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The Forum > Article Comments > Life in a hot, hungry world > Comments

Life in a hot, hungry world : Comments

By Julian Cribb, published 12/11/2007

No side of politics seems to fully grasp the role of agricultural know-how in preventing conflict and ecological crises in our region.

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The professor again has highlighted an issue that has been on the table for a decade - and we are no closer to addressing it. The National Farmer's Federation has for some time lobbied the Government to tackle the problems, seemingly without tangible success.

Some people deny there is a problem, but it would be prudent to acknowledge the climate is changing and is starting to bite and impact our daily lives more and more. It would have helped if our government was more proactive or progressive in tackling national/international issues as this. They haven't.

The next government will have acknowledge the problem, then start to address them.
Posted by Q&A, Monday, 12 November 2007 9:08:22 AM
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Julian, I fear that you are concentrating entirely on only one side of the equation; that of matching food production to demand. We surely also need to concentrate, in fact more so than anything else, on stabilising the demand.

If we don’t do that, even the most brilliant and efficient food production efforts will simply facilitate an ever-increasing population….and a continued move away from sustainability.

The key surely is not to maximise agricultural potential, but to learn to live within the means of a well-below-optimum production regime.

Just imagine the sort of expense and effort that would be required to greatly boost Australia’s food production, not to mention the environmental degradation.

Weigh that up against the simple stabilisation of our population, and even a gradual reduction. If we could just get our collective headspace off of the absurdity of automatic unquestioned continuous population growth and onto a genuine sustainability ethic, then we could easily achieve this.

Of course, both increases in food supply and stabilisation of demand should be happening. But the latter is surely far more important.
Posted by Ludwig, Monday, 12 November 2007 9:32:52 AM
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There are a number of points here that need addressing.

I read somewhere that Indonesia's population will hit 500 million
in 50 years or so, as many still can't afford family planning.
Well yup, there will be those kinds of problems, with those kinds
of populations. Its the same in Africa. Send them more food,
you get more babies, so just producing more food is not the answer,
it leads to even greater problems. Why can't every woman on the
planet at least be offered family planning?

Secondly, food at the farmgate is still so cheap, that its nearly
more valuable as "carfood". As energy for MVs becomes more expensive,
energy for people is bound to be dragged into the equasion.

Julian is correct, r&d in agriculture is being ignored, but so
are invasive species taking over large parts of Australia etc.

Fact is these things are not easy vote catchers, like new football
stadiums or baby bonuses, of another 5$ for pensioners, so they
are ignored. The votes are in the cities and city people most of
the time don't have the foggiest about what is happening in country
areas.

Sadly it seems that people need pain to learn and people will only
value agriculture a little more, when their food prices eventually
skyrocket, but by then the damage will have already been done.
Posted by Yabby, Monday, 12 November 2007 12:51:06 PM
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ludwig, i believe this guy is onto something: "we're producing less food than we're eating." this can only mean cannibalism. what a simple solution to all our problems, just feed the pollies to the hungry masses!
Posted by DEMOS, Monday, 12 November 2007 1:00:28 PM
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While funding may be faltering, it's not really the case that no ground-breaking work is being done on sustainable agriculture.

One very promising "new" idea is adapted from ancient native South American soil-management practice. It promises to boost soil productivity with reduced water and nutrient requirements by harnessing the carbon cycle with activated charcoal. It is *precisely* the "cold burn" forest fuel management technique beloved of our own perseus, but writ large on agricultural soils.

http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/stories/s2012892.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_preta
http://www.biochar-international.org/aboutbiochar.html

Believe it or not, it also seems to have the effect of reducing nitrous oxide emissions from the growing plants.
Posted by xoddam, Monday, 12 November 2007 3:36:18 PM
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Demos impugns, "we're producing less food than we're eating" and suggests “this can only mean cannibalism.” LOL

Cribb actually said, “It means (see chart), year on year, humanity now eats more than it produces.”

The world’s stockpile of grain stocks has been diminishing for the reasons the prof gives.

This is costly, in more ways than one, and the trend is clearly unsustainable.
Posted by Q&A, Monday, 12 November 2007 4:39:51 PM
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Ludwig - you are right on the money. My problem is I never know how to get ALL the relevant inssues into 850 words!
I write this reply from the World Vegetable Centre in Taiwan, having just visited their centre in Africa. And yes,there is an answer - eat more vegies!
Vegies can address the nutritional (and disease) problems of the 850 million hungry, and the nutritional and disease problems of the 1.4 billion obese. They are more water efficient and energy efficient per unit of food than most other crops and all forms of meat. They can use all the water and nutrients which our cities currently waste. They cause less land degradation that broadacre farming.
I'm not advocating vegetarianism, just a rebalacing of the global diet. Did you know there are 400 'undiscovered' indigenous vegetables in Africa alone. How many have we got in Australia? - julian
Posted by JulianC, Monday, 12 November 2007 8:04:01 PM
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The problem is compound. Concentrating specifically on Agriculture alone is not enough. All the systems upon which Agriculture depends need fostering. Otherwise Agriculture itself will barely survive, let alone prosper.

The specialist field of mycology is just one of the fundamental supports for Agriculture. Without continuing development of our understanding of fungi and such-like, progress will be stunted: The world of fungi occupies almost a quarter of all the earth’s biological mass, and much of it resides in the top layer of soil, so often eroded. Its benefits to vegetation are huge.

Professional Ecologists also contribute, by overview of the cohesion of biological systems. Specialists in climate and geology provide support from their disciplines. Microbiologists, entomologists, botanists, the scientists who provide the know-how into chemical and physical properties of soil, – future health of Agriculture stands dependent upon support from all. In Australia that has been so in the past, and is essential for the future.

Those in the paddock at the sharp end are key players in a huge partnership. One which rose to world renown a long time ago. It has been, and is in, the process of being bled white by a succession of Labor and Coalition governments having very narrow focus.

Julian Cribb is right that Australian Agriculture is facing difficulty. But we need a wide focus on the problem in order to squeeze the utmost productivity out of land that is increasingly challenged in regard to climate, fertility, and locality.

If we do that we just might, possibly, be able to squeeze more people in – at the present preferred minimum of a million every four years. To fifty million and continuing – perhaps? That is the purpose of it all. And Agricultural capability is fundamental to it. We have to keep the bastards happy. The politicians, I mean – the ones who allow their agenda to be set by industries hell-bent on growth. The Housing Industry, the Business Council, etc. who publicly promote increasing population as a necessity. Will one of their own please tell their colleagues that it is all a pipe dream?
Posted by colinsett, Monday, 12 November 2007 8:29:46 PM
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A timely article from the Prof.

Is the high of a euphoric binge of economic rationalism slowly subsiding to the reality of the need for longer term scientific monitoring and research into a plethora of "longer term issues"?

I think that a royal com. is needed into the water issue in southern Australia. It concerns me that in a time of potential food shortage that water traders(in the private sector) can dictate who produces food. Scary.

If you think our Pollies are just thinking of votes in the metropolis then you're right because they are going to rob the Goulburn system and pipe water from the Murray system south over the great divide.
After all the Murray Darling's got too much water, has'nt it?

If we have no bread then we may yet hear that much over-used Political retort again.....Qu'ils mangent de la brioche!
Posted by miss_allaneous, Monday, 12 November 2007 8:42:59 PM
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JulianC, interesting comment about “rebalancing of the global diet” and all those indigenous vegetables.

How many have we got in Australia? I can personally attest to acceptability of the “lettuce” which Luderick love, as long as it is not from near a sewer outfall.
Davidsonian Plum is great as a squishy mouthful, after the fur has been rubbed off it – and if you are a lemon fancier. Burdekin Plum is pleasant – when it has softened after burial in sand. Such “undiscovered” are many and varied. I expect you would be aware that A.B. & J.W. Cribb give most of the long list a good coverage in their book WILD FOOD IN AUSTRALIA.
Unfortunately, how to grow, gather, and deliver such produce in sufficient quantity (and minimum cost) might be a challenge. Selecting and developing optimum varieties might be more costly than using the already developed standard vegetable. Great monoculture plantations are sure to be favoured, and would eventually introduce problems such as the Macadamia monocultures are apparently on the brink of facing.
As for Africa – six months back I attended a talk by someone who had recently returned from an agricultural project in Africa. A processing project, actually. One which minimized the potassium cyanide content of the staple vegetable, Cassava. The overpopulated land under discussion had been so flogged that firewood was scarce, and only Cassava (of South American origin) was capable of supplying their vegetable needs. I expect there would have been a less-populous time when “undiscovered” vegetables would have been a substantive part of their diet.
Posted by colinsett, Monday, 12 November 2007 9:42:18 PM
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Ludwig, Oh Ludwig, why is it that only the posters seem to realise that unless we stabilise world population, all these ideas are irrelevant, and we are just urinating into the breeze?

Why is it that the only issue that unites George W. Bush, the Pope, and the entire muslim and third world, is that NOTHING must be done to limit world population?

Is that why any reference to population stabilisation is equated to genocide, and regarded as totally politically incorrect?

Why do we have to rely on the four horsemen of the apocalypse to do the job? (And they seem to be falling down the job, as despite AIDS, famine and war, the world population continues its inexorable increase) Surely we can come up with a gentler method.

The one I propose (and which is bitterly opposed in much of the third world), is to educate young girls, as the number of children they bear is inversely related to their education. If I had my way, all our foreign aid would be directed there, and any country that refused it would be denied all aid, trade and tourism.

Given that this will never come about, it seems clear that we are in for a very rough ride this century. Thank heavens we have a sea boundary, and hopefully will be able to continue to produce enough food for ourselves.
Posted by plerdsus, Sunday, 18 November 2007 10:29:06 PM
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Isn’t it strange Plerdsus. So many posters on OLO can see the significance of population size and growth rate on all levels, from local to global, and hardly a one ever expresses support for continued population growth or a lack of concern about it.

So why isn’t there a strong united force against population growth?

OLO is a good indicator of what ordinary Australians are concerned about. So what gives?

The Australian Conservation Foundation has had a good population policy for yonks. But they just don’t act on it. Why?

Similarly with the Greens and Democrats.

Meanwhile, Sustainable Population Australia Inc battles to hold onto a few hundred members after 20 years of lobbying and despite having esteemed people such as Dr John Coulter as its president and Professor Tim Flannery, Prof Ian Low and others as its patrons.

I’ve done hundreds of property visits throughout north and central Queensland as part of my job. Just about everyone out there on the land can see the population problem, and they very often mention it early on in our informal discussions. And yet there is no united concern.

When I was president of the North Queensland Conservation council fifteen years ago, I encountered many people who expressed this concern. And yet the NQCC committee couldn’t cop it and the membership was split down the middle as to whether the organisation should have anything to say about it.

So it goes. Perhaps the biggest issue of all, which practically every thinking person (or perhaps every person who is not brain-dead) can see, goes virtually unaddressed.

Why? This has got to be the greatest mystery on the planet.
Posted by Ludwig, Tuesday, 20 November 2007 11:37:19 PM
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OK, let me have a try at the population issue, based on a proposal I wrote for the CGIAR in the 1990s.
The reason no politician or leader talks about reducing the population is that it is political suicide to do so. Note how Mr Costello and others promote more childen, not less. This is based on their reading of the mood of the 'average' citizen.
There is only one thing that successfully, universally and voluntarily reduces the birthrate: prosperity. To reduce the number of births you need to lift the average income of poor people above $US2000/year. Countries which have succeeded in this almost invariably experience large decline in the number of children/mother. This implies stimulating economic growth in poor countries as humanity's chief contraceptive.
Urbanisation also lowers the birth rate as children have a lower economic value in urban than in rural society. However I'm not sure that urbanisation is a very sustainable solution to overpopulation, given its other impacts, especially in demand for water, energy etc.
If we aim to lower the world population to 1.5-2 billion by 2100 voluntarily, we are going to have to bring the poor out of poverty very quickly, and this implies a mid-century 'hump' in demand for the earth's resources that may or may not be sustainable, but either way will be temporary. It's what I've been writing about in the context of food etc.
How do you get this on the political agenda, not to mention the religious agenda? - well, it is very hard, as everyone here seems to acknowledge. But it can be done by advancing rational and humane ways to do it, like this, in public fora like this. It won't happen if we just sit round and grouse. We need to generate global public awareness in the same way the IPCC has done for climate change.
Posted by JulianC, Wednesday, 21 November 2007 8:57:11 AM
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Julian, you have said: “Note how Mr Costello and others promote more childen, not less. This is based on their reading of the mood of the 'average' citizen.”
Utter balderdash!
It is, instead, based on the antediluvian state of their intelligence.
Australian women with a fertility rate currently at 1.8 give evidence as to “average mood”.
The Australian Parliamentary Group on Population Development are also aware of that.
We do have global public awareness. Have had it, and recommended direction, since 1994 in Cairo, as you no doubt know.
The awareness is pervasive. Action upon it has been actively prevented by politicians leaned upon by fundamentalist pressure groups of either religious or voodoo-economics origin.
It doesn’t take much intellectual effort to realize that lifting the average income of poor people above $US2000/yr is impossible while their fertility rates remain above 2.1. All the good work you promote will go down the drain if adequate efforts aren’t made to facilitate that. While you remain silent about it in the mainstream of your public utterances, you remain part of the problem – facilitating continued expansion of ever-desperate consumers. You’ve got a lot to contribute – get to it.
Posted by colinsett, Wednesday, 21 November 2007 1:00:32 PM
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JulianC,

I liked your article. It complements what the Earth Policy Institute has to say about global grain supplies:

http://www.earth-policy.org/Indicators/Grain/2006.htm

It is true that prosperity eventually leads to lower birthrates, although there is often a considerable lag. (Remember the very high birthrates after WWII.) Mexican immigrants to the US have a considerably higher fertility rate (on the order of one child more per woman) than comparable people back in Mexico. The ones in the US believe that they can now afford the very large family sizes that are idealised by their culture. The second generation has fewer babies, but still a lot more than the US average. Even in prosperous societies with low birthrates, governments can still promote population growth with mass migration, even though ordinary people are less than keen on it all over the world:

http://pewglobal.org/reports/display.php?ReportID=258

The problem is not the attitude of ordinary people, but of elites who want a cheap, compliant work force, effortless profits from land speculation, savings on training costs, undermining of support for the welfare state, etc., etc. Because of the additional consumption, an extra person in a developed country is a far greater disaster than an extra person in the Third World.

In any case, all the calculations indicate that it would take the resources of three Earths to give all 6.75 billion of us a Western European standard of living. (See the Redefining Progress site and a short article by Daniele Fanelli in the Oct. 6, 2007 New Scientist, p. 10). I can't see any alternatives other than Chinese style authoritarianism at best and a Rwanda style solution at worst.
Posted by Divergence, Wednesday, 21 November 2007 1:14:58 PM
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Julian, I think you overestimate the role of money and underestimate
the role of religion, when it comes to the population debate.

I've spent alot of time investigating this one and everywhere it
seems similar. Yes there are women in the third world who simply
cannot afford family planning measures, they are too poor. So
hundreds of millions of women use none. No wonder there is a rising
population. Yet all surveys I've seen show that these women would
use family planning, if it was available.

What also becomes clear, is the overwhelming influence of the Catholic
Church in the third world. There are plenty of women in
places like Nicaragua, the Philipines etc, who would love to
have their tubes tied, but religious influence on politics, prevents
this happening. The Catholics are determined that the Muslims
will not outbreed them and there is no better global lobby group,
then the Vatican.

As we see even in Australia, the Church has an influence on those
politicians determined to get their Catholic ticket to heaven.
Posted by Yabby, Wednesday, 21 November 2007 1:35:29 PM
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