We Are Now One Year Away From Global Riots, Complex Systems Theorists Say [food shortages]
52 replies, posted
[QUOTE=Jacknife;37626431]I'm a bit confused. Am I reading this right? Is it going to be third world countries? Or does it include UK, USA, AUS, etc?[/QUOTE]
Hey man, I'll tell you an amazing secret bro. It's a huge secret so pls don't tell anyone.
I hear like man, okay just hear me out... Reading the story actually reveals questions and like, isn't that hard man.
just try it.
[QUOTE=Jacknife;37626431]I'm a bit confused. Am I reading this right? Is it going to be third world countries? Or does it include UK, USA, AUS, etc?[/QUOTE]
Don't be guilible, western countries have trade contracts and most important: Billions in subventions to keep food prices stable.
[QUOTE=DamagePoint;37625161]I didn't even notice that food prices went up in 2011 so unless there's a mass famine I don't think most first world countries are going to notice.[/QUOTE]
There's going to be a massive increase in the cost of meat soon due to the drought the midwest US is having.
Sometimes I just want to bury my head in the sand, I know it's a horrible thing to say, but with all these projections on our doom it just gets me depressed.
[QUOTE=Coble;37627530]Sometimes I just want to bury my head in the sand, I know it's a horrible thing to say, but with all these projections on our doom it just gets me depressed.[/QUOTE]
it'll probably be worse thinking about it than actually living it. I mean, experiencing it will be pretty damn bad (in fact it'll be REALLY damn bad), but when you're anxious I tend to find you can make Darth Vader flying through the air and molesting you sound plausible.
This don't sound good at all; we need to invest more money into agriculture and make more food.
Actually, the problem probably isn't [B]JUST[/B] the lack of food; it's the disparity between countries; some places have a lot more food than they need, whilst others have just under enough to keep most folks alive. This might sound idealist, but we should honestly sell off our surplus agricultural produce to the other countries at a fair price, or even set up plenty of farms in places where food is scarce. The sooner we have hydroponic greenhouses and good-quality vat-grown meat, the better.
Another problem is the rich hoarding food for themselves; i'd imagine some Ugandan warlord sits atop a throne of pork 'n' beans and wears a crown of grapes and eggs, brandishing a scepter made of corn-cobs and topped with an artichoke. Not to forget North Korea either; doesn't the government have the majority of their food stockpiled for the higher-ups? In my view, hoarding food when others are starving essentially portrays the asshole as a great big pinata; they risk getting cracked wide open and their resources get distributed amongst the community.
it's surprising how, even when it's a stable system as it is now, the 1st-world food chain is ridiculously fragile. a knock-on effect from some sort of ruination of the transport systems, possibly from strikes and/or fuel price inflation, can destroy the chain in a matter of days. this is because of how finely crafted the chain is in terms of its consistent 24/7 stream of goods
so what the article describes might be more realistic than it seems. although the western world is sat on a ridiculous surplus of food at any one time, the ability to store and move this food around properly lies on a knife edge
thomas malthus
thomas malthus
thomas malthus
[img]http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/77/Thomas_Malthus_by_Vallotton.jpg[/img]
'ere lads!
buy your torches and pitchforks now
they'll skyrocket in price as we near the date
We should buy as much food as possible to prepare for shortages.
i can haved imagine it two bee like it was in shrekle in the swarmp
[img]http://i143.photobucket.com/albums/r130/Vargas2087/Alpha%20Centauri%20pics/droneriots.jpg[/img]
[editline]11th September 2012[/editline]
[QUOTE=Sobotnik;37628126]We should buy as much food as possible to prepare for shortages.[/QUOTE]
That mentality is what causes shortages to get bad. Everyone decides to stock up, and then you run out.
[QUOTE=S31-Syntax;37628152]That mentality is what causes shortages to get bad. Everyone decides to stock up, and then you run out.[/QUOTE]
Then everybody has to stock up before we run out. :o
[QUOTE=Sobotnik;37628233]Then everybody has to stock up before we run out. :o[/QUOTE]
No, everybody needs to get what they need, not what they want.
20 people with a capacity of 10 units
There are 100 units in total
If everyone tries to stock up, then unless you regulate and ration, then you end up with like, 10 people with 10 units and everyone else gets nothing.
If you stock up as much as possible, you will CAUSE the shortage. Food stores are not designed to hold enough for all people, its designed to hold enough until the next supply cycle.
[QUOTE=S31-Syntax;37628320]No, everybody needs to get what they need, not what they want.
20 people with a capacity of 10 units
There are 100 units in total
If everyone tries to stock up, then unless you regulate and ration, then you end up with like, 10 people with 10 units and everyone else gets nothing.
If you stock up as much as possible, you will CAUSE the shortage. Food stores are not designed to hold enough for all people, its designed to hold enough until the next supply cycle.[/QUOTE]
He's taking the piss.
[QUOTE=S31-Syntax;37628320]No, everybody needs to get what they need, not what they want.
20 people with a capacity of 10 units
There are 100 units in total
If everyone tries to stock up, then unless you regulate and ration, then you end up with like, 10 people with 10 units and everyone else gets nothing.
If you stock up as much as possible, you will CAUSE the shortage. Food stores are not designed to hold enough for all people, its designed to hold enough until the next supply cycle.[/QUOTE]
That's only if [I]everyone[/I] starts stocking up. And that'll never happen.
Also fun fact: The average household has enough food for a total of 3 days (9 meals).
Mum buys food once a week so we have food for at least 10 days.
[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;37625292]People are starving because if they price of food drops dramatically, it'll put a lot of farmers bankrupt - and then who will grow the food?
Not to mention that a lot of those starving already can't afford much food to begin with and it's expensive to hand out free food all the time to them, no matter how humanitarian or noble it may be.[/QUOTE]
Not if we create a positive feedback loop. If we increase the productivity of food production, then the food can be produced at a higher amount. We can then sell it, preferably at a lower amount. Because farmers are working less per harvest for more, because of higher productivity, they will get paid less per harvest but more overall, keeping them sufficiently paid. Even if they are paid less than they were before, then it wouldn't hurt that bad, because the price of food will have lowered significantly.
Essentially
We give farmers better capital, they get paid less per harvest, therefore more food at lower prices, and yet it balances out because food is less expensive.
Less expensive food provides for more of the population, allowing more laborers to further enter the market. This will increase economic productivity and begin to stabilize and grow shitty economies.
The only reason why positive feedback loops in economies like this don't work is when a profit-maker increases productivity but does not lower the cost of their product on the market. While this may be challenged by a competitor who takes advantage of the situation, forcing prices down, it doesn't when there's only one producer (i.e. the state or a single MNC in most third world countries), and rarely does in a profit-based industry where all competitors have created a price that provides for maximum profits yet is still affordable for the average person.
This is why the US government subsidizes our major food product- corn- so much. With most other distributors, corn would be treated like meat: that is, even though it's produced for dirt cheap, it's price-jacked a million times before making it to a retailer. The US government puts a fair bit of money into the corn industry to keep the prices low, which is why corn is now in the vast majority of US food products and is the major feed grain for livestock. It keeps corn at the level it should be, and created a positive feedback loop where we now produce enough corn to give every person in the world 10 ears of corn every year, if we spread it all out.
The price of food is linked heavily with the overall strength of an economy and standard of living, and it's not hard to figure out why. When food is cheap, people are able to eat well, have more of an expendable income, and can work healthier and longer. It won't put farmers out of a job, because while they may be paid less early on, as the economy develops, the overall price of food goes down, etc, not only will the less they'd be making be more valuable in relation to how much food their dollar buys, the economy itself will have been strengthened, giving everything a lower cost to produce and the currency a higher value, and therefore the quality of living increases. There's now an opening for a consumer market, and cheap food production will be in high demand (as is the case in the US, where we produce more food than will ever be eaten by the nation) leading to even more farmers and a better income.
Basically, lower food costs are the essential starting point to getting any economy on track. You NEED lower food costs to start the positive feedback loop of establishing a valued currency, industrializing, opening a consumer market, and then stabilizing a healthy economy.
[editline]11th September 2012[/editline]
[QUOTE=Emperor Scorpious II;37628659]That's only if [I]everyone[/I] starts stocking up. And that'll never happen.
Also fun fact: The average household has enough food for a total of 3 days (9 meals).[/QUOTE]
In what country?
In the US, I'd say no. Working in a grocery store, and from personal experience, I'd argue that the average family (at least in this region) buys a week's worth of food at a time. I know a 150$ grocery trip for my family (only 2 people, though) will keep us set for 2 weeks. Since the average grocery trip for a family from my experience is between 150$ and 250$ at a time, I would assume that the average family would have enough for a week to ten days per trip, and since alot of our customers return for large orders about every two weeks, I'm guessing that's roughly accurate. This is a lower-middle and working class demographic of rural Michigan, with some upper-middle class thrown in.
Good to know my country would be fine on it's own. It'll be down to the basics, so no more fancy shit and sweets, but we'll survive.
But on topic, the inefficient usage of food in the western world is disgusting. I worked at a 5-star hotel recently, and to maintain their "class" or what the fucking ever, thay had to please every customer no matter what. If a fat fuck wanted one more meatball on his plate when the platter was empty, we filled it back up and gave him that one meatball, then threw all the rest out. The up-side was that employees could just hoard whatever they wanted from the leftovers and eat it where the customers couldn't see...
Atleast, I can play Black Mesa before that might happen.
why are we searching for a cure for cancer? We should make super cancer!
Actually we are in the middle of global food price riots.
German article:[url]http://www.dradio.de/dkultur/sendungen/interview/1864294/[/url]
It's an interview with the UN special reporter for the "right to have food"
Hunger riots we never heard about:
Indonesia,Honduras, North of the Senegal, Phillipines,
41 Mio. h went got property of world-player conglomerates last year in Africa alone, the EU subventions make EU vegies available in Africa for 1/3rd of the price of local producers
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