3 ms·

Except that those exports of high-price-per-calorie food (meats, dairy, wheat) were what paid for large imports of low-price-per-calorie food (rye, corn). If th

Except that those exports of high-price-per-calorie food (meats, dairy, wheat) were what paid for large imports of low-price-per-calorie food (rye, corn). If they'd shut down exports, those imports would not have come and the famine would have been worse.

crdoconnor 10y ago
Ireland was perfectly capable of farming all the rye & corn it needed. It was just more profitable to farm meat/dairy/etc for export to England. Those profits were not used to feed the starving, either. They largely went to rich landowners. Amazing that even today people defend this.
- snrplfth 10y ago
  Here's some citations for you: https://pseudoerasmus.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/irish-famine.jpg?w=640&h=267 https://pseudoerasmus.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/irish-fami... https://pseudoerasmus.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/ograda-figure-3-1.jpg?w=640 https://pseudoerasmus.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/ograda-fig... As you can see, domestic Irish production of all foods, in calories, just about halved. Food production absolutely cratered, due to weather and blight. They eminently were not able to farm "all the rye and corn they needed", and such imports were also in shorter supply than usual, because famine/scarcity conditions were occurring all across Europe (helping to spark the 1848 Revolutions, notably.) But these imports still had to be paid for somehow, and in an era of largely subsistence farming and thus small savings, this had to be paid for in large part by exports - of what? Of highest-value agricultural goods. You see from the graph that Ireland, during the depths of the famine, was a net importer of every grain except oats, where their exports had also fallen from normal levels. And, you see from the chart that, in total calories, Ireland had gone from being a net exporter to a net importer - bringing in over one-quarter of their total food supply in the Famine years, and going from typically exporting around 240,000 tons of grain a year, to importing up to 750,000 tons. Stopping exports from Ireland would have meant more dairy, oats, meat in Ireland, true - and less of the cheap imported grains that people really needed. It's true that the landowners were part of the overall problem, but no export limits would have caused new food supply to spring into existence or be imported.

crdoconnor 10y ago

Ireland was perfectly capable of farming all the rye & corn it needed. It was just more profitable to farm meat/dairy/etc for export to England. Those profits were not used to feed the starving, either. They largely went to rich landowners. Amazing that even today people defend this.

snrplfth 10y ago
Here's some citations for you: https://pseudoerasmus.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/irish-famine.jpg?w=640&h=267 https://pseudoerasmus.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/irish-fami... https://pseudoerasmus.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/ograda-figure-3-1.jpg?w=640 https://pseudoerasmus.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/ograda-fig... As you can see, domestic Irish production of all foods, in calories, just about halved. Food production absolutely cratered, due to weather and blight. They eminently were not able to farm "all the rye and corn they needed", and such imports were also in shorter supply than usual, because famine/scarcity conditions were occurring all across Europe (helping to spark the 1848 Revolutions, notably.) But these imports still had to be paid for somehow, and in an era of largely subsistence farming and thus small savings, this had to be paid for in large part by exports - of what? Of highest-value agricultural goods. You see from the graph that Ireland, during the depths of the famine, was a net importer of every grain except oats, where their exports had also fallen from normal levels. And, you see from the chart that, in total calories, Ireland had gone from being a net exporter to a net importer - bringing in over one-quarter of their total food supply in the Famine years, and going from typically exporting around 240,000 tons of grain a year, to importing up to 750,000 tons. Stopping exports from Ireland would have meant more dairy, oats, meat in Ireland, true - and less of the cheap imported grains that people really needed. It's true that the landowners were part of the overall problem, but no export limits would have caused new food supply to spring into existence or be imported.