8 ms·

2022/23 worldwide grain consumption will exceed production [pdf]

58 points by Kon-Peki 4y ago

Gravityloss 4y ago
At least over here, farmers are planting a lot less than previous years, because fertilizers are so expensive. I don't know why the markets or futures trade don't work to increase the price of grain enough to make it worthwhile.
- tinco 4y ago
  Because of the often overlooked part of the demand/supply equation is that demand isn't just what people want, it's what people can afford. Grain futures won't go higher if people won't pay more for grain. Less grain production will simply mean at some point that the persons who don't have enough money will go hungry (or eat something else). It's actually the effectiveness of the markets that cause this. If grain production in rich countries goes down because of expensive fertilisers, then the demand of grain by those rich countries is satisfied by the supply of poorer countries. The pain won't be felt domestically, except by the farmers.
  - xyzzyz 4y ago
    Farmers might benefit from that too. It all depends on the exact shapes on demand and supply curves. Reduction of supply volume can result in more supplier profit, if the price also goes up appropriately. You are, of course, correct that it will be the poorest customers that will suffer.
  - lumost 4y ago
    Modern practice is to ban food exports in these cases. The Irish potato famine was notably not caused by a lack of food production in Ireland, but by a lack of affordable food. In a food drought it’s quite likely that rich countries would feel the pain as well as poor countries.
  - unyttigfjelltol 4y ago
    We're talking about grain. If people can't afford grain what simpler, cheaper food would they fall back to? Sand?
    - colechristensen 4y ago
      Lots of US grain goes to produce ethanol which can be cut back. Lots more goes into livestock feed around the world. People might be able to afford grain but not meat and lots of grain is available to be reallocated to humans.
    - drozycki 4y ago
      If people can't afford grain then they go without food. Aka famine is the "fallback".
      - formerkrogemp 4y ago
        From the ancient riots in Rome for the 'panem,' the cries of the Miserables storming the Bastille for the pan, the Russian revolution, the 'Arab spring,' the collapse of the Soviet Union, and other revolutions and times of trouble seem all to be coinciding with elevated grain/flour/bread prices. The poorest will have nothing to lose and will have everything to gain with a change in regime. Rich people will be fine I'm sure. Interesting times that we live in.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
poxwole 4y ago
Malthus called, says he wants his idea back
- UncleOxidant 4y ago
  Malthus doesn't get a lot of love around here, but looking around it kind of seems like he was more right than wrong. We're overfishing the oceans leading to huge declines in large fish. Insect populations seem to be crashing. And there's also climate change, etc. The techno-optimists will counter that there are technical solutions for all of of our problems, but it seems that a lot of these issues actually require political will that just isn't there; humans generally don't have the longterm outlook required to fix many of these things on a global scale. Politicians who try to get us to take a longer view don't seem to last long in our political systems. So yeah, I guess the earth could probably handle more people, but that's only if those people take a much longer view and intentionally try to live much more lightly on the earth - I don't see that happening so I have to conclude that Malthus' thesis seems to (unfortunately) be correct given the reality of human nature. Changing human nature isn't something technology is going to be able to do.
  - mensetmanusman 4y ago
    Malthus was wrong from a thermodynamic standpoint (we are still living within a conservation of mass framework), but he may have been accidentally right from a ‘what happens when you have a madman with 10,000 nukes?’ standpoint.
  - str34m 4y ago
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
_8j50 4y ago
Did the US stop dumping subsidized grain into the ocean?
- macshome 4y ago
  I don’t think they ever did. The main source of this seems to be papers in Iran. https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/16971/does-the-united-states-throw-wheat-in-the-ocean-to-keep-the-prices-high https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/16971/does-the-...
- woodruffw 4y ago
  To the best of my knowledge, the US has never done that. What they have done is dump dairy, which is both directly subsidized and indirectly subsidized (by grain subsidies).
lesgobrandon 4y ago
ortusdux 4y ago
This impending disaster has got me thinking about Salish Blue, a newly developed perennial 'wheat'. The plant last ~5 years and sends out deep roots, so they require less fertilizer and water. I don't know if it ready for primetime yet, but the beer I had that was brewed with it was indistinguishable from any other beer. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/new-self-sustaining-wheat-could-change-farming-industry-180962101/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/new-self-sustainin...
- giantg2 4y ago
  Cool. Sounds ideal for garden production too. I would love a perennial patch of that. And yes, I would malt it for beer too.
  - OJFord 4y ago
    Wouldn't you need quite a large patch (by garden standards) even just for a single home brew? I'm no expert but it seems to me cereals only really work at scale.
    - jws 4y ago
      My experience growing small patches of grain is that migrating sparrows and sleeping deer will mostly wipe you out. These are relatively insignificant depradations for large fields, but if you only have 40 square meters they can destroy it all.
    - LeifCarrotson 4y ago
      Depends on what you mean by "Garden standards". No, a single plant isn't worth harvesting by itself, and one square foot would be barely enough for a single serving, but a typical 1 acre lawn, imagine a square that's just ~200 feet/60 meters on a side, is 43 THOUSAND + 560 square feet. The linear/square relationship can be really surprising. Wheat yields like 50 bushels/acre, if I seeded my lawn in wheat I'd have 3,000 pounds, more than I could possibly hope to brew or drink. If I instead grew sweet corn, I'd have something like 15,000 ears. That's a lot of corn on the cob, and you've got to eat it within 24 hours of harvest for best flavor, and the harvest window is only a few weeks in early August. No, you're not going to want to grow cereals one stalk at a time in a raised bed, nor grow it like a little potted oregano on your kitchen window sill. But it doesn't take that much cultivation - say, 10 rows of sweet corn along the edge of the lawn - to get more than you can hope to consume.
OJFord 4y ago
contracts but will still exceed production, that should read. It has exceeded production since 2020/21, and also did in 2018/19, per the same graph in the submission (which isn't itself so dramatically titled).
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- civilized 4y ago
  How can consumption exceed production year after year? Do we have tons of stored grain that lasts for many years?
  - OJFord 4y ago
    I'm no expert, but yes it can be stored; see also the 'stocks' section in the submission. It also seems to be implied that 'consumption' includes derivative products (which makes total sense as long as it's not double-counting). It's not continuously harvested (spring and winter crops) so there'd have to be a buffer anyway, and you wouldn't know in advance if that's going to be good bad or average. Also I assume good stock control (not necessarily just FIFO, but also relegating the good stuff to animal feed as it ages) so really running a slight deficit for several years is the same as a big deficit for one year. (Or better even - less implied risk for the next year, doesn't seem so volatile.)
  - hrisng 4y ago
    Yeah. A majority of grain on the market is not 'new'. It's been stored for a while, either waiting for buyer, or for the right time and the right price. Most country also have a national reserve to ensure food security. And they tend to be quite trigger happy with the slightest risk to that. I'm from a major rice producing country and when the first wave of Covid hit, they block exporting right away.
    - DantesKite 4y ago
      That’s very interesting. Are there any books that go into detail about this?
mschuster91 4y ago
The obvious consequence would be to immediately stop the use of food-grade crops for producing bio-fuel, as long as this war is going on. The amount of loss is mind-blowing - every day, Europe alone is burning the equivalent of 15 million loaves of bread for wheat alone [1]! The next step would be to tighten meat consumption to further improve the amount of wheat available to feed humans and outright ban Brazilian meat imports when we're at it to stop further devastation of the Amazon rain forest. And the final step would be to sanction China to hell and beyond for their hoarding [2] which was a major price driver even before the Russians invaded. One might be inclined to believe China fully knew what was about to go down and decided to profiteer. [1] https://www.euractiv.com/section/biofuels/news/biofuels-impact-on-food-security-debate-resurfaces-amid-ukraine-war/ https://www.euractiv.com/section/biofuels/news/biofuels-impa... [2] https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Datawatch/China-hoards-over-half-the-world-s-grain-pushing-up-global-prices https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Datawatch/China-hoards-ove...
- vosper 4y ago
  > And the final step would be to sanction China to hell and beyond for their hoarding [2] which was a major price driver even before the Russians invaded. One might be inclined to believe China fully knew what was about to go down and decided to profiteer. Why does any country have an obligation to export? I get that other countries might like them to, but sanctioning a country for not selling you something seems wrong. I get that sanctions are coercive, but usually not like that?
  - woodruffw 4y ago
    I think the implication is that China had previously imported much of their reserves and is now reselling at an opportunistic time. The argument for sanctions would be similar to the argument against price-gouging or scalping.
    - erklik 4y ago
      > reselling at an opportunistic time Are they reselling? I don't think China is really exporting any grain at all in any major amounts. They can't satisfy domestic demand and prices are soaring. To then sanction a country for not selling to you is kind of bonkers in my mind.
Reichhardt 4y ago
- woodruffw 4y ago
  This seems like a straightforward way to kill a few hundred thousand people, particularly at a time when global wheat prices will be pushing poorer countries out of the market. I think I'd rather pay a little more at the grocery store and not have that on my conscience.
  - Reichhardt 4y ago
    Populations in some countries are expanding infinitely. These countries should adapt now, by reducing family sizes and generally operating within resource limits based on national output and productivity. Losses of 100,000 today will be 100 million tomorrow. Mali Population 1950: 4.7 million Mali Population 2022: 21.4 million Mali Population 2100: 80.3 million https://www.populationpyramid.net/mali/2022/ https://www.populationpyramid.net/mali/2022/ UK Population 1950: 50.6 million UK Population 2022: 68.5 million UK Population 2100: 78 million It is unrealistic to imagine that countries such as Mali will voluntarily adopt family planning or quickly reach a sub-replacement fertility rate. The only limit to their population growth is incoming food supplies. About a quarter of the population is already reliant on international aid.
    - woodruffw 4y ago
      Population growth is tied closely to privation: families have more children when they need more bodies to labor and produce resources for survival. Intentionally starving entire countries because of some misinformed attempt at Malthusianism has the opposite of the intended effect. And that's even before we consider how disgustingly callous it is.
      - Reichhardt 4y ago
        The childhood mortality rate in Mali has fallen from 37% in 1970 to 9% in 2020. The fertility in the same period fell only from 7.13 to 5.78. The number of surviving children has thus increased from 4.49 to 5.25, thanks to medical advances and international aid. As we donate aid and food, the population will continually increase until either our generosity is exhausted or some other environmental limit is hit. Mali has 37% of its population without access to contraception. We should be donating education, contraception and abortion for women, not food aid.
RappingBoomer 4y ago
some folks gonna get that summer body whether they want to or not
Havoc 4y ago
On the plus side I recently learned I’ve got a wheat & gluten intolerance so I shall be doing my bit to fix the imbalance by not eating any
- xahrepap 4y ago
  Sorry and welcome to the club! Unsolicited referral: America’s Test Kitchen has a cook book series called “How Can It be Gluten Free Cookbook”. We have 2 of them, I think there’s only 2. Literally everything we’ve tried has been outstanding! And the lessons they teach about what makes things work are really interesting.
  - Havoc 4y ago
    >Sorry and welcome to the club! haha indeed. Though frankly I seem to be more in the sensitivity camp so very reluctant to invoke gluten anything given that it isn't comparable to actual celiac sufferers
- Reichhardt 4y ago
  You might simply be sensitive to Roundup, which is found as residue in bread in North America, since it is used as a pre-harvest desiccant. https://inhabitat.com/roundup-bread-the-real-reason-americans-are-intolerant-to-wheat/ https://inhabitat.com/roundup-bread-the-real-reason-american... Try consuming organic wheat products only.
  - Havoc 4y ago
    >You might simply be sensitive to Roundup, This was from blood IgE anti-body screening so I'd imagine it wouldn't confuse wheat and roundup...
FooBarBizBazz 4y ago
It increasingly looks like I need a diversified portfolio of farmland, nonperishable food, solar panels, livestock, replacement parts, Nana's recipes, basic tools, loyal dogs, diesel fuel, antibiotics, good insulation, barbed wire, warm clothes, fertilizer, bandages, a foot-pedal washing machine, surveillance drones, firewood, ammunition, bags of cement, a reliable spouse, flashlights, a Toyota Hilux, a cast-iron stove, some bicycles, a well-borer, night-vision goggles, fruit trees, popular cigarettes, rain barrels, a hardcover encyclopedia, and marriageable female relatives.
- formerkrogemp 4y ago
  At our current rate, your antibiotics will be worthless in a decade or two. Who knows?
- prawn 4y ago
  I like your comment because it's useful to consider but amusing at how dire survival amongst humans might be. If you haven't watched Last Man On Earth (TV show), it's a good combo of the same thoughts (humorous, but easily provokes more serious thought). And for less-light fare, Alone is a good insight into survival in the wild, though without worrying about humans as a threat. Humans, of course, completely changes the game.
orwin 4y ago
Far from me the idea to dictate what you should eat, but now is the time to reduce meat consumption. Once every three meals should reduce it enough in developped country to add a lot of grain on the market. But once every two meals is good too. I'm not dictating anything, just think about it and how hard is would be for you.

58 points by Kon-Peki 4y ago

At least over here, farmers are planting a lot less than previous years, because fertilizers are so expensive. I don't know why the markets or futures trade don't work to increase the price of grain enough to make it worthwhile.

tinco 4y ago
Because of the often overlooked part of the demand/supply equation is that demand isn't just what people want, it's what people can afford. Grain futures won't go higher if people won't pay more for grain. Less grain production will simply mean at some point that the persons who don't have enough money will go hungry (or eat something else). It's actually the effectiveness of the markets that cause this. If grain production in rich countries goes down because of expensive fertilisers, then the demand of grain by those rich countries is satisfied by the supply of poorer countries. The pain won't be felt domestically, except by the farmers.
- xyzzyz 4y ago
  Farmers might benefit from that too. It all depends on the exact shapes on demand and supply curves. Reduction of supply volume can result in more supplier profit, if the price also goes up appropriately. You are, of course, correct that it will be the poorest customers that will suffer.
- lumost 4y ago
  Modern practice is to ban food exports in these cases. The Irish potato famine was notably not caused by a lack of food production in Ireland, but by a lack of affordable food. In a food drought it’s quite likely that rich countries would feel the pain as well as poor countries.
- unyttigfjelltol 4y ago
  We're talking about grain. If people can't afford grain what simpler, cheaper food would they fall back to? Sand?
  - colechristensen 4y ago
    Lots of US grain goes to produce ethanol which can be cut back. Lots more goes into livestock feed around the world. People might be able to afford grain but not meat and lots of grain is available to be reallocated to humans.
  - drozycki 4y ago
    If people can't afford grain then they go without food. Aka famine is the "fallback".
    - formerkrogemp 4y ago
      From the ancient riots in Rome for the 'panem,' the cries of the Miserables storming the Bastille for the pan, the Russian revolution, the 'Arab spring,' the collapse of the Soviet Union, and other revolutions and times of trouble seem all to be coinciding with elevated grain/flour/bread prices. The poorest will have nothing to lose and will have everything to gain with a change in regime. Rich people will be fine I'm sure. Interesting times that we live in.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

poxwole 4y ago

Malthus called, says he wants his idea back

UncleOxidant 4y ago
Malthus doesn't get a lot of love around here, but looking around it kind of seems like he was more right than wrong. We're overfishing the oceans leading to huge declines in large fish. Insect populations seem to be crashing. And there's also climate change, etc. The techno-optimists will counter that there are technical solutions for all of of our problems, but it seems that a lot of these issues actually require political will that just isn't there; humans generally don't have the longterm outlook required to fix many of these things on a global scale. Politicians who try to get us to take a longer view don't seem to last long in our political systems. So yeah, I guess the earth could probably handle more people, but that's only if those people take a much longer view and intentionally try to live much more lightly on the earth - I don't see that happening so I have to conclude that Malthus' thesis seems to (unfortunately) be correct given the reality of human nature. Changing human nature isn't something technology is going to be able to do.
- mensetmanusman 4y ago
  Malthus was wrong from a thermodynamic standpoint (we are still living within a conservation of mass framework), but he may have been accidentally right from a ‘what happens when you have a madman with 10,000 nukes?’ standpoint.
- str34m 4y ago

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

_8j50 4y ago

Did the US stop dumping subsidized grain into the ocean?

macshome 4y ago
I don’t think they ever did. The main source of this seems to be papers in Iran. https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/16971/does-the-united-states-throw-wheat-in-the-ocean-to-keep-the-prices-high https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/16971/does-the-...
woodruffw 4y ago
To the best of my knowledge, the US has never done that. What they have done is dump dairy, which is both directly subsidized and indirectly subsidized (by grain subsidies).

lesgobrandon 4y ago

ortusdux 4y ago

This impending disaster has got me thinking about Salish Blue, a newly developed perennial 'wheat'. The plant last ~5 years and sends out deep roots, so they require less fertilizer and water. I don't know if it ready for primetime yet, but the beer I had that was brewed with it was indistinguishable from any other beer. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/new-self-sustaining-wheat-could-change-farming-industry-180962101/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/new-self-sustainin...

giantg2 4y ago
Cool. Sounds ideal for garden production too. I would love a perennial patch of that. And yes, I would malt it for beer too.
- OJFord 4y ago
  Wouldn't you need quite a large patch (by garden standards) even just for a single home brew? I'm no expert but it seems to me cereals only really work at scale.
  - jws 4y ago
    My experience growing small patches of grain is that migrating sparrows and sleeping deer will mostly wipe you out. These are relatively insignificant depradations for large fields, but if you only have 40 square meters they can destroy it all.
  - LeifCarrotson 4y ago
    Depends on what you mean by "Garden standards". No, a single plant isn't worth harvesting by itself, and one square foot would be barely enough for a single serving, but a typical 1 acre lawn, imagine a square that's just ~200 feet/60 meters on a side, is 43 THOUSAND + 560 square feet. The linear/square relationship can be really surprising. Wheat yields like 50 bushels/acre, if I seeded my lawn in wheat I'd have 3,000 pounds, more than I could possibly hope to brew or drink. If I instead grew sweet corn, I'd have something like 15,000 ears. That's a lot of corn on the cob, and you've got to eat it within 24 hours of harvest for best flavor, and the harvest window is only a few weeks in early August. No, you're not going to want to grow cereals one stalk at a time in a raised bed, nor grow it like a little potted oregano on your kitchen window sill. But it doesn't take that much cultivation - say, 10 rows of sweet corn along the edge of the lawn - to get more than you can hope to consume.

OJFord 4y ago

contracts but will still exceed production, that should read. It has exceeded production since 2020/21, and also did in 2018/19, per the same graph in the submission (which isn't itself so dramatically titled).

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
civilized 4y ago
How can consumption exceed production year after year? Do we have tons of stored grain that lasts for many years?
- OJFord 4y ago
  I'm no expert, but yes it can be stored; see also the 'stocks' section in the submission. It also seems to be implied that 'consumption' includes derivative products (which makes total sense as long as it's not double-counting). It's not continuously harvested (spring and winter crops) so there'd have to be a buffer anyway, and you wouldn't know in advance if that's going to be good bad or average. Also I assume good stock control (not necessarily just FIFO, but also relegating the good stuff to animal feed as it ages) so really running a slight deficit for several years is the same as a big deficit for one year. (Or better even - less implied risk for the next year, doesn't seem so volatile.)
- hrisng 4y ago
  Yeah. A majority of grain on the market is not 'new'. It's been stored for a while, either waiting for buyer, or for the right time and the right price. Most country also have a national reserve to ensure food security. And they tend to be quite trigger happy with the slightest risk to that. I'm from a major rice producing country and when the first wave of Covid hit, they block exporting right away.
  - DantesKite 4y ago
    That’s very interesting. Are there any books that go into detail about this?

mschuster91 4y ago

The obvious consequence would be to immediately stop the use of food-grade crops for producing bio-fuel, as long as this war is going on. The amount of loss is mind-blowing - every day, Europe alone is burning the equivalent of 15 million loaves of bread for wheat alone [1]! The next step would be to tighten meat consumption to further improve the amount of wheat available to feed humans and outright ban Brazilian meat imports when we're at it to stop further devastation of the Amazon rain forest. And the final step would be to sanction China to hell and beyond for their hoarding [2] which was a major price driver even before the Russians invaded. One might be inclined to believe China fully knew what was about to go down and decided to profiteer. [1] https://www.euractiv.com/section/biofuels/news/biofuels-impact-on-food-security-debate-resurfaces-amid-ukraine-war/ https://www.euractiv.com/section/biofuels/news/biofuels-impa... [2] https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Datawatch/China-hoards-over-half-the-world-s-grain-pushing-up-global-prices https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Datawatch/China-hoards-ove...

vosper 4y ago
> And the final step would be to sanction China to hell and beyond for their hoarding [2] which was a major price driver even before the Russians invaded. One might be inclined to believe China fully knew what was about to go down and decided to profiteer. Why does any country have an obligation to export? I get that other countries might like them to, but sanctioning a country for not selling you something seems wrong. I get that sanctions are coercive, but usually not like that?
- woodruffw 4y ago
  I think the implication is that China had previously imported much of their reserves and is now reselling at an opportunistic time. The argument for sanctions would be similar to the argument against price-gouging or scalping.
  - erklik 4y ago
    > reselling at an opportunistic time Are they reselling? I don't think China is really exporting any grain at all in any major amounts. They can't satisfy domestic demand and prices are soaring. To then sanction a country for not selling to you is kind of bonkers in my mind.

Reichhardt 4y ago

woodruffw 4y ago
This seems like a straightforward way to kill a few hundred thousand people, particularly at a time when global wheat prices will be pushing poorer countries out of the market. I think I'd rather pay a little more at the grocery store and not have that on my conscience.
- Reichhardt 4y ago
  Populations in some countries are expanding infinitely. These countries should adapt now, by reducing family sizes and generally operating within resource limits based on national output and productivity. Losses of 100,000 today will be 100 million tomorrow. Mali Population 1950: 4.7 million Mali Population 2022: 21.4 million Mali Population 2100: 80.3 million https://www.populationpyramid.net/mali/2022/ https://www.populationpyramid.net/mali/2022/ UK Population 1950: 50.6 million UK Population 2022: 68.5 million UK Population 2100: 78 million It is unrealistic to imagine that countries such as Mali will voluntarily adopt family planning or quickly reach a sub-replacement fertility rate. The only limit to their population growth is incoming food supplies. About a quarter of the population is already reliant on international aid.
  - woodruffw 4y ago
    Population growth is tied closely to privation: families have more children when they need more bodies to labor and produce resources for survival. Intentionally starving entire countries because of some misinformed attempt at Malthusianism has the opposite of the intended effect. And that's even before we consider how disgustingly callous it is.
    - Reichhardt 4y ago
      The childhood mortality rate in Mali has fallen from 37% in 1970 to 9% in 2020. The fertility in the same period fell only from 7.13 to 5.78. The number of surviving children has thus increased from 4.49 to 5.25, thanks to medical advances and international aid. As we donate aid and food, the population will continually increase until either our generosity is exhausted or some other environmental limit is hit. Mali has 37% of its population without access to contraception. We should be donating education, contraception and abortion for women, not food aid.

RappingBoomer 4y ago

some folks gonna get that summer body whether they want to or not

Havoc 4y ago

On the plus side I recently learned I’ve got a wheat & gluten intolerance so I shall be doing my bit to fix the imbalance by not eating any

xahrepap 4y ago
Sorry and welcome to the club! Unsolicited referral: America’s Test Kitchen has a cook book series called “How Can It be Gluten Free Cookbook”. We have 2 of them, I think there’s only 2. Literally everything we’ve tried has been outstanding! And the lessons they teach about what makes things work are really interesting.
- Havoc 4y ago
  >Sorry and welcome to the club! haha indeed. Though frankly I seem to be more in the sensitivity camp so very reluctant to invoke gluten anything given that it isn't comparable to actual celiac sufferers
Reichhardt 4y ago
You might simply be sensitive to Roundup, which is found as residue in bread in North America, since it is used as a pre-harvest desiccant. https://inhabitat.com/roundup-bread-the-real-reason-americans-are-intolerant-to-wheat/ https://inhabitat.com/roundup-bread-the-real-reason-american... Try consuming organic wheat products only.
- Havoc 4y ago
  >You might simply be sensitive to Roundup, This was from blood IgE anti-body screening so I'd imagine it wouldn't confuse wheat and roundup...

FooBarBizBazz 4y ago

It increasingly looks like I need a diversified portfolio of farmland, nonperishable food, solar panels, livestock, replacement parts, Nana's recipes, basic tools, loyal dogs, diesel fuel, antibiotics, good insulation, barbed wire, warm clothes, fertilizer, bandages, a foot-pedal washing machine, surveillance drones, firewood, ammunition, bags of cement, a reliable spouse, flashlights, a Toyota Hilux, a cast-iron stove, some bicycles, a well-borer, night-vision goggles, fruit trees, popular cigarettes, rain barrels, a hardcover encyclopedia, and marriageable female relatives.

formerkrogemp 4y ago
At our current rate, your antibiotics will be worthless in a decade or two. Who knows?
prawn 4y ago
I like your comment because it's useful to consider but amusing at how dire survival amongst humans might be. If you haven't watched Last Man On Earth (TV show), it's a good combo of the same thoughts (humorous, but easily provokes more serious thought). And for less-light fare, Alone is a good insight into survival in the wild, though without worrying about humans as a threat. Humans, of course, completely changes the game.

orwin 4y ago

Far from me the idea to dictate what you should eat, but now is the time to reduce meat consumption. Once every three meals should reduce it enough in developped country to add a lot of grain on the market. But once every two meals is good too. I'm not dictating anything, just think about it and how hard is would be for you.