> Further, if the point is food production and not food profit for the nation then the focus should be on producing the most water efficient foods (per calorie)

> Further, if the point is food production and not food profit for the nation then the focus should be on producing the most water efficient foods (per calorie) not the most profitable foods produced under an assumption of free or near free water. Wait, why are we measuring this per calorie? That's a terrible way to measure what should be produced. The US is still the fattest country in the world[1]. We don't need more calories, we need more nutrients. There are several measures of nutrient density[2]. Fats/sugars/proteins/alcohol (the things that contain calories) are macronutrients, so they are a component of nutrient density, but Americans are getting plenty of these. Optimizing incentives for calories would drive prices in a direction such that Americans will get even fatter. Let's not make this mistake. [1] http://www.worldobesity.org/site_media/library/resource_images/Overweight_and_obesity_in_Global_Adults_v2.pdf http://www.worldobesity.org/site_media/library/resource_imag... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nutrient_density https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nutrient_density EDIT: The popular discussion on this subject often centers around almonds, the comparison being that beef has a much higher calorie efficiency per water. If you look at nutrient density, almonds fare much better. EDIT 2: Australia has a standard for calculating nutrient density, which has been codified in the Nutrient Profiling Scoring Calculator (NPSC)[3]. [3] http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/industry/labelling/pages/nutrientprofilingcalculator/Default.aspx http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/industry/labelling/pages/nut...