desert for a few decades. After that, with some rain it might be a nice place again. It was a regular paradise before Christians arrived."

"But if people stop reading the Bible, would you stop the drought?"

"Ha! Maybe it will stop by itself. Maybe it is a natural cyclical phenomena! Next!"

At that point I was blown out of the interview space, back to my natural home in coastal northern California, where it is raining. Where it is okay to believe in Special Relativity and Natural Selection. Where people are friendly, and mostly see no need to go to Afghanistan to kill people.

But I was a little bit miffed that the interview ended so abruptly. I thought the tradition was that when God gives you an interview, and you get back to spread the Word, everybody is thankful and gives you ten percent of their income. Next time I get an interview, I'm starting with fee negotiations.

Russia Wheat Crop Failure Warns on Population

This year Russia is expect its wheat crop to be 10 to 20% below normal. As a result it has suspended its usual export of wheat, one of its best cash earners after oil and gas. Secondary to that world wheat prices have risen. Of course that helps farmers in areas where the wheat crop is good this year, like the United States.

This event is driven by high temperatures and drought. That in turn may be driven by global warming, but specific events are hard to attribute to slow, general trends.

The wheat situation is a reminder that the Earth is overpopulated with humans. Food production is a tricky business. Drought has tended to have the largest impact on food production since the invention of pesticides, but fungus, viruses, insects, weeds, and even rodents still compete with humans for the crops we try to raise. There are multiple points of failure available, and where there are multiple points of failure, failures will occur.

The United States is no longer a net food exporter. True, we are far from endangered in the short run. Over half of Americans are fat, so calorie intake could probably be cut something like 25% for our population as a whole before any widespread detrimental health effects set in.

Looking ten to twenty years down the road, however, the situation could turn far more serious as both the global and U.S. populations continue to rise. As food prices rise (after a century of low prices by most measures) more land may be brought into production, and yields would be expected to continue to show technology-based increases. But it is hard to plot out a scenario where food supplies grow as fast as the population.

We can count on global warming, but we don't know where and when its local effects will strike. If multiple major grain exporting nations are hit by simulaneous droughts lasting two years or longer, we could see famines on a global scale.

The only real long term solution is a global population policy. Let me be clear: over the next century the human global population should be reduced to about 3 billion people. Carbon dioxide is not the problem. Too many people is the problem.

More on the global population problem:

Food and Population [January 31, 2007]

Population and Global Warming [January 25, 2007]

Population Incentives [January 6, 2007]

Population, Population, Population [December 13, 2006]

China's Population Issues [link to People's Daily Online]

You Are Getting Warmer

Have you begun to suspect that neither the Democratic Party nor the Republican Party is going to take steps significant enough to halt global warming?

You are getting warmer.

Have you begun to suspect that trading one war crimes organization, the Republican Party, for another, the Democratic Party, is not going to prevent war?

You are getting warmer.

Has the economic crisis got you wondering just how much stupidity and cupidity human beings are capable of?

You are getting warmer.

Do you live in one of the many areas of the United States that has suffered through a drought since the year 2000?

You are getting warmer.

Has the increased cost of food and gas, combined with your boss telling you not to expect a raise this year, made you suspect that the system is rigged against people like you?

You are getting warmer.

Have you heard that La Jolla California, one of the most beautiful places on earth, is having all of its vegetation eaten by a "stick insect" that originated in India? Have you noticed similar changes in your area on those rare occasions when you closely observed the local flora and fauna?

You are getting warmer.

Do you suspect that there is no humanoid God, just the Natural Universe?

You are getting warmer.

Are you beginning to suspect that in order to save yourself, your friends, and your family, drastic action, maybe even rebellion, has become a necessity?

You are getting warmer.

Maybe it is time to start thinking about Natural Liberation.