Community | May 03, 2009 | 4 comments

Could a Food Shortage Bring Down Civilization?

source: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=civilization-food-shortages

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csmonut
This article is rather long and basically a no brainer for many who post here.
This is a concept many may find totally bewildering, but it can be turned around. However, we had better hurry-up, because the clock is ticking faster each day.
For those that know of the Doomsday Clock...wouldn't it be nice to see it stop?

Excerpts:
"Food scarcity and the resulting higher food prices are pushing poor countries into chaos.
Such “failed states” can export disease, terrorism, illicit drugs, weapons and refugees.
Water shortages, soil losses and rising temperatures from global warming are placing severe limits on food production.
Without massive and rapid intervention to address these three environmental factors, the author argues, a series of government collapses could threaten the world order."
"In six of the past nine years world grain production has fallen short of consumption, forcing a steady drawdown in stocks."
"States fail when national governments can no longer provide personal security, food security and basic social services such as education and health care."
"Failing states are of international concern because they are a source of terrorists, drugs, weapons and refugees, threatening political stability everywhere."
"In contrast, the recent surge in world grain prices is trend-driven, making it unlikely to reverse without a reversal in the trends themselves. On the demand side, those trends include the ongoing addition of more than 70 million people a year; a growing number of people wanting to move up the food chain to consume highly grain-intensive livestock products [see “The Greenhouse Hamburger,” by Nathan Fiala; Scientific American, February 2009]; and the massive diversion of U.S. grain to ethanol-fuel distilleries."
  1. groups:
    Community,   Green,   Humanism,   Current Democrats
  2. tags:
    Environment,  Climate Change,  Water,  Disease,  3 more
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4 comments // Could a Food Shortage Bring Down Civilization?

  • desertcat
    • 0
      desertcat  

    • If there were a food shortage here the people of the US would panic, bring out their guns and shoot anyone who came within 500 feet of their property. Look how they act when a snowstorm is announced or hurricane. You would think they were going weeks without supplies instead of one or two days. Probably be the same in other countries too. the people of Africa and other third world countries have been starving for years and yet they survive and thrive.
      Take a challenge do not go shopping for food foe next two weeks, only eat what is in your cabinets and refrierator and see if you can last.

    • 2 years ago
  • csmonut
    • 0
      csmonut  

    • V,
      I do believe that a major famine could topple a country that has a weakened infrastructure.
      Perhaps even a country whose infrastructure is sound, but it's leaders are not.
      History may not be able to predict what can actually happen in a case like this because there is no historical structure to build upon.
      A global economy, population, climate change, water and food shoratges are not something that has much history.

    • 2 years ago
  • WakeUpPeople
    • 0
      WakeUpPeople  
    • csmonut:

      "A global economy, population, climate change, water and food shoratges are not something that has much history."

      That is absolutely right csmonut. While famines have taken place in history, they have never been on a global scale and never under the current conditions humanity has created.

    • 2 years ago
  • Vierotchka
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