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Cuba trade with most countries in the world. North Korea is popped up by China. Iran should have no problems importing food with their huge oil revenue. Russia

Cuba trade with most countries in the world. North Korea is popped up by China. Iran should have no problems importing food with their huge oil revenue. Russia is under the harshest sanction at the moment yet do you see any food shortage there? How about Belarus? Perhaps their regime’s failure is the reason why some of those countries have food availability issue?

mcpackieh 3y ago
China too has an abysmal food self-sufficiency ratio, and it has been trending worse. Between 2000 and 2020, their food SSR dropped from 93% to 65%. This is a damning indictment of their government and economic system.
- dirtyid 3y ago
  > SSR dropped from 93% to 65%. This is a damning indictment of their government and economic system. The opposite. PRC SSR dropped because economy exploded and people can afford significantly more calories, including imported food products. Meanwhile absolute food security increased since 2000s baseline, grain production per capita went from ~350kg to ~400kg while adding ~200m people. Meanwhile SSR in SKR is 44%, JP is 38%, TW is 31%. Obviously, this is a damning indictment of their government and economic system.
  - mcpackieh 3y ago
    When food demand skyrockets but production doesn't, that's a damning indictment of the system. Production should be scaling with that economic prosperity, but in the case of China it isn't. Other countries with economic prosperity and huge amounts of land have food SSR above 1. China's economic prosperity is masking the problem.
    - dirtyid 3y ago
      No it's just recognition that the problem is PRC has less ariable land and water resources per capita. Relative to other developed economies with comparable restraints, PRC's doing the the same thing of importing calories (and by extention, water) from ag exporters with excess agri resources, except PRC also smart enough to pursue absolute per capita food self sufficiency, hence demand skyrocketed AND domestic production of calories ALSO increased even relative to population increase. Not to mention within PRC capita GDP bracket (i.e. just below high income), PRC system actually delivers more calories and protein comparable to much wealthier countries - average PRC citizen gets to enjoy better diet due to the system.
- TeMPOraL 3y ago
  I wonder how that works. Naive intuition tells me it should be the opposite - the market generally isn't capable of processing longtermist ideas like food self-sufficiency, so if that SSR drops, you'd imagine it's because as the food market became increasingly free and profit-based, it aligned itself with local preferences and global economy - meaning imports for price arbitrage, and imports for variety.

mcpackieh 3y ago

China too has an abysmal food self-sufficiency ratio, and it has been trending worse. Between 2000 and 2020, their food SSR dropped from 93% to 65%. This is a damning indictment of their government and economic system.

dirtyid 3y ago
> SSR dropped from 93% to 65%. This is a damning indictment of their government and economic system. The opposite. PRC SSR dropped because economy exploded and people can afford significantly more calories, including imported food products. Meanwhile absolute food security increased since 2000s baseline, grain production per capita went from ~350kg to ~400kg while adding ~200m people. Meanwhile SSR in SKR is 44%, JP is 38%, TW is 31%. Obviously, this is a damning indictment of their government and economic system.
- mcpackieh 3y ago
  When food demand skyrockets but production doesn't, that's a damning indictment of the system. Production should be scaling with that economic prosperity, but in the case of China it isn't. Other countries with economic prosperity and huge amounts of land have food SSR above 1. China's economic prosperity is masking the problem.
  - dirtyid 3y ago
    No it's just recognition that the problem is PRC has less ariable land and water resources per capita. Relative to other developed economies with comparable restraints, PRC's doing the the same thing of importing calories (and by extention, water) from ag exporters with excess agri resources, except PRC also smart enough to pursue absolute per capita food self sufficiency, hence demand skyrocketed AND domestic production of calories ALSO increased even relative to population increase. Not to mention within PRC capita GDP bracket (i.e. just below high income), PRC system actually delivers more calories and protein comparable to much wealthier countries - average PRC citizen gets to enjoy better diet due to the system.
TeMPOraL 3y ago
I wonder how that works. Naive intuition tells me it should be the opposite - the market generally isn't capable of processing longtermist ideas like food self-sufficiency, so if that SSR drops, you'd imagine it's because as the food market became increasingly free and profit-based, it aligned itself with local preferences and global economy - meaning imports for price arbitrage, and imports for variety.