Answers to the World Food Crisis

Farms in the sky gain new interest



The detritus from cities is interesting as at some point the detritus and human density build up to such a point that some level of a self-sustaining system can almost be reached. Look at all the compost that could be created from vegetable clippings from cities everyday - tons and tons and tons. We should have a collection point in a public park or something manned by compost wardens who receive your veggies and tend to the local public compost garden from where it is bagged and resold to the city for subsequent regrowth. In a city block this would be even easier - just use the vegetables in skyscrapers without them ever leaving the outside of the door - they just go up onto the roof to grow the next batch of veggies for reuse.

The same could be done with other human detritus. Surely the world population could reach squillions if this was done everywhere?

(is there a problem with the dictionary today? squillions has a red line under it)

Auditor #9 wrote:

Farms in the sky gain new interest



The detritus from cities is interesting as at some point the detritus and human density build up to such a point that some level of a self-sustaining system can almost be reached. Look at all the compost that could be created from vegetable clippings from cities everyday - tons and tons and tons. We should have a collection point in a public park or something manned by compost wardens who receive your veggies and tend to the local public compost garden from where it is bagged and resold to the city for subsequent regrowth. In a city block this would be even easier - just use the vegetables in skyscrapers without them ever leaving the outside of the door - they just go up onto the roof to grow the next batch of veggies for reuse.

The same could be done with other human detritus. Surely the world population could reach squillions if this was done everywhere?

(is there a problem with the dictionary today? squillions has a red line under it)

I remember reading somewhere that the critical issue on population levels supported by agriculture is whether we send all our poo floating away down our rivers or whether it goes onto the land.

The Irish Times today has an analysis of the food crisis by Paul Cullen - I couldn't find it on their website, but found this interesting article on food and population with this alarming analogy:


http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2008/0731/1217368676117.html

Cullen talks about the energy dependency of food production , the increased demand from developing countries like India and China and the demand for biofuels / biomass. He concludes that higher prices are the permanent reversal of a long trend to cheaper food that took place in the 20th century.

He also points to the end of the CAP as leading to a situation where surpluses were no longer accumulated and managed to even out dips in food supply - shortage therefore means steep price increase. Food reserves are getting lower and lower.
The end of the CAP means a shift in the source of farmers incomes from general taxation to sales of food - this hits lower income people harder that higher income groups. Shortages are fuelling speculation, that in itself then pushes prices up.

He also says that efficiencies of mass production and distribution have flattened off and are not likely to continue. Supermarkets are therefore trying to squeeze the price at the farm gate - but with increased fuel costs to the farmer, farmers are saying it would be better to stop farming or plough the crop into the ground.

We need to be providing the opportunity for contraception to everyone who wants it, as well as developing sustainable agriculture and reducing waste.

Anyone heard of the Olduvai Theory? According ot its author Richard Duncan we are on the brink of a major 'die-off', the population of the planet will radically shrink back to approx 2 billion within a very shot period of time - as early as 2050. The worrying thing about his theory is that it claims ours is a 'one-off' civilisation - that our consumption to exhaustion of metals, energy resources etc means it will simply be impossible for the sort of society we now have to continue and that we will indeed revert to a far more 'primitive' form of living because that will be the only possible way of surviving. At any rate it's food for thought - summarised here on Wikipedia:

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

Other references at the foot of the article - worth browsing through to cheer yourself up no end.

Aragon wrote:

Anyone heard of the Olduvai Theory? According ot its author Richard Duncan we are on the brink of a major 'die-off', the population of the planet will radically shrink back to approx 2 billion within a very shot period of time - as early as 2050. The worrying thing about his theory is that it claims ours is a 'one-off' civilisation - that our consumption to exhaustion of metals, energy resources etc means it will simply be impossible for the sort of society we now have to continue and that we will indeed revert to a far more 'primitive' form of living because that will be the only possible way of surviving. At any rate it's food for thought - summarised here on Wikipedia:

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

Other references at the foot of the article - worth browsing through to cheer yourself up no end.

Jaysus ... just before I go out for the most decadent Magnum ice cream I can get my hands on I'll say this: how much do we rely from day to day on oil-based plastics and other finite resources like metals? Apparently lithium is also in short supply or will be soon with all the batteries.

Even if we collect all the plastics and metals in order to recycle them then it's possible that the extra population which is increasing at the rate of 1.73 million per week on the earth's face will put not only pressure on already scare resources but on the resources to recycle those resources so yes we might need to live a life of cotton and cardboard in the future but would that be so bad?

But what if someone invents plastics that can be made directly from plants?

Aragon wrote:

Anyone heard of the Olduvai Theory? According ot its author Richard Duncan we are on the brink of a major 'die-off', the population of the planet will radically shrink back to approx 2 billion within a very shot period of time - as early as 2050. The worrying thing about his theory is that it claims ours is a 'one-off' civilisation - that our consumption to exhaustion of metals, energy resources etc means it will simply be impossible for the sort of society we now have to continue and that we will indeed revert to a far more 'primitive' form of living because that will be the only possible way of surviving. At any rate it's food for thought - summarised here on Wikipedia:

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

Other references at the foot of the article - worth browsing through to cheer yourself up no end.

Reading Jared Diamond's "Collapse" raises the same spectre. We are fuelling an enormous population expansion by quarrying out finite resources. Time to pull back and regroup all around.

My childhood wasn't that different to my mother's in terms of the way I lived, what I ate, listened to and wore and so on. My children's childhood is transformed in terms of consumption (travel, transport, different foods, entertainment, gadgets) and I can't say I think it is a real advantage to them.

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2008/08/200882419549244452.html

Just something about GM food production in Paraguay.