Feeding the world sustainably

Posted by Gar Lipow (Guest Contributor) at 3:09 PM on 24 Apr 2007

Read more about: food | agriculture | organic food | industrial ag

(Part of the No Sweat Solutions series.)

If heaven was a pie it would be cherry
Cool and sweet and heavy on your tongue
And just one bite would satisfy your hunger
And there'd always be enough for everyone
-- Gretchen Peters, "If Heaven"

Agriculture for food and fiber represents another significant category of environmental impact. Before we worry about how to farm, we should consider how much agriculture we need. If you read the technical news, when this subject comes up it always centers on how to increase food production for a hungry world.

This is completely misleading. There is enough food produced (including meat and fish) worldwide not just to feed everyone on the planet, not just to make everyone fat, but to make everybody morbidly obese. Counting grain, beans, roots, fruits, vegetables, nuts, and other plants and fungi (not including animal feed), plus livestock, dairy, fish, eggs, and other animal products raised for human consumption, we produced nearly 2,800 calories per person per year in 2001[1] -- including 75 grams of protein. 2,200 calories per day is generally accepted as the average needed to keep a person healthy -- neither losing nor gaining weight[2]. 56 grams of protein is the U.S. RDA for adult men[3].

Many people have higher requirements than this -- most grown men, pregnant and lactating women, athletic women. (As one instance, Lucy Lawless used to perform gymnastics and horseback riding in fairly heavy armor ten or more hours per day while starring in "Xena - Warrior Princess," and probably burned 6,000+ calories daily at the peak of her schedule.) Children, and median-height adult women, generally need less. Below 2,200 calories, and 56 grams on average, is considered an absolute shortage; if we allow a comfort and safety margin, that would mean we want at least 2,300 calories on average per person available worldwide.

How big an increase do we need to keep up with population growth? According to the U.S. Census[4], if you assume the same production with projected increases in population we will still average ~2,500 calories per person per day in 2010, ~2,300 per day in 2020. Without no cultivation of more acreage or increase in production per acre, we then approach absolute scarcity, falling to 1,900 in 2050. We need no increase in total food production before 2020, and only a 21 percent increase by 2050.

Moreover, in one sense the problem of getting that increase is already solved.

I'm going to suggest reasons to go beyond plain old organic farming in a moment. But it turns out that even conventional organic farming could feed more people than our current industrial system[5]. Normally, when people measure land use for organic farming they look at the rich nations, and note that rich nations on average can grow less per acre via organic means than with conventional ones. (It turns out that the difference is smaller than we thought, though -- about 20 percent.) However, it is a different story in developing nations. According the Brian Halweil in World Watch Magazine:

[S]cientists from the University of Michigan tried to estimate how much food could be raised following a global shift to organic farming. The team combed through the literature for any and all studies comparing crop yields on organic farms with those on non-organic farms. Based on 293 examples, they came up with a global dataset of yield ratios for the world's major crop for the developed and the developing world. As expected,organic farming yielded less than conventional farming in the developed world for most food categories, while studies from the developing world showed organic farming boosting yields. The team then ran two models. The first was conservative in the sense that it applied the yield ratio for the developed world to the entire planet, i.e., they assumed that every farm regardless of location would get only the lower developed-country yields. The second applied the yield ratio for the developed world to wealthy nations and the yield ratio for the developing world to those countries.

The second model [the realistic model - Gar] yielded 4,381 calories per person per day, 75 percent greater than current availability-and a quantity that could theoretically sustain a much larger human population than is currently supported on the world's farmland.

So our problem is not how to massively increase food production. We need to make sure everyone has access to the plenty that already exists. Hunger in the world today is due to injustice, not shortages. But that doesn't mean injustice is the only problem with the international food system.

Current agricultural production consumes far too much water and contaminates far too many clean water sources. Water is a renewable resource, but not in unlimited quantities. If we contaminate enough of the water cycle, we will have less water available at any given moment. Future clean water does us no good when we need it in the present. If we don't drastically lower agricultural consumption and contamination of water sources, we will eventually suffer a genuine food shortage.

Similarly, worldwide we erode topsoil every year. Again, we need to reverse this to maintain the ability to feed everybody. There are some questions about mineral sources and soil micronutrients as well.

In addition, the IPCC has pointed out that some of the global warming already locked in will decrease food production in some of the world's poorest nations. But if we can confine the damage to less than a 2 degree centigrade warming we will actually have an overall 20 percent increase -- much of it, unfortunately, among the rich nations. Of course this increase won't do people in the poorer nations any good if they are not given access to the food. That is a critical problem, probably the most critical problem -- but the point is, there's no technical obstacle to feeding the world, even in the face of global warming.

The technical problem is to maintain food production for the next ten+ years, then increase it slowly, while using far less water, far less energy, eroding less soil, using fewer mineral resources, and releasing fewer toxins into the water table. Conventional organic agriculture is not the limit of how we can do this.

A good start would be to reverse the current trend of destroying farmland by converting cropland to urban uses (roads, buildings, and so forth) and destroying suitability of land for farming by erosion, destruction of water sources, mining, and toxic contamination.

Meat production is another example. In 2000, the U.S. used ~27 percent [6] of its cropland to grow grain for animal feed; the world used ~18.5 percent of its production for the same purpose[7]. But it turns out feeding grain to cattle, sheep, goats, and other ruminants is not particularly healthy for them or for people who eat them. Forcing animals to spend up to half their lives confined in feedlots causes all sorts of problems. They need hormones to handle grain -- far richer food than they are designed to digest. They need antibiotics to stave off the diseases that come from close confinement, and overfeeding -- which creates antibiotic resistant strains of bacteria. (Meanwhile, hospitals try to minimize antibiotic prescriptions for people.) This still results in occasional E. coli scares. Further, in an effort to increase weight gain, until quite recently we fed animal byproducts to cows and steers -- which are really not well designed to be carnivores. This contributed to cases of mad cow in the United States, just as it did in the UK previously.

There is an alternative. Cattle evolved over a long period of time to eat grass. Even today, meat cattle are grass fed in pastures or ranges for around half their lives -- and confined to feed lots only during their final months. But there are farmers out there who "grass-finish" their cattle -- raise them to their final slaughter weight on plain grass, and produce healthier lower fat, better tasting beef.

Doesn't that lower the tons of beef you raise per acre? It certainly would seem logical. If you pack cattle as tightly as if already dead in steel and concrete feedlots, you can raise more cattle per acre than on pasture. But it takes land to raise the corn and grain and soybeans upon which feedlot cattle subsist. Count this, and grazed cattle have about the same production per acre as feedlot beef[8].

Will this lead to range and pasture erosion from overgrazing? It won't if we use green grazing (intensively managed rotational grazing), which has a long and honorable history. Instead of eroding pasture or range, land intensively grazed for a short time, then rested, gains topsoil and fertility -- just as the Great Plains did when grazed by buffalo instead of cattle. So we can produce as much beef per acre via grazing as we can with feed-lots, without the soil erosion of conventional pasture or range, let alone that of row crops. (Note: we may not produce quite as many pounds of meat, since grass-fed cattle move more and build muscle. But the protein is likely to be the same, and the taste is better.)

Grass-finished beef require between a fifth and a third of the fossil fuel energy needed by feedlot cattle[9]. (Substituting other ruminants -- bison, beefalo, sheep, and goats -- can reduce this further.)

How do the economics work out? Given an equal playing field, the costs of grass-finished beef (and milk as well) are lower than conventional ranching[10].

Grass-fed beef currently sells for more than feedlot beef. Demand is high relative to supply. Because ranchers who grass-finished cattle tend to raise small herds, they don't have access to the economies of scale that larger ranchers have -- facing higher transportation, slaughter, and marketing costs per cow than the big guys.

Also, regulations tend to favor the giants. For instance, health regulations strictly enforce exactly what equipment is used in slaughter, whereas actual bacteria present tends not be measured. An opposite approach, one that specified results rather than the means to obtain them, would give the little guy a better chance to compete, while protecting consumers better than present rules.

(In one recent case, John Stewart of Creekstone Farms Premium Beef Co., wished to test every animal his company slaughtered for mad cow disease; permission was refused out of fear that if one processor did this, others would be pressured to do the same[11]. [Note: he won his case, and gained the right to test.])

How does green grazing preserve the soil? It avoids root damage; disturbing roots disrupts the growth of key soil micro-organisms -- especially the fungi that produce glomalin (one key glue that holds soil in place). Grazing seldom pulls roots; normal grazing weakens plant health by returning to the same spot too often; management intensive grazing gives plants time to heal -- and thus completely preserves root structures. The difference compares to that between an annoying cousin who drops by for dinner a few times weekly, and an irritating one who stays over one holiday weekend per year, but leaves you alone the rest of time.

Just as with animal husbandry, we can grow row crops by means that don't disrupt root structure. No-till farming with crop rotation is a first step in this direction. In no-till farming, roots are left undisturbed, and any part of the crop not actually harvested is returned to the soil. This not only cultivates glomalin, but retains soil nutrients. If a legume and a green manure are both included in the rotation, no-till can completely eliminate any need for nitrogen fertilizer, and greatly reduce other fertilizers as well -- usually producing slightly greater output than ploughed soil[12].

From a global warming perspective, a critical additional factor is that glomalin accounts for 27% of carbon stored in soil[13]; glomalin actually serves as a significant carbon sink.

The Rodale Institute makes an important point; often, those who promote no-till simply seem to be encouraging the use of Roundup (the world's leading herbicide). Without tilling, weed control appears at first glance to require more herbicide. With all the extra uncomposted plant matter in the soil, it is difficult to avoid attracting insect pests that require pesticide as well. A great deal of grain in the U.S. is grown by no-till methods without crop rotation; this actually increases chemical use. But with proper rotation, cover crops and the use of a chop stalker or roller to convert agricultural residues to an in-place no till mulch, it is possible to reduce herbicide and pesticides by half to two thirds, and water use by 30 to 50 percent [14]. Because in a no-till field, pesticides and herbicides remain in the soil until they decompose, pesticide and herbicide run-off is reduced by 90 percent or more.

Biointensive integrated pest management can reduce chemical pesticides and herbicides further. This includes early pest detection and monitoring, use of predator insects and other biological controls, and least toxic, targeted pesticide and herbicides specific to particular pests as last resorts. This in combination with well-designed rotation lets more or less conventional no-till reduce chemical herbicide and pesticides by three quarters. In some case it even allows completely organic methods. For example, Rodale has developed a new cover crop roller that may make no-till without herbicides competitive with herbicide production in yield in per acre[15]. Thus no-till can increase yield per acre, preserve the soil, and reduce or eliminate pesticide, herbicide and artificial fertilizer use -- without increasing costs.

How are the economics of no-till farming? Generally you get more production per acre, lower labor costs, and lower capital costs as well. (Thus, while conventional organic agriculture decreases production per acre in rich nations, low input biodiverse no-till increases crops harvested.) There are transition costs. Converting ploughed land to a no-till system takes between three and five years to build the soil enough for increased production. (Lower costs normally increase net profitability even during the transition period.) No-till with fiber crops such as kenaf or hemp can lead to increased compaction -- though it has been found that improved drainage, combined with crop rotation will solve this problem.

How much energy does this save? Nitrogen fertilizer use (eliminated in no-till) and farm equipment operations (drastically reduced) are the two biggest energy consumers in row-crop cultivation. Drastic reductions in (or elimination of) other fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides cut energy use further. So again lowering material intensity indirectly saves energy -- in this case by half. Carbon emissions are reduced even more. As with management intensive grazing, building soil structure transforms agriculture from a carbon source to a small carbon sink -- providing minor amounts of sequestration.

Beyond this, recent work on charcoal as soil amendments may allow us to go further -- sequestering significant amounts of carbon and building soil to a far greater extent[16]. However, there are significant limitations we need to watch out for here. Just as conventional chemical fertilizers add nutrients without building soil structure, charcoal agriculture build soil structure without adding nutrients. So you want to limit the percent and type of agricultural waste you convert to charcoal for this purpose -- especially avoiding nitrogen rich materials. Additionally, charcoal making is usually very air polluting. There are charcoal making methods this is not true of, but they are expensive, especially on the small scale you want to use for conversion of agricultural wastes. None of this is insurmountable. Rodale is working on incorporating charcoal agriculture into its no-till farms. It just should not be seen as a quick fix that can avoid the need for emissions reduction.

The following table summarizes some methods of lowering material intensity in agriculture:

Lowering Material Intensity in Agriculture
Means	Intensity Reduction (%)	Energy Savings (%)		Comments
Green grazing of ruminants(Management Intensive Grazing)	78%-90%	66%-80%		(lower cost)
Green grazing non-ruminants (Management Intensive Grazing)	50%	25%		Pigs cost less[17]; chickens more
Rotational No-Till Row Crops, including Legumes, Green Manure, and Biointensive Integrated Pest Management	75%	50%
Slight or great reduction in meat production depending upon how quickly we move[18].	Meat requires more land per ton of usable complete protein than vegetable sources; to what extent we continue to eat meat depends upon how well we preserve existing agricultural land.
Sense of location - planting crops appropriate to location. Example: not growing cotton in desert	Cumulates with other means to achieve maximum savings.
Attention as substitute for inputs. Example: visually inspecting drip irrigation system to verify that it is watering plants as instruments show.	" "
Hemp as partial cotton substitute - 100% in some applications, mixes 50/50 in others - overall could substitute for 75% of cotton use. (Most non-clothing use, and clothing that does not touch skin directly such as jeans, and jackets, plus 50/50 mix with cotton in other applications such as T-shirts.	40%[19] (given 75% substitution)		15%		Hemp is an excellent crop to include in rotation with grain, legume and green manure. So it can contribute to much larger savings. Advanced cottonization lets hemp be processed in a soft fiber that may be 100 percent substituted for cotton. However this is water and energy intensive. 75 percent substitution with organic cotton used for the remaining 25 percent would be better ecologically.

Because ruminants and row crops account for overwhelming majority of agricultural impact and energy use, very roughly we could expect a 60 percent reduction in agricultural energy consumption from this. The key point is that we could increase production -- per acre and per hour from various near-organic techniques, while lowering ecological impacts more than pure organic production can. This is sometimes described as a "middle path", though the non-organic inputs are fairly trivial.

Before we leave the subject of agriculture we may want to examine the current outer limit of low-input cultivation.

Biointensive farming is many steps beyond no-till. Generally through double digging and the use of compost, aerated soil is provided to a depth of 24 inches, either in raised or sunken beds. A variety of crops, not just one or two plants but a multiplicity, are grown closely spaced. The close spacing shuts out weeds, as does the filling of all available niches by multiple crop plants. The biodiversity also discourages pests, since very few insects, diseases, or fungi are generalist enough to attack all the species grown.

It produces far more food per acre than other form of agriculture, excluding some forms of hydroponics. It is so land efficient that 100 percent of a vegan diet may be produced on less than 3,200 square feet -- fertilized only by compost from the person the garden feeds[20].

Now, this is also a very labor-intensive form of agriculture, perhaps slightly less labor-intensive than traditional agriculture, but much harder work than modern no-till or industrial farming. It is not something to implement on a large scale, in its present form, in the long run. But a large part of the world lives on less than two dollars a day; this type of system certainly makes sense in places where people are starving and without work. It is undesirable, though, that people stay poor. Hopefully any nation poor enough that this makes sense for a large part of its people would use it as a stepping stone to improve their lives, and not leave them with subsistence agriculture (no matter how ecologically correct the type) as all that held off starvation.

The main point of bringing it up in the context of the U.S., where we don't live on two dollars a day and hopefully won't in the future, is to show that we have by no means begun to tap the potential of what sustainable agriculture can do. While current sustainable low-labor no-till techniques will meet our needs in the long run, it is important to gain resource efficiency in agriculture comparable to that of biointensive techniques without the waste of valuable human labor.

One last point: this deals with question of soil and energy for agriculture, not water. Water will be the subject of my next post in this series.

-----

[1] Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), "Food Balance Sheet," FAOSTAT Online Database 2004. Commodity Balances Database -- Production. August 2004.

[2] Economic Research Unit United States Department of Agriculture, ERS/USDA Briefing Room -- Global Food Security: Questions and Answers. May 11, 2005.

[3] Institute of Medicine of the National Academies, Dietary Reference Intakes: Macronutrients. May 2005. National Academy of Sciences.

[4] U.S. Census Bureau, "World Population: Total Midyear Population," International Data Base, 30/April 2004, U.S. Census Bureau, 25/May/2004 http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/worldpop.html.

[5] Brian Halweil, "Can Organic Farming Feed Us All?" World Watch Magazine 19, no. 3 May/June 2006. The Organic Center, Worldwatch Institute, January 3, 2007.

[6] Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), FAOSTAT Online Database 2004 -- Crops Primary. August 2004.

U.S. Grain harvest in 2000 in hectares equal 58,497,083.

U.S. agricultural harvest from cropland in 2000 equals 136,057,883.

So ~43 percent of total cropland harvested in 2000 was grain.

World Resources Institute, "Meat Consumption: Grain Fed to Livestock as a Percent of Total Grain Consumed," EarthTrends Environmental Portal - Environmental Information Database, 2004.

From 60 to 65 percent of U.S. grain is fed to animals, so around 27 percent of U.S. cropland is used to grow food for animals.

[7] Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), FAOSTAT Online Database 2003 - Crops Primary.

Total Crops Worldwide 2000 (Ha): 1,348,840,594

Total Crops World Wide Grain (Ha): 674,247,980

So ~50% of harvested primary crop acreage used for grain in 2000.

World Resources Institute, "Meat Consumption: Grain Fed to Livestock as a Percent of Total Grain Consumed," EarthTrends Environmental Portal - Environmental Information Database, 2004.

Around 37 percent of grain crops worldwide fed to animals.

~37 percent of ~50 percent equals ~18.5 percent of total cropland worldwide used to grow grain for animals.

[8] Joel Salatin, a grass-fed beef pioneer and author makes the point from a stockman's viewpoint:

Roughly speaking, land that will produce 100 bushel-per-acre corn, will produce 400 cow-day[s] forage (one cow day is what one cow will eat in one day--cow-days are to graziers what inches are to carpenters and board-feet are to lumberjacks). If 100 bushels (average 60 pounds per bushel, weight 6,000 pounds), that will produce about 857 pounds of beef.

At 400 cow-days we can carry 600 stocker calves (400-800 lb.) gaining at least 1.5 pounds per day, yielding 900 lbs. (600 X 1.5 = 900) of beef per acre.

…... The point is to move the stock to mimic grazing patterns of native herbivores….

... Under good controlled grazing, we allow the grass to recuperate through its "blaze of growth" period before being regrazed… …By keeping 98% of the farm at rest and in the fast growth period, not letting the forage get grazed too early or too late after growth slows down, we can see tremendous increases in forage growth….

…. Most parasites lose strength dramatically after being denied a host for three weeks. Since most paddock shifts occur at least three weeks apart…, this depletes parasite virility and reduces the need for wormers ...

... Because the animals lounge in different paddocks every day, they spread their manure more evenly over the pasture….

Joel Salatin, "Joel Salatin Introduces Livestock Grazing...'Salad Bar Beef'". Acres USA - A Voice for Eco-Agriculture March 1996Eco-Friendly Foods.

[9]Cutler J. Cleveland and Charles A. S. Hall, "Climate Change Human Driving Forces, Biophysical Basis, and Likely Impacts," Climate Change - Socioeconomic Dimensions and Consequences of Mitigation, ed. Pentti Vartia, 2000). Oct 1999. Fortum, Boston Univerisity.

[10]Jimmy Henning et al., Rotational Grazing. Cooperative Extension Service, University of Kentucky, Department of Agriculture, 2000.

State of Illinois Department of Agriculture Illinois Sustainable Agriculture Committee, "S/A 98-18 Sustainable Beef Production - Management Intensive Grazing Vs Corn Silage Program for Beef Stocker Calves," Sustainable Agriculture Grant Review Committee C2000 Sustainable Agriculture Grant Projects -- ON-FARM RESEARCH AND DEMONSTRATION. Oct 2001. State of Illinois Department of Agriculture Illinois Sustainable Agriculture Committee, State of Illinois Department of Agriculture Illinois Sustainable Agriculture Committee.

(*Note: total beef production over the three year period was about one third the per acre production from corn. However this was an experimental program grazing basically two forages -- alfalfa /orchard grass during warm weather, and small grain cereal rye during cool. A more experienced grazer with a wider variety of forages could expect better results -- especially if drought resistant varieties were used. Also the cattle tested were largely bred as feedlot animals. Forage animals in pasture compared to feedlot breeds on grain would be a better test. However, even with the lower production per acre, cost per pound of beef, and especially labor per pound of beef was lower with grass raised.)

Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems of the University of Wisconsin's College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, CIAS: Management Intensive Rotational Grazing's Sense..and Dollars. April 1996, Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems of the University of Wisconsin's College of Agricultural and Life Sciences.

(The milk per acre is slightly lower, but labor costs are MUCH lower, as are feed costs and capital costs. So even with no price premium the farmer would make higher profits.)

[11]Richard Cowan, "U.S. Group Blasts Creekstone Mad Cow Testing Plan," Reuters Via Forbes.com19/Apr 2004, Forbes.

[12]Donald Lobb, "No-Till Success Hinges on Developing a Complete Crop Production 'System'," Sustainable Farming, no. Winter 94 (1994)Ecological Agriculture Projects, McGill University(Macdonald Campus), Resource Efficient Agricultural Production - Canada (REAP-CANADA).

[13]Sara Wright, Glomalin: A Manageable Soil Glue. 2004, USDA Sustainable Agricultural Systems Laboratory, 26/May/2004.

[14]Preston Sullivan, "Conservation Tillage", Jul-2003). Appropriate Technology Transfer For Rural Areas.

Corliss Karasov, "No-Till Farming on Comeback Trail," Environmental Health Perspectives, February 10, 2002.

[15]Laura Sayre, "New Farm Research: Cover Crop Roller

," The New Farm, November 20, 2003, The Rodale Institute.

[16] Emma Marris, "Black is the New Green," Nature 442, no. 10 Aug 2006, Charcoal Sequestering Carbon in Soil, Nature Publishing Group.

[17] Greg Gunthorp and Lei Gunthorp, Grassfarmer.Com -- PASTURED PIGS ON THE GUNTHORP FARM. February 24, 2004, American Farmland Trust.

Sustainable Agriculture Network, "Profitable Pork: Strategies for Hog Producers," Livestock Alternatives. July 2003. Sustainable Agriculture Network, Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program.

[18]Roger Segelken (ED), "U.S. Could Feed 800 Million People with Grain That Livestock Eat, Cornell Ecologist Advises Animal Scientists," Cornell University Science News, 7/Aug 1997, Cornell University, 13/Sep/2005.

[19] "All About Hemp," Industrial Hemp, Hempopotamus, June 22, 2004.

[20]John Jeavons, "Cultivating Our Garden: Biointensive Farming Uses Less Water, Land, Machinery, and Fertilizer - and More Human Labor," In Context, no. 42/Fall 1995 -- A Good Harvest (1995), Context Institute.

For story: Feeding the world sustainably
36 Comments | Post a Comment

People are made from food

Gar:

I have no disagreements with most of your post, but I think it's important to challenge the underlying assumption in this question:

How big an increase [in food production] do we need to keep up with population growth?

The simple fact is that we don't need any increase in food production to "keep up with population growth." People are made from food--you can't make them out of anything else. Consequently, the world's human population will not continue to grow unless the food supply grows to support a larger population. Increases in food production fuel population growth.

The danger is not that we won't be able to increase food production enough to feed 9 billion people by "A.D." 2050 but that we will, because that means we can count on having 9 billion people. And, if we do increase food production sufficiently to feed 9 billion people, I think it's highly likely we will eventually find ourselves no longer able to feed them because of soil degradation, aquifer depletion, climate disruption and sea-level rise, and so on. We can't outgrow our food supply, but we can outgrow our ability to grow food on a sustainable basis.

"You can never get enough of what you do not really want." - Huston Smith

by John Fish Kurmann at 4:59 PM on 24 Apr 2007

comments and suggestions

First this is very well written and quickly comprehensive account of the options for sustainable agriculture.

To further expand on your ideas it may be good to talk about alternative farming methods like Wes Jackson's project in The Land Institute in Kansas. Jackson works with natural system agriculture to mimic the bio-diverse and perennial nature of the prairie. This method is very sustainable but a different approach both in thinking and practice. Another example of natural system agriculture is the practice of tree-cropping: Using the perennial nature of tree to support both domesticated animal and human consumption.

I would also suggest a discussion about what this word sustainable actually means. There have been serious suggestions to farm fast growing tree crops and use the wood chips in a slurry, genetic engineer this slurry with vitamins, flavor it with artificial flavorings and feed it to us. This method can be made highly sustainable but is this process really what we mean by sustainable agriculture? This is the kind of question we need to think about when looking for sustainable agriculture. We have to remember that we cannot just separate numbers and thought, but use them together for effective change.

by cilantro4u at 5:06 PM on 24 Apr 2007

Assumption

"How do the economics work out? Given an equal playing field, the costs of grass-finished beef (and milk as well) are lower than conventional ranching"

I am assuming that subsidies are creating the less than level playing fields.

In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world

by biodiversivist at 6:44 PM on 24 Apr 2007

Despicable

>The danger is not that we won't be able to increase food production enough to feed 9 billion people by "A.D." 2050 but that we will, because that means we can count on having 9 billion people

I could go on to remind you once again that what you say is not true. A lot of nations manage to have far fewer people than they are able to feed. But I'm so freaking repulsed by your openly hoping that people will starve to death, that I won't bother.

by Gar Lipow at 6:48 PM on 24 Apr 2007

In short

Excluding transportation and processing energy losses, meat requires a bare minimum of 10x the vegetables to make 1x the meat energy.

But yes largely this is why Biofuels don't make much sense.

If climate change is real, and weather patterns get wonky. We can expect a lot less viable farmland.

China for instance already put a moratorium on corn based ethanol plants because they've been losing large swaths of farmland due to industrial pollution.

by GreyFlcn at 9:32 PM on 24 Apr 2007

Deal with what I wrote, Gar...

...not your biases. I don't hope for anyone to starve, though I recognize that it is inevitable to some degree. No species is immune to starvation. If you want to see starvation, though, just go on "increasing food production to keep up with population growth" because that will fuel growth beyond our sustainable capacity to feed people--if we're not already there, and we might be for all any of us knows for sure.

Provide some facts if you can to prove what I'm saying isn't true, starting with answering this question: What are those 2.5 additional people who are projected to be alive in "A.D." 2050 going to be made from if we don't increase the global food supply enough to feed 9 billion people?

I didn't claim that each nation's population perfectly matches its potential--or even its actual--food production. I asserted that the total world population cannot outgrow total food production--a simple biological fact.

Here're two papers on the subject for those whose views aren't so entrenched as to immediately accuse me of "hoping" people will starve:

"Human Population Numbers As A Function Of Food Supply"

"Human Carrying Capacity Is Determined By Food Availability"

And here's a nontechnical approach to the subject: "Reaching For the Future with All Three Hands"

"You can never get enough of what you do not really want." - Huston Smith

by John Fish Kurmann at 10:26 PM on 24 Apr 2007
[ Parent ]

Before anyone jumps on it...

...let me acknowledge that I just went to the U.S. Census Bureau's site and found that they are currently projecting a global population of 9.4 billion in "A.D." 2050. Last I recalled seeing when I wrote my earlier posts were projections of a population of 9.1 billion in 2050, which I rounded down to 9 billion.

Projections vary, though: The most recent prediction I have found from the United Nations Population Division is 9.2 billion in "A.D." 2050.

Which doesn't alter my underlying point: Unless we increase food production enough to create an additional 2.8 or so billion people, we won't ever have 9.4 billion people on the planet--and I hope we don't. The best answer we have to the challenge of hunger is local or regional self-sufficiency, not increases in global food production.

"You can never get enough of what you do not really want." - Huston Smith

by John Fish Kurmann at 11:19 PM on 24 Apr 2007

And if the world keeps pushing energy crops?

Excellent post, Gar. But I'm curious. In the various projections you've come across, what kind of assumptions are the analysts making about biofuels? If current policies, especially mandates, keep driving a rapid explosion in production of biofuels from crops, what does that do to the ability to feed the world's projected population.

Food for thought: in the U.S.A., corn is produced organically on, in round figures, an estimated 150,000 acres. In 2007 it is expected that total corn plantings will cover 90,500,000 acres. That means that organic production methods are being used on just 0.166% (1/600th) of the land growing corn. More corn ethanol = land farmed using convention (a.k.a. industrial) methods.

These are only my personal opinions.

by Ron Steenblik at 12:39 AM on 25 Apr 2007

Biofuels

There is enough "give" in these figures for some modest biofuels, but not enough for the huge amount biofuel enthusiasts are pushing.

And you are right that are economy won't switch to sustainable farming "naturally". You would need a change in the pattern of worldwide agricultural subsidies, plus a price on greenhouse emissions, plus a world (meaning institutions with power, not just well meaning individuals) which gave a damn about poverty.

Kurmnan: your approach to population remains pretty dreadful. You are advocating limiting the food supply as a way to reduce population. That does mean starving people to death. Contraception prevents people being born. Limiting the food supply only controls population if people starve to death. We are not just made of food; we are also made of water. So by your logic we could limit people by limiting the water supply too. Prosperous, free people (free in many dimensions including rights for women) tend to have fewer children. Yes some people still have four or five, but that is made up for by people who have zero or none.

And by the way the alternative to feeding people adequately and sustainably is not for them to die. Another choice is to feed them inadequately and unsustainably, converting 100% of remaining wilderness to farmland for example. So if I were as concerned about population as you seem to be, I'd opt for the prosperity and freedom option, not the genocide option. Cause even if the idea of cutting off necessities to people as a way of controlling their numbers does not ping your moral sense, you might want to consider that putting your plan seriously into effect might provoke some those you deliberately starve into fighting back.

And right now there are all sorts of imperatives that drive people to large families. Cutting off food won't stop (living) people from making babies; the only way a "food ceiling" will limit population is by increasing the death rate. So when you say a capability of feeding 9-11 billion sustainably is "bad news" you are indeed advocating starving them.

by Gar Lipow at 8:18 AM on 25 Apr 2007

subsidies

Oh I missed answering the subsidy question.

The "unbalanced playing field" comes from a number of sources. Part of it is regulatory capture by biggest ranchers, so that regulations are more aimed at protecting their profits than the public.

Part of it is subsidies. Both green and non-green grazers are subsidized in the sense that grassland is leased at way below market price. But feedlot cattle are also fed highly subsidized corn and soybeans which lower the price of feedlots.

Another part of it is that large scale ranchers already have a profitable model, and are not interested in tinkering with it. Green grazers tend to be small guys. There are lots of economies of scale in cattle ranching. Slaughtering is done more cheaply if you are a major customer for a big slaughterhouse. Ranching takes a lot of management and planning; so a big guy has similar costs for this to small rancher, but divides those cost among many more cattle. And green grazing requires more planning that ordinary grazing; because you always have to be watching for the right time to move the cattle to the next field. So small green grazers competing against big non-green grazers accounts for a lot of the cost difference.

Also since grass finished meat is a small percent of available meat in the U.S., you have a simple supply demand issue that provides a premium for grass finished beef.

by Gar Lipow at 8:52 AM on 25 Apr 2007

Organic

Nice to see organic mentioned in conjunction with large scale, mechanized agriculture.

Organic fertilizer from biogas digestors could help the nitrogen situation. Allowing the addition of more charcoal and straw. In turn sequestering more CO2.

Pyrolisis could feed gas into fuel cell/turbines then the charcoal could be put back in the soil. Pyrolisis heat could come from waste heat from the fuel cell.

Biomass processed this way would provide a good backup for renewables. The fuel cell CO2 could be sequestered with solar collector algae systems.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

by amazingdrx at 10:36 AM on 25 Apr 2007

Nitrogen

In row crops, most of the nitrogen you need could be provided by rotating in leguminous crops--both stuff like soybeans for consumption, and stuff like alfalfa or clover as green manure. With that included in the rotation food waste and sewage from the people who consume the food could close the loop.

Pyrolysis and methane digestion in combination sound interesting. Biogas produces in essence a liquid fertilizer as a result - a good source of nutrients but contributing to soil structure. Pyrolisis of carbon rich material produces heat, an inferior type of biogas, a small amount of very high quality oil, and charcoal. Charcoal of course is tremendous source of soil structure but adds no nutrients. On first blush, it sounds like the combination of liquid fertilizer from methane production and charcoal from pyrolosys would provide good care for the soil--adding nutrients and soil structure plus sequestering carbon. But I would want to see a test over a number of years. The other things I mentioned have been demonstrated over long periods of time in real world conditions. I would want to see chargas agriculture tested similarly before being adapted on a wide scale.

by Gar Lipow at 10:52 AM on 25 Apr 2007

Land Institute

I'm very interested in the Land Institute, but did not include them, because I'm trying to concentrate on what is available now.

The Land Institute has as its primary mission breeding perennial versions of various annuals (or of crops that may substitute for them) so that agriculture may become lower input.

They have not succeeded to date, though they have made huge progress.

In terms of recommendations for today, they seem to think classic Amish farming techniques are the optimum with today's technology. I have yet to find an analysis by them of no-till agriculture.

by Gar Lipow at 10:57 AM on 25 Apr 2007

two comments

First, I'm with JFK on the idea that more food creates more people and not the other way around. If people are faced with declining amounts of food, such as for example in the former Soviet Union, particularly in urban/suburban areas, where living area is also limited, people don't eat less, i.e. starve, they don't reproduce as much. The argument against JFK's position that it is morally repulsive to 'starve' these people is a strawman, because no one would get starved as a result of producing the same amount of food or less. As you yourself said, Gar, starvation is not an issue of production but distribution. Also, as you yourself said, pregnant women need more calories. Anyways, I'll leave this one open for more comments.

Second, herbicide use. There is a common idea that herbicides are the worst thing since... well, I can think of many really bad things, but it would be pointless to rehash them. Herbicides by themselves are not 'bad', they act on the photosynthetic pathways of plants and some have higher affinities for certain taxonomic units: angiosperms/gymnosperms, dicots/monocots. Since humans and other zoological creatures do not photosynthesize, there are no ill effects outside of target plants. That said, there are ill effects of the delivery media that are used, such as diesel fuel (Yep, that happens), which can easily be done away with through regulation or simple substitutes (vegetable oil). This is different from pesticides, such as fungicides or insecticides, which act upon similar biological functions that we have. So... I'll leave this one open for comment.

by atreyger at 11:18 AM on 25 Apr 2007

cows

I find it too offensive to continue reading an article past the point where the author begins referring to cows a "beef."

Such insensitivity regarding animal life is sickening and obscene.

by Pandu at 11:43 AM on 25 Apr 2007

Minimizing herbicides

Still takes energy to create herbicides. As to the safety of herbicides:

New York State's Attorney General has sued Monsanto for claiming that RoundUp is "safe" and "environmentally friendly." This suit ended in a settlement with Monsanto in which Monsanto agreed to cease and desist from using these terms in advertising RoundUp in the state of New York. Monsanto, while not admitting any wrongdoing, paid the state of New York $250,000 in settlement of this suit. When Monsanto violated the first settlement agreement by advertising within New York that RoundUp is "safe," a second agreement was negotiated. In addition the same problem that tends to occur with herbicides and pesticides seems to be occurring. Weeds are growing immune. (Another reason to minimize use: postpone weed immunity as long as possible.)

I will add that even if RoundUp's toxicity is only to plants, putting large amounts of stuff that poisons plants into our water table is not a great idea. At any rate not using herbicides when there are reasonable alternative is generally not controversial. Note that I talked about some cases where herbicides are minimized rather than eliminated: so I'm not being purist about this.

In terms of starvation: yeah, starving women tend to have a harder time getting pregnant (or in extreme cases lose fertility entirely). They have a higher chance of losing their baby and having their own health damaged during pregnancy. Umm so this makes limiting food production something that is humane? In terms of population drop in the former Soviet Union after the fall of the Soviet Empire; much of this was lower life expectancy, higher death rates and higher infant mortality rates. At some points life expectancy fell as by (I believe this is from memory) as much as eight years. This is what you advocate as a model?

Again limiting food supplies does not limit human population in any way a humane person would approve of, or at any rate motivating people to voluntarily avoid pregnancy is not the primary affect. Women's rights and a minimal degree of prosperity seem to be essentials, with some degree of economic equality a big help too--especially where the degree of prosperity is modest. Again on current trends we are heading towards a 9 billion world population. I doubt you can cite any peer reviewed research that argues that limiting food supply below this won't decrease life expectancies, harm the health of a large number of people, and increase infant mortality rate. Current hunger is not caused by absolute shortage. But not increasing supplies as population grows will cause absolute shortage.

There are all sorts of things that can be done of proven effectiveness. Providing a comprehensive healthcare system that includes access to constraceptives. Making condoms available to anyone that wants them. Support women's rights. Support more economic equality, more democracy, human rights in general--all these things can help lower population growth as a side effect. Why the emphasis on limiting food supply? Is this some sort of blog equivalent of a macho swagger?

by Gar Lipow at 12:08 PM on 25 Apr 2007

Sewage sludge as fertilizer?

Gar, you write:

In row crops, most of the nitrogen you need could be provided by rotating in leguminous crops--both stuff like soybeans for consumption, and stuff like alfalfa or clover as green manure. With that included in the rotation food waste and sewage from the people who consume the food could close the loop.

Certainly, spreading "night soil" used to be an important source of nutrients almost everywhere, and still is in many countries. But in developed countries, what goes into the toilet is not usually separated from what goes down the drain. The latter can include all manner of nasty chemical cleaners and anything else homeowners have a mind to dispose of in that way. I am not up-to-date on this issue, however. Can you provide examples of where sewage sludge is being applied on food crops without requiring expensive pretreatment -- e.g., to separate out heavy metals? (I hope you can!)

These are only my personal opinions.

by Ron Steenblik at 12:12 PM on 25 Apr 2007

You missed my point entirely re: food = population

First, herbicides: I was just saying that herbicides are not an 'evil' if used properly; I am personally all in favor of reducing their usage. The case of Monsanto v. people of New York is another strawman: it had to do with advertising practices. But, in general, we are in agreement, I was just pointing out the fallacy of combining every -cide without considering the effects.

Second, food increases population. You are right, there are plenty of other reasons for the decline of population in the Eastern block besides food availaibility, such as the cultural differences and life expectancy. But I would bet that one of the more important reasons for the reduced births is the lack of food and resources in an urban setting. Studies regarding ' limiting food supply below this won't decrease life expectancies, harm the health of a large number of people, and increase infant mortality rate ' are rare, because there are very many confliciting correlated variables: increased food production at the same time as manufacturing increases, at the same time that health breakthroughs increase life expectancy and decrease infant mortality.

I'm not even sure, and I'm not so sure I would even want to get into looking this up due to limited time, that anyone has attempted to look at this at a regional scale in order to isolate the effects of food production from the rest of the confounding variables. However, the following works on almost any level of ecology, except for marine and probably freshwater systems: with increased food supply, regeneration/reproduction and subsequently population increases. Arguing against this is basically, well... stupid.

Once again, you are right about empowering women and all the rest of the jazz that you said. BUT, it's probably not as important as reducing the amount of available food in terms of decreasing birth rate. There are plenty of situations where under the woman-empowerment scenario, increased food production (and other resources) will inevitably lead to higher birth rate than death rate, resulting in increasing population. Or my original point: more food = more people.

by atreyger at 12:34 PM on 25 Apr 2007

Sewage

I actually intended that as an illustration of how little nitrogen is required in a no-till system. For example the "Old Rotation" in Alabama (tho oldest rotation in the U.S. did a three year no-till rotation with corn,soybeans, cotton, a rye-grass/vetch mixture, and alfalfa. Note that soybeans, vetch and alfalfa are all legumes. They used 3 pounds of nitrogen per acre on the rye/vetch mixture and nowhere else in the cycle. So that is about a 95% reduction in nitrogen from straight grain after grain rotation. Small enough that it could theoretically be done from human waste and table scraps. Would it be worth doing in practice? You can modify homes to seperate black water from grey water. That will make the black water pretty free of toxins, and concentrate the microrganism. there are then various biological treatments (including anerobic composting for methan) that can reduce the microoranism count to the point that fairly simple treatments (such as exposure th sunlight and air) can reduce them to safe level. Whether this is worth doing is another question, but it is certainly possible. If some of the production were fed to animals--chickens and pigs which can't live entirely on grass for example--their manure could certainly be captured, treated and fed back into the system. Even without humanure, I would speculate that this could be enough to close the nitrogen loop in in a no-till rotation cycle. At any rate if we needed some sort of humanure, it can be made safe. There is an argument for doing so. Nitorgen fertilizers are a huge indirect contributor to NxOx which are major greenhouse forcing gases, many times stronger per mole than CO2 or even than methane. So being a bit purist about them and going to great trouble to completely eliminate them might pay out given a reasonably high emissions price, or reasonably limited number of permits.

by Gar Lipow at 12:49 PM on 25 Apr 2007

Humanure

You can modify homes to seperate black water from grey water.

Sounds like a job for the WTO! (The World Toilet Organization, that is.) Actually, on second thought, maybe it's more of a job for Composting Toilet World.

By the way, "Humanure" would make a great name for a punk rock band.

These are only my personal opinions.

by Ron Steenblik at 2:51 PM on 25 Apr 2007

Cut Out 3% of the Fat

The only way to get a "sustainable" planet is to remake it where 3% of the people don't get to clutch on to 95% percent of the resources.

The Guillotine is the answer:

Guillotine 3% tshirt

Texeme.Construct(function(x)=Participation(x))

by jabailo at 3:06 PM on 25 Apr 2007

Great post. comment on humanure.

I believe that Rodale institut has established that average crop yields with organic methods meet or exceed averages with standard methods.

For actual accounting of Kcals in to Kcals out permaculture or organic methods stand head and shoulders above standard methods. When you consider that in a mixed permaculture your cow poop is chicken food, snails are human food and slugs are duck food the efficiencies become obvious.

Human manure is perfectly capable of becoming fertilizer. Our primary problem is that we sell household cleaning materials that would qualify as toxic waste. That should be stopped.

Given sufficient pressure on our environment people could return to saving manure in buckets for collection as was once common practice in chinese cities. Population pressure does not tolerate wastefull practices for long.

Put the Carbon Back

by Pangolin at 3:20 PM on 25 Apr 2007

Reprint your T-shirts, Jabailo

I thought that concentration looked too high. According to a recent paper by James B. Davies, Susanna Sandstrom, Anthony Shorrocks, and Edward N. Wolff, on "The World Distribution of Household Wealth", in the year 2000, 94% of the world's wealth was held by the top two deciles (20%) of households, calculated on an official exchange-rate basis. On a PPP (purchasing power parity) basis, the share drops to 84%. Still high, but a lot lower than 95% held by the top 3%.

These are only my personal opinions.

by Ron Steenblik at 3:38 PM on 25 Apr 2007

3 is such a nice number

Thanks for the research...I'd rather stick with 3% -- it's catchier.

And 84% is a lot of cabbage.

Texeme.Construct(function(x)=Participation(x))

by jabailo at 3:42 PM on 25 Apr 2007
[ Parent ]

Ciphered It

I did some "ciphering" as Jethro Bodine used to say.

Some might say, hey, so the rich 3% own only 84% -- that still leaves us with almost a fourth right?

This is how bad it is:

Imagine a space with 100 people and 100 units of resource. Based on our current Earth, where 3% controls 84% of everything, the situation would be:

3 of the people would have 84 units. Each of those three could have 28 units.

How about the rest? The other 97 people would have to split the remaining 16 units. Each person would get about 0.16 units -- or less than 2 tenths of a unit.

Now, everyday, someone from the 3% comes into Grist and blathers on about his "new plan" to save the planet and how we should all turn out themostats down.

Texeme.Construct(function(x)=Participation(x))

by jabailo at 4:25 PM on 25 Apr 2007
[ Parent ]

Transition help?

This is an excellent post, and I like how you think, Gar. I generally love meta-analysis based models like the UMich one, so am very glad you included that. Question: are there groups working on facilitating organic/biointensive transitions with an eye to doing this on a worldwide scale? That is, who is making and implementing the plans that will enable the shift to occur? (I imagine there are many groups, but am wondering whose doing the best work in the developing world, in particular, both at the farm and the policy level)

Stephanie www.stephaniepaigeogburn.com

by Stephanie Paige Ogburn at 5:02 PM on 25 Apr 2007

Yeah, right

Given sufficient pressure on our environment people could return to saving manure in buckets for collection as was once common practice in chinese cities.

I can't wait..

The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.

by spaceshaper at 5:12 PM on 25 Apr 2007

humanure

>Given sufficient pressure on our environment people could return to saving manure in buckets for collection as was once common practice in chinese cities.

Umm no. There are systems out there that just let you flush your toilet into a different pipe than your other wastewater. Both flows still go to a treatment center. But as separate flows they are much easier to treat. That actually is dealt with to some extent in the next post.

by Gar Lipow at 6:32 PM on 25 Apr 2007

Excellent info

Gar,

Thanks for this wealth of information. We often parrot things, because they are popular to say, but it's always good to find the facts, with sources.

I read an article that said obesity was growing faster than starvation (trying to find a non talking out my butt source for that.) Access seems to be the root of many of our world problems.

In bounciness, Lo Fleming

by bralessliving at 7:13 PM on 25 Apr 2007

On food supply/population -- Let's ask the source

Good to see the question of food supply and its link to population being discussed. Two of the links John Fish Kurmann provided above are to the studies by Hopfenberg, one coauthored by Pimentel. I've had some of the same questions Gar raises about their hypothesis. I'm not going to form any conclusions though until I get a chance to hear how the authors answer those questions. Hopfenberg, Pimental, and Daniel Quinn (an important influence on their work) are pretty bright people who have spent years thinking about this stuff, and it doesn't seem prudent to dismiss their ideas before having the chance to question them or someone with an intimate familiarity with their hypothesis. I do know that their basic point is simply that human population growth is subject to the same influences which govern population growth in other species. That does seem a simple, but strong point, but it's hard not to ask questions about a lot of human cultural creations which might set us apart from other species in that regard.

As it happens, I've managed to set up a chance to do just that on May 3rd, when Growth is Madness! will host Russ Hopfenberg providing comments on his work and answering people's questions. Everyone is welcome to stop by, pose a question or comment prior to May 3rd, or in response to his comments then (he will follow up), and decide for yourself what you make of his hypothesis. He (and Quinn etc.) argues stopping the growth of the food supply would not, in fact, cause more starvation. Quinn offers one explanation in the third link provided by JFK above. But that leads to more questions. Let's ask the source for answers. :)

http://growthmadness.org/

by JohnF at 8:48 PM on 25 Apr 2007

Poo power and phosphorus

>Given sufficient pressure on our environment people could return to saving manure in buckets for collection as was once common practice in chinese cities.
Gar: Umm no. There are systems out there that just let you flush your toilet into a different pipe than your other wastewater. Both flows still go to a treatment center. But as separate flows they are much easier to treat. That actually is dealt with to some extent in the next post.

This is an issue. I've read of systems (in Sweden I think), where separate sewage lines led to holding tanks in apartment buildings, etc. I haven't heard of treatment centers built to do this - my impression that large systems for this purpose haven't even been contemplated yet. But maybe Gar can point to some designs. Sure would be a great idea.

These systems are elaborate and expensive, but the biggest problems are in poor and developing countries. The greatest need will be in rural areas where fertilizers are needed for crops, and the housing is too dispersed for centralized systems. So I think we will see a resurgence of the traditional Chinese practice.

A group in Sweden called EcoSanRes is working on this problem: http://www.ecosanres.org/ .

If Gar is working on a follow-up, maybe he could say something about phosophorus. I've run into an unpublished article which talks of a "peak" in phosophorus production. A couple hours of reading on the Web makes me think that the writer is on to something. Supplies are limited, we're going through them quickly, and much phosophorous is lost through our sewage practices and over-fertilizing. Any thoughts?

Bart
Energy Bulletin

by Bart Anderson at 9:16 PM on 25 Apr 2007

Jabailo,

Look at the paper. Perhaps I should have been more clear. To repeat, it shows that calculated on a PPP (purchasing power parity) basis, the share of the world's wealth owned by the top 20% of households (not 3%) is 84%. The authors explain, however:

While wealth (and income) concentration is somewhat less when the estimates are done on a PPP basis, we have argued that the large share of wealth that is owned by people who can readily travel and invest globally means that converting at official exchange rates is preferable for many purposes when one is studying the distribution of wealth, rather than income distribution or poverty.

Converting wealth on an exchange-rate basis, the concentration is 94% held by the top 20% of households. My point was, you need to change that 3% to 20%.

These are only my personal opinions.

by Ron Steenblik at 10:12 PM on 25 Apr 2007

What I am advocating...

Wow, Gar, now you're offhandedly accusing me of advocating genocide. That's pretty amazing. For the record, genocide is "deliberate and systematic destruction of a racial, political, or cultural group." Hmmm...nope, nowhere have I advocated anything like that.

No, I'm not "advocating limiting the food supply as a way to reduce population." I'm advocating that we abandon the ridiculous idea that we have to increase food production in order to "keep up with" population growth, as if the human population will continue growing regardless of whether the food supply does. And I'm also advocating that we, in the collective sense, stop working our asses off to increase food production year after year in the mistaken belief that this will someday "end world hunger."

Yes, theoretically we could stop population growth by limiting the water supply, but there's one crucial difference: Most of the human food in the world today is in a very real sense manufactured, while the amount of fresh water simply is what it is. Yes, folks do various things to increase the amount we can harvest, including desalination, but it's still not the same thing.

Here're the premises I work from:

We may already have overshot the carrying capacity of the planet, as evidenced by such reports as Redefining Progress's "Footprint of Nations 2005," which calculated that the "world's ecological footprint exceeds biocapacity by nearly 40%."
Even if we haven't already overshot the carrying capacity of the planet, it seems clear to me from the evidence that we can't be far from doing so.
On the basis of the first two premises, it also seems clear to me that we cannot afford for the world's population to continue to grow, certainly not by another 2.8 billion over the next 43 years.
No population agency or demographer I know of thinks increased access to contraceptive information and methods combined with empowerment of women and greater prosperity in less-affluent regions will stop population growth in the near-term.
Stabilizing food production will stop population growth because people are made from food (yes, and water, too, much of which is consumed in food).

Now, you argue that this "mean[s] starving people to death." Is that true?

Say we actually did somehow manage to stop increasing food production as of right now. Not going to happen, but this is a hypothetical. Even if no one in the world made a different decision with regard to whether or not they will have a child in the next year in response to the end of food production increases--which seems highly unlikely to me--and we had just as much net population increase over the next year as the U.S. Census Bureau presently predicts, would people starve to death as a result? More than are currently starving to death, that is.

The Census Bureau currently projects that between 77 and 78 million people will be added to the world's population from the middle of this calendar year to the middle of the next. Let's round it up to 78 million. Now, does anyone think that, if we add 78 million people to the current estimated population of just shy of 6.6 billion--and those 78 million would be spread out around the world, not concentrated in one nation, region, or continent, of course--that there's any reason to think people are suddenly going to be starving who weren't starving already? Why? Babies don't eat that much.

What this would do, though, is send a signal to everyone that we cannot keep growing, and people might just take a closer look at the contraceptive methods available to them. And I'd gleefully support increased funding around the world for contraceptive education and access.

I also find it particularly interesting that you keep declining to address my longer-term point, which is that not stopping population growth in the near-term--continuing to increase food production and watching the population continue to grow toward a projected 9.4 billion by "A.D." 2050--would lead to catastrophic famine on a massive, global scale in the future. Even if you're right that no longer increasing food production would mean more starving people in the near-term--and I'm not saying you are--I think that'd still be the more compassionate course of action in the long run.

And, for me, at least, this ain't all about humanity. There is a whole community of life here that we're part of, and the simple fact is that continuing to increase the amount of the world's biomass that is made up of us and our stuff (including the animals and plants we have a coevolutionary relationship with as our food) will inevitably decrease the amount of biomass that can be other species. The world will only support so much biomass, so continuing to increase the human proportion is a direct attack on the diversity of life. Given that we're already in the early stages of the 7th Mass Extinction in the history of the planet, that strikes me as utter insanity. I'd even call it ecocide.

No matter how many times you attempt to cast me in the role of a villain here, Gar, I will refuse to play along.

"You can never get enough of what you do not really want." - Huston Smith

by John Fish Kurmann at 10:43 PM on 25 Apr 2007
[ Parent ]

Gar asked...

..."Why the emphasis on limiting food supply?"

First, to once again be clear, what I've advocated is no longer increasing food production--and that isn't the same as limiting food supply.

Why do I emphasize no longer increasing food production? Because that would actually achieve the goal I think we must achieve to head off a catastrophic global collapse--a near-term end to population growth. You may certainly disagree with my conclusion that we must achieve that goal--no one knows for sure what the carrying capacity of the planet is--but that doesn't make me an advocate of genocide.

"You can never get enough of what you do not really want." - Huston Smith

by John Fish Kurmann at 10:58 PM on 25 Apr 2007
[ Parent ]

I agree

I agree with many of your points, John Fish Kurmann.

And speaking in a psychological/philosophical sense, I think it is difficult for many people to come to terms with the fact that life in general depends on death - that is to say, death plays a role in the life cycle. We fight death in many ways, and in many ways convince ourselves that death is an enemy. We see starvation as a moral issue, and not as a natural occurance ("It is wrong to let people starve."). This is not to say that I advocate starving people, or abolishing modern medicine, or anything like that. But I agree that perhaps the most moral thing to do at this point is to look at life for what it is: a cycle of life, death and rebirth.

On a less philosophical note, I agree that we may be inviting further destruction if we "try to increase food production." I think we can all agree that doing increasing food production would be excessive, if not also entirely undesirable.

I am surprised that no one has yet considered the fact that a good percentage of the world's population stays alive thanks to industrial food production, i.e. corn/soy, and that reliance on such monoculture may also be inviting future problems. Really, it would be easy to feed a population of 9 billion or more: just industrialize food to the point that it is not food anymore, pump it full of corn syrup, and add loads of artificial/natural flavors so that no one knows the difference! Kraft will feed the world in 2050!

by zacaroni at 7:48 AM on 26 Apr 2007

Good points, JFK

I think JFK is making his case better with each successive comment. I want to underline his point that even if stopping the increase in food production would cause more starvation (and it's looking more and more to me as though it wouldn't) the alternative would likely be far worse. The consequences of serious overshoot would presumably be a die-off of proportions that should far outweigh even concerns about increased starvation as a result of stopping the growth of food production. That's key.

zacaroni, you say:

It surely is. When you factor in the whole peak oil issue, and consider the reliance of industrial farming on oil, there's a serious problem ahead. Peak oil activist Paul Chefurka has commented convincingly on this.

Growth is Madness!

by JohnF at 4:57 PM on 26 Apr 2007

ADVERTISING POLICY

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