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As you would expect from the National Geogrpahic they have wide ranging take on this issue that goes over 13 pages.

The first paragraph  is tilted towards USA readers, but is apposite generally.

"It is the simplest, most natural of acts, akin to breathing and walking upright. We sit down at the dinner table, pick up a fork, and take a juicy bite, obliv­ious to the double helping of global ramifications on our plate. Our beef comes from Iowa, fed by Nebraska corn. Our grapes come from Chile, our bananas from Honduras, our olive oil from Sicily, our apple juice—not from Washington State but all the way from China. Modern society has relieved us of the burden of growing, harvesting, even preparing our daily bread, in exchange for the burden of simply paying for it. Only when prices rise do we take notice. And the consequences of our inattention are profound."

"Agricultural productivity growth is only one to two percent a year," warned Joachim von Braun, director general of the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington, D.C., at the height of the crisis. "This is too low to meet population growth and increased demand."

"Such agflation hits the poorest billion people on the planet the hardest, since they typically spend 50 to 70 percent of their income on food".  I reiterate to you , thats the real price of food when you don't have the hidden subsidy of oil.  It's the high price of food when it is hand hewn.  The real price you will have to pay to eat when peak oil hits home fully, perhaps 20 years time will be more than half your income.  Think it through. What that must mean for things like rents and therefore house prices?

"Even China, the second largest corn-growing nation on the planet, can't grow enough grain to feed all its pigs. Most of the shortfall is made up with imported soybeans from the U.S. or Brazil, one of the few countries with the potential to expand its cropland—often by plowing up rain forest. Increasing demand for food, feed, and bio­fuels has been a major driver of deforestation in the tropics. Between 1980 and 2000 more than half of new cropland acreage in the tropics was carved out of intact rain forests; Brazil alone increased its soybean acreage in Amazonia 10 percent a year from 1990 to 2005. "  So lets see. The world biggest producer of corn can't grow enough for its own needs.  Where does that leave over populated over consuming places like Jersey that imports the vast majority of its food?

Read the appalling detail of the green revolution in the Punjab, How it starts of producing in abundance but leaves a legacy of saline land, undrinkable water and a huge rise in cancers. "The green revolution has brought us only downfall," says Jarnail Singh, a retired schoolteacher in Jajjal village. "It ruined our soil, our environment, our water table. Used to be we had fairs in villages where people would come together and have fun. Now we gather in medical centers. The government has sacrificed the people of Punjab for grain." 

"But is a reprise of the green revolution—with the traditional package of synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, and irrigation, supercharged by genetically engineered seeds—really the answer to the world's food crisis? Last year a massive study called the "International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development" concluded that the immense production increases brought about by science and technology in the past 30 years have failed to improve food access for many of the world's poor. The six-year study, initiated by the World Bank and the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization and involving some 400 agricultural experts from around the globe, called for a paradigm shift in agriculture toward more sustainable and ecologically friendly practices that would benefit the world's 900 million small farmers, not just agribusiness"

Of course the agribusiness sees it differently "So far, genetic breakthroughs that would free green revolution crops from their heavy dependence on irrigation and fertilizer have proved elusive. Engineering plants that can fix their own nitrogen or are resistant to drought "has proven a lot harder than they thought," says Pollan. Monsanto's Fraley predicts his company will have drought-tolerant corn in the U.S. market by 2012. But the increased yields promised during drought years are only 6 to 10 percent above those of standard drought-hammered crops."  I have to tell you that tradition plant breeding and selection have done just as well as that.  We have lost much of the gene bank that gave properties like drought resistance because we favoured yield.  Home seed savers and traditional farmers have kept alive odd varieties that do show these useful traits.

"Regardless of which model prevails—agriculture as a diverse ecological art, as a high-tech industry, or some combination of the two—the challenge of putting enough food in nine billion mouths by 2050 is daunting. Two billion people already live in the driest parts of the globe, and climate change is projected to slash yields in these regions even further. No matter how great their yield potential, plants still need water to grow. And in the not too distant future, every year could be a drought year for much of the globe.

New climate studies show that extreme heat waves, such as the one that withered crops and killed thousands in western Europe in 2003, are very likely to become common in the tropics and subtropics by century's end. Himalayan glaciers that now provide water for hundreds of millions of people, livestock, and farmland in China and India are melting faster and could vanish completely by 2035. In the worst-case scenario, yields for some grains could decline by 10 to 15 percent in South Asia by 2030. Projections for southern Africa are even more dire. In a region already racked by water scarcity and food insecurity, the all-important corn harvest could drop by 30 percent—47 percent in the worst-case scenario. All the while the population clock keeps ticking, with a net of 2.5 more mouths to feed born every second. That amounts to 4,500 more mouths in the time it takes you to read this article.

Which leads us, inevitably, back to Malthus. "People who say Malthus is wrong usually haven't read him," says Tim Dyson, a professor of population studies at the London School of Economics. "He was not taking a view any different than what Adam Smith took in the first volume of The Wealth of Nations. No one in their right mind doubts the idea that populations have to live within their resource base. And that the capacity of society to increase resources from that base is ultimately limited"


http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2009/06/cheap-food/bourne-text
 

I was intrigued to read a piece about a Belgian town (Ghent) that have gone vegetarian one day a week. It gives an airing to some of the arguments I have written about on the relationship between diet, population, and climate change. Unfortunately it misses the peak oil and health angles that are also part of the mix.  It does however acknowledge the water scarcity problem of growing food. Some nice snippets of historical aspects of meat eating and vegetarianism are in there too. 

This figure is pretty shocking: "There is water scarcity in large parts of the world, yet livestock-rearing can use up to 200 times more water a kilogram (2.2lbs) of meat produced than is used in growing wheat". Another useful pointer is this: "Likewise, countries have very different animal husbandry methods. For example, in the US, for each calorie of meat or dairy food produced, farm animals consume on average more than 5 calories of feed. In India the rate is a less than 1.5 calories. In Kenya, where there isn't the luxury of feeding grains to animals, livestock yield more calories than they consume because they are fattened on grass and agricultural by-products inedible to humans". 

The author goes on to lok at food consumption pre head. "Based on the global food production figures published by the FAO, I did a few preliminary calculations. Global average consumption of meat and dairy products including milk was 152kg a person in 2003. Average EU and US consumption, by contrast, was over 400kg, while Uganda's was 45kg. In order to reach the equitable fair share of global production, rich western countries would have to cut their consumption by 2.7 times – and this doesn't include the fact that the butter will have to be spread even more thinly if the global population really does increase by another 2.3 billion by 2050."  Personally I think that 2.7 times figure is very significant. 

When I did some work  on ecological footprints, the figure for the UK was about 3.5 times what the planet could support. Changing to a simple vegetarian diet could go quite some way to redressing that imbalance, and probably improve our population health simultaneously.  I can see a time , perhaps 10 or 20 years down the line when we have special meat taxes, like we have already on petrol and alcohol.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/may/16/ghent-belgium-vegetarian-town-environment

• The UK is currently around 58% self-sufficient in all foodstuffs consumed here, but much lower for certain food groups - over 90% of all fruit and 50% of vegetables are imported. Overall there’s been a 23% drop in food self-sufficiency since 1995.
• Less than 1% of the UK population works in agriculture. When Cuba ‘lost’ its imports of fuel, fertiliser and pesticides following the collapse of the Soviet Union - some 15-24% of the country’s labour force had to be turned to growing food. In the UK in the early 1900s some 40% of the population was engaged in farming.
• 57% of UK Grade1 farmland (best) is at risk from climate change related sea level rise of between 26 - 86cm by the 2080s; making arable farming unviable on 86% of the Fens; 10% of the remainder of East Anglia, and 7% of the North West - unless expensive adaptations are made to flood defences.
• Globally, agriculture is calculated to be responsible for between 10-12% of the world’s total greenhouse gases. The scientific consensus is for 80% cuts on 1990 levels of greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
• Although the oil price has halved from its recent high of $140 a barrel to around $75, long-term forecasts are for sustained higher prices - predicted to reach $200 a barrel over the next 5-10 years.  Higher oil prices mean higher input costs - fertiliser prices have doubled over the past year with 10-20% price hikes announced by major pesticide manufacturers.
• 44% of the UK’s arable soils are suffering from erosion, 36% at moderate to serious risk (Soil Survey England & Wales, R. Evans et al). Across Europe, soil erosion and degradation seriously affects near 157 million hectares (16% of Europe, nearly 3 times the total surface of France), making it the major environmental problem linked to the shift to intensive agriculture.
• According to the UN, 10 million hectares of cropland are degraded or lost to erosion annually across the world. UNEP has stated that 50% of world’s arable land will be unusable by 2050.

If you have missed the senatorial hustings so far, you won't know I've been trying to make the case for Jersey having a food security policy.  Now Chatham house, as reported in the Guardian have come to my rescue.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/oct/07/food.shortages.prices

Food crises could swing future UK elections, says thinktank Felicity Lawrence
The Guardian, Tuesday October 7 2008

A food crisis is highly likely in the UK, with price and availability becoming issues that swing the outcome of future elections, according to a report from the thinktank Chatham House.

The UK's food system is unable to cope with rapid changes in supply driven by climate change, rising energy prices and population growth, the report says. Consumers are likely to have to accept a shift from individual preferences to a system in which government and industry have to ensure the food that is sold reflects the wider needs of society. The report, made available in draft to the Guardian, will be published next month. Hilary Benn, the environment, food and rural affairs secretary, used the first day of a Chatham House conference yesterday on the future of food to announce the creation of a food policy council to advise government on costs and security of supply.

In what appeared to be a shift in policy, he said: "With rising prices and increasing demand across the globe, we can't take our food supply for granted.

"Our supply needs to be reliable and resilient and able to withstand shocks and crises."

In an indication of the government's concern about the effect of food price rises, Benn was asked to update Gordon Brown's national economic council on the UK's food supply yesterday.

The Chatham House study concludes that the British government does not yet fully understand the challenges it faces over food in the 10 years. It identifies serious challenges to world agriculture:

• UK consumers use food at a rate that represents six times more land and sea than is available to them.

• Developed countries face a chronic shortage of migrant workers, leading to the loss of seasonal crops. In Scotland up to a fifth of the soft fruit crop, worth £5.2m, could be lost in 2008.

• The equivalent of 20 Nile rivers move annually from developing to developed countries, but much of agriculture's use of water is unsustainable.

• Modern food production is energy-intensive and vulnerable to oil and gas price rises.

• Rising prices of agricultural commodities have already produced pressure for more protectionism. Russia plans to form a state grain trading company to control up to half of its cereal exports.

• Falling yields due to climate change will inflate food prices further.

• The rapid rise in world population will continue to push up demand.

• Emerging economies such as China and India are shifting to more meat and dairy products. This will cause greater pressure on food and feed prices, and exacerbate environmental and health problems.

"Other countries have already started looking at food in strategic terms. It's about time the UK did the same," said Kate Bailey, who led the research for the project.
 

Who would have thought it?  A revolting peasant like me and Prince Charles agreeing on something so fundamental as food, farming and the future of the planet.

http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1488655367/bclid1452257940/bctid1726720198

The Prince, in an exclusive interview with the Daily Telegraph, also expressed the fear that food would run out because of the damage being wreaked on the earth's soil by scientists' research.

He accused firms of conducting a "gigantic experiment I think with nature and the whole of humanity which has gone seriously wrong".

Relying on "gigantic corporations" for food, he said, would result in "absolute disaster".

"What we should be talking about is food security not food production - that is what matters and that is what people will not understand.

I wonder what he thinks of the crown appointees on the States chamber?

À bétôt

Our Council of Ministers is to hold an emergency meeting on what can be done to help local people with rising fuel and food prices.  That's surely doomed to be the shortest Council meeting ever.  Why?  We import 99% of our energy and fuel, and apart from milk and in season Royals, we also import the vast bulk of our food too.  We are not sufficiently big an importer compared to suppliers to exert any pressure on the prices they charge us. In short we have to take the price they offer.  

The only option for our ministers is to use its tax revenues.   They have already added 3% GST on just about everything, a regressive move that has hit the lowest paid disproportionately.  They could raise more taxes to have more to redistribute. If those taxes are further regressive levies then it will only be taking money of the poorest simply to give it back to them. Minus the extra administration costs of course. Perhaps they should have a progressive tax system, and tax the wealthiest more.  But if they do this now, why did they not do that instead of the hated GST in the first place?  It would give the lie to the 'we had no option' argument advanced at the time of the GST debate.  

In short there is nothing substantive they can do in the short term .  Sure there are things at the margin , like providing allotments  and subsidising the insulating of homes.  But even these measures will take time to organise and implement.  Immediate relief it won't be.

Had the States taken on board some years ago the message about the dependence of food production on oil, and the imminence of peak oil then plans might have been laid.  We would not be having any emergency meetings. One can only wonder what the ministers think they will be able to do when things get really bad, as some of us believe they may well do in just a few short years from now.  Energy and food security policies should already be in place.

À  la préchaine

This is my annotated commentary on the transcript of Chief Minister Walker's speech.  Mr Walkers statements are in blue