West Central Alberta Coldest, wettest edge | A quick look at both a vegetative and a climate map of the world, then comparing that to the regions which are currently in agriculture should convince anyone that we are no where near maximum production. Look at the effort first world countries apply to make productive farmland, reclaiming ocean in Holland, irrigating the desert in the west, draining and tiling swamps in the cornbelt, laser leveling, landscaping, terracing; irrigating and tiling saline land to wash the salt out, fighting frost and snow on both ends of the season in order to grow long season crops in our area. Contrast that with many areas of the world in political instability, where all that is needed is motivation, the land is already productive. I've often wondered how much of that is a direct result of Europe and America subsidizing production for so long that it wasn't economical to grow crops in Africa etc. when they could be purchased on the world market for less than cost of production and if that was an intended consequence?
I can't seem to find any evidence on google today, but I've read that population growth keeps going slower than previous estimates, as more people improve their economic status, with the inevitable accompanying drop in fertility rate. So far all of the Malthusian population explosions with accompanying mass starvation have been premature, seems to be a pattern. Of course, as people improve their standard of living, and have less kids, they will also eat better, negating much of the reduced population growth effect. Many oil exporting countries in the middle east are seeing this effect already with oil, as their internal consumption is growing so rapidly that they could become net importers, as happened with Indonesia already.
Article about middle east oil consumption:
http://jubakpicks.com/2011/04/25/run-away-oil-consumption-in-the-mi...
The same effect will happen with food consumption, especially if surpluses drive prices lower from bringing on additional land, cheap food in places which previously had deficit food supplies will spur demand, especially if they all want to eat meat like we do, eventually driving prices higher, bringing on more land...... I suppose this vicious circle has been ongoing forever, keeping supply and demand in balance, almost.
The primary inputs are nearly limitless:
No one is forecasting a shortage of sunshine(unless some global warming fanatics decide to enact one of their geoengineering schemes to cool the climate, there is a scary thought for those of us who harvest sunshine)
If global warming anthropogenic, or natural is real, that will be mostly a net benefit for agriculture, maybe requiring some adaptation, which farmers seem to be very good at, or even shifting further north, but not insurmountable. Global cooling on the other hand, long term, or short term as a result of a volcanic erpution, that, I don't know how to adapt to, at least not here in the great white north.
We live on the blue planet, even if much of the water is salt water, frozen or not very well distributed, there is certainly a lot of it, and it is renewable. With enough energy input, and money, ocean desalinization, and long distance irrigation pipelines and canals could make any desert into an oasis. Just ask Saudi Arabia what can be done with lots of oil money:
http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/2008/01/saudi-arabia-to-end-wheat-g...
So it is possible, with enough motivation, apparently they do not have enough motivation to keep doing it at today's prices, think about that.
The remaining inputs are not so limitless. Nitrogen shouldn't be a limiting factor given that our atmospere is 76% N, and many plants can capture this directly, and with GM, surely it must be possible to increase that. Otherwise, just like with water, all that is needed is unlimited energy and money, and N is limitless. Potash, while a few years ago was supposedly in shortage, seems to have gone the other direction with all of the "motivation" of high prices to go looking for more, with 60 new projects in the works. Surpluses are forecast, at least for now:
http://www.agrimoney.com/news/potash-giants-face-critical-test-to-d...
Currently Phosphorus could well be a limiting factor in the future.
http://e360.yale.edu/feature/phosphate_a_critical_resource_misused_...
Will a shortage have the same effect as it had with Potash, spurring more exploration and investment, or is there none left to find? This is one thing that does scare me, always reminds me of the picture of the barrel with water running over the shortest stave, all of which are labelled with a crop input. If P is that short stave, and we can't find more at any price, we have a problem. And no price would be too high, when you consider it is food. Given humans record of ingenuity, and responding to price, it is hard to be too pessimistic, but someday we will discover that some resource truly is non renewable, hope it isn't one that's required as fertilizer.
Probably a bigger risk than shortages of inputs or climate, is the risk of diseases or pests due to the nearly monoculture agriculture practiced in most of the world. Just ask the banana producers, where one breed of Banana accounts for 99% of all international consumption, and that breed gets a deadly disease:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/banana-crops-are-under-th...
Banana's are serious enough, but what about a disease that affects a world staple like wheat in the developing world:
http://www.economist.com/node/16481593
Can our plant breeders and chemists keep up with the myriad of diseases and pests which assault our intense and nearly continuous cropping practices here in the developed world? Or alternately, our human population growth could be vulnerable to a similar disease threat, as it has succumbed multiple times throughout history, and a crowded planet with international travel and a population with little natural immunity due to our obsessively "clean" lifestyles. A big reduction in human population could set demand back for generations.
http://listverse.com/2009/01/18/top-10-worst-plagues-in-history/
So that is how I see is, a race between population, both in growth and in affluence, development of land, improvement of land, climate, diseases, pests and inputs. Which sounds simple, but then throw in government intervention, well meaning and otherwise, and I have no idea.
Personally, I think production will win, and population will peak earlier and lower than currently estimated, assuming that everything else remains equal, climate, diseases, politics etc.
As an added bonus, when the underdeveloped land does come into production, cost of production will likely be cheaper, since they won't yet have the regulations, and labor costs that we have, they won't be spoiled with a history of subsidies and risk management insurance, and much of it will be close to where the population and affluence growth is, so less freight.
I don't see where inflation/deflation has a net effect, it changes relative values, as you compare one product, or one country to another, but people will eat regardless, and in the longer term, inputs will cancel out the movement in crop prices. Unless hoarding produce as a store of wealth to protect from inflation becomes popular.
So my policy is to take advantage of the good times while they are here, capitalism works, and high prices will cure themselves, always have, unless of course you guys reelect the socialists...... |
for JB and Alberta Farmer
