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Brazil develops tropical wheat and predicts self-sufficiency in 5 years
- tootie 3y agoSelf-sufficiency is not a real metric when it comes to commodities. Wheat sells at the market rate to whoever buys it.
- ouid 3y agomarkets are a construct of peacetime. self-sufficiency is not
- myth2018 3y agoWheat prices fluctuate according to USD/BRL rates and this is one of the reasons Brazilian inflation gets significantly affected by exchange rates -- which is expected, considering how many basic products, like bread, depend on wheat. The prices will still fluctuate like you said, but a local production can give the country some autonomy to design policies and attenuate the impact.
- Barrin92 3y agoself sufficiency in food is pretty much the most fundamental basis of political autonomy for any nation. It's honestly harder to imagine a 'real metric'
- ClumsyPilot 3y agoSo you learnt no lessons from over-reliance on Russian gas, which has caused widespread misery in Europe. What do you think will happen if there is major crop failure and food shortages? These free-market extremists don't know when to stop, they have caused more damage than the Taliban.
- lostlogin 3y ago> Russian gas, which has caused widespread misery in Europe. I agree with you cynicism about the free market, but the situation with Russian gas turned out way better than was feared. Party this was due to a mild winter but the forecasts were very grim for a while there.
- doctor_eval 3y agoIn matters like this, it’s not what actually happened, but what might have happened, that is important.
- brabel 3y agoThey are responding to a factual statement: "... caused widespread misery in Europe". I live in Europe and have to laugh at that. The misery they're talking about is a 2x increase in the electric bill, which some of the richer governments (e.g. Sweden) paid back to most consumers (I got two paybacks so far, making my electric bill for the year about the same as the year before, I would say). If they think this is "misery", I think the commenter has absolutely never seen anything even close to real misery.
- fijiaarone 3y agoTrade isn’t the problem. War is.
- tambourine_man 3y agoEmbrapa does a truly remarkable job. It has for decades
- daveguy 3y agoTo save a search, Embrapa is The Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation[0]. Very impressive. [0] https://www.embrapa.br/en/international https://www.embrapa.br/en/international
- abdullahkhalids 3y agoThey claim the current wheat yield is 3.3 tons/hectare while the new variety has yield 10 tons/hectare, about a 3x difference. What impact does this have on the micronutrient profile of the harvested crop? And does this result in faster depletion of those micronutrients from the soil, i.e. is it sustainable to harvest this crop?
- scythe 3y agoYields of most plants are higher in the tropics: there is more sunlight, more water, and no frost. Wheat, historically, hasn't been able to benefit from this as it wasn't adapted to the climate. Most minor minerals are present in plants to the tune of 0.001% by weight or less. We extract many times as much manganese, chromium, copper etc as the metal as we would from the soil. Selenium is generally postulated as the limiting element for life on Earth, but we're not yet at the point of needing to supplement it in soil. Brazil nuts are supposedly a particularly Se-avid crop, yet they haven't destroyed the ecosystem of Brazil so far. Soil depletion more generally consists of changes in texture (less water holding) and reduced ability to slow-release the nutrients we already add (NPK). It has been addressed by adding clays — chiefly aluminosilicates — which are predominantly composed of elements not utilized by living things (mostly). In other words, it's usually not the nutrients themselves being removed from a "depleted" soil, at least in the modern day.
- blacksqr 3y agoThe bottleneck on large-scale farming is always nitrogen fertilizer. The only adequate source of nitrogen is ammonia manufactured from petroleum. So Brazil's chief challenge will be obtaining adequate ammonium fertilizers.
- namaria 3y agoBrazilian soils are phosphate poor. I believe that's typical of tropical soils. So they have a mineral bottleneck, that can't be solved by pumping energy into the supply chain.
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- daveguy 3y agoAnyone familiar with the governmental policies of Brazil? They mentioned deforestation twice to say that it's not a problem because this will be done on existing farmland. But, how long that will hold when there's money to be made?
- uoaei 3y agoIf Bolsonaro were still in charge I'd be concerned but Lula is an advocate of indigenous communities so I'm not as worried. There is still plenty of corruption and schemers who will poach land but they won't have a bright green light like they would have before Lula was elected.
- fijiaarone 3y agoIndigenous communities would rather grow wheat and raise cattle and sell timber than pose in grass skirts and lip rings for exploitive camera crews.
- matheusmoreira 3y agoYou should be more concerned now. Deforestation is a lot higher now with Lula in power. He's also making moves that sideline the environmental agenda. Ironic, isn't it?
- uoaei 3y agoSource? Sibling comment has an article that says the opposite. And anyway, the Amazon is huge so land poachers are hard to detect and catch in real time. It's much more likely that poachers feel a time crunch that wasn't as tight under Bolsonaro since he gave them free rein.
- matheusmoreira 3y agohttps://www.gov.br/mma/pt-br/analise-dos-alertas-de-desmatamento-na-amazonia-legal-jan-fev-2023 https://www.gov.br/mma/pt-br/analise-dos-alertas-de-desmatam... Haven't found good english sources newer than 2020. Sibling article you mentioned says nothing about amazon deforestation. It's about indigenous people's land rights.
- seydor 3y ago[flagged]
- diego_moita 3y agoAuto-sufficiency in 5 years and back to dependency in 25 years, after global warming decimates their agriculture.
- pbj1968 3y agoI think they could probably manage to survive a 10% reduction…
- throwaway1777 3y agoAmazingly snarky claim with so few sources to back it up!
- diego_moita 3y ago> with so few sources to back it up! There are few sources to back up Global Warming? Oh, ok. I rest my case.
- mfcl 3y agoI think they meant sources about Brazil's agriculture getting decimated in 25 years.
- throwaway1777 3y agoYes
- morkalork 3y agoWhat do you propose, just sit down and wait for starvation to set in?
- diego_moita 3y agoNo, there are 2 solutions for Brazil's problems: Guarulhos and Galeão. I took Guarulhos, 10 years ago. Couldn't be happier.
- nemonemo 3y agoThis sounds amazing, but at the same time, I am concerned about the rain forest. Obviously more economically useful crops would accelerate repurposing the rain forest. Maybe the world would need to subsidize Brazil more to keep the rain forest? And could Brazil be expecting more subsidy with this development?
- schoen 3y agoI'm sure some actual Brazilians will comment since many are active on HN. I remember being asked in elementary school to help "buy a piece of the Amazon to stop it from being cut down". I mentioned this years later to some Brazilian friends, and they found it amazing, saying first that it almost certainly wasn't a specific plot of land, and second that enforcement of property rights and anti-poaching laws in spread-out rural areas has been spotty, and also hindered by violence and corruption. So I guess it's a thorny question, if someone in Brazil accepts such a subsidy, how that ultimately translates into physically stopping people from making illicit uses of Amazon lands. Edit: In theory, stopping an illicit farm (which takes time to grow and has to be tended and harvested) would be easier than stopping someone with a pickup truck and chainsaw from just grabbing a bunch of trees for lumber. On the other hand, the U.S. has spent tons of money trying to eradicate poor people's coca farms in the Andes and it doesn't seem to have had the level of success the government hoped for (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coca_eradication https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coca_eradication). Meanwhile, some people are apparently still maintaining wildcat marijuana farms on U.S. Federal lands. Wheat farms aren't as profitable as coca or marijuana, but even suppressing certain kinds of farms in remote enough areas seems like it can be non-trivial!
- mxkopy 3y agoAt the level of randoms with chainsaws, my first thought is to treat it as a drug production problem. Treat chainsaws like methamphetamine precursors.
- lostlogin 3y agoHow well has that worked with meth? A better analogy with the drug war would be to copy a country that manages meth by managing addiction. Offer better alternative and employment to the farmers and loggers. Obviously this isn’t easy.
- shinjitsu 3y agoAn interesting take on this. Will it lead to a general increase for the Global South? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKvT7OS-lbU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKvT7OS-lbU
- Seanambers 3y agoPeter Zeihan has a lot of interesting POVs. I'm half way through his first book 'The Accidental Superpower' and he makes convincing arguments all around so far.
- garrickvanburen 3y agoI find he continues to make solid arguments though and including his most recent The End of the World Is Just the Beginning.
- storkhm 3y agoI have to try to get through Guns, Germs and Steel again. Excruciating detail is a good way to put it with that book.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- GravityLabs 3y agoThis is incredible news to read. I am now even more optimistic about the future considering this and the progress in renewables (in market) and fusion (in meaningful achievement) over the last 15 years.
- atlas_shrugged 3y agoWho wrote this article? How come it has no byline?
- neom 3y agoIt's ripped from another site, looks like this is the author: https://www.czapp.com/author/carla-aranha/ https://www.czapp.com/author/carla-aranha/
- News-Dog 3y ago[flagged]
- marcodiego 3y agoThere are a few things that would make Brazil a lot more stable economically (and even socially and politically) if we achieved self-sufficiency: Fossil fuels: Currently, Brazil is self-sufficient in oil, but we export petrol to buy back refined fuels (gasoline and diesel). If we were self-sufficient in fossil fuels we would be much more immune to inflation every time OPEC decides to reduce oil output. Wheat: We are the top of the world exporting foods. We produce 6x our current need. Nevertheless, we still need imported wheat. Ukraine war and dollar variations literary affect our bread. Fertilizers: The largest world food producer needs imported fertilizers. The irony: our main supplier is Russia. This basically prevents Brazil taking any side in the conflict and affects our (and our buyers) food prices as much as wheat. Achieving self-sufficiency in these three areas would be like a second independence for us (first was when we got free from Portugal).
- lostlogin 3y ago> Fertilizers: The largest world food producer needs imported fertilizers. The irony: our main supplier is Russia. This basically prevents Brazil taking any side in the conflict and affects our (and our buyers) food prices as much as wheat. No, it means you can’t take a position without paying a cost. A lot of countries used to depend on Russia for various things, and they have paid a price to change this.
- mkoubaa 3y agoIf Brazil exports less food it isn't Brazil alone that would pay the price
- roqi 3y ago> If Brazil exports less food it isn't Brazil alone that would pay the price Ukraine is/was the world's bread basket. Supporting Russia jeopardizes the world's access to food. Brazil's actions don't exist in a vacuum.
- irusensei 3y agoBrazil is not Europe. It’s not going to be some minor inconvenience like having people to take cold showers and virtual signal on the internet. There will be famine and the poorest people will die.
- courseofaction 3y agoThis article is a copy and paste of an article dated 6 March 2023: https://www.czapp.com/analyst-insights/brazil-develops-tropical-wheat-and-predicts-self-sufficiency-in-5-years/ https://www.czapp.com/analyst-insights/brazil-develops-tropi...
- doctor_eval 3y agoAs tropical weather slowly moves further north and south from the topics, this seems like good news for humanity in general?
- vitorgrs 3y agoIn the 80's, Embrapa (same research agency) discovered a way to grow Soy in the Midwest/cerrado... And that's how today Brazil is the largest soy exporter in the world. Before the 80's, soy was only grown in the South of Brazil (and Brazil imported soy at the time as I recall). Currently, wheat is also only grown in the South as well. Now, things are not simple. The wheat prices will need to be competitive to make farmers plant wheat instead of only soy. Soy currently totally dominates Brazilian farming. Everywhere you look you only see soy. PS: Embrapa is also developing several varieties of grapes for Cerrado/Midwest region. Currently it's basically only grown in the South as well.
- spaceman_2020 3y agoThe same country that imports Brazilian soy (China) also has a lot of appetite for wheat.
- joak 3y agoMore agriculture in Brazil means more destruction of Amazon forest.
- spaceman_2020 3y agoThis is a massive development for the world, not just Brazil. Tropical wheat would fix the constant food insecurity issues in all the tropical countries in the world.
- pelasaco 3y agoUS: We have to bring democracy to Brazil, ASAP.
- pvaldes 3y agoSo we have a free hectare and we want to produce food. We decide to culture wheat in that space. Our wheat would reach around 1m high, thus our "food 3D printer" has a volume of 100 x 100 x 1m. We could obtain 2 to 7 tons of wheat in that space With corn our production space is 100 x 100 x 2 m and we can obtain on average 5 tons of corn (but we could obtain 7-10 tons with some extra effort). With avocados our production volume is 100 x 100 x 25 m. We could obtain between 7 and 13 tons of Has avocados, but with a good culture practices, good rootstocks and smart planning we could produce 23 tons With Oranges we could harvest also 10 - 22 tons of oranges And bananas would yield 50-60 tons of food... on average So If our goal is to feed as many people as possible, what should we culture, trees or herbs?
- petre 3y agoThis is great but I think they'll burn down the Amazonian forests to turn them into dipe ground for intensive agriculture. We are too dependant on grain. We should probably learn from the Koreans and Japanese, diversify and do more algae farming?