Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["TradingPostPaul" <tradingpost@riseup.net>]

http://nfu.ca/press_releases/press/2007/May-07/food_supply_crisis___grain_st

ocks_use_ratio_release_THREE.pdf

Sent: Friday, May 11, 2007 1:20 PM
Subject: NFU news release re: food supply crisis - grain stocks use ratio

National Office
2717 Wentz Ave.
Saskatoon, Sask., S7K 4B6
Tel (306) 652-9465
Fax (306) 664-6226

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - MAY 11, 2007

LOWEST FOOD SUPPLIES IN 50 OR 100 YEARS: GLOBAL FOOD CRISIS EMERGING

SASKATOON, Sask.-Today, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA)
released its first projections of world grain supply and demand for the
coming crop year: 2007/08. USDA predicts supplies will plunge to a 53-day
equivalent-their lowest level in the 47-year period for which data exists.

"The USDA projects global grain supplies will drop to their lowest 
levels on
record. Further, it is likely that, outside of wartime, global grain
supplies have not been this low in a century, perhaps longer," said NFU
Director of Research Darrin Qualman.

Most important, 2007/08 will mark the seventh year out of the past eight in
which global grain production has fallen short of demand. This consistent
shortfall has cut supplies in half-down from a
115-day supply in 1999/00 to the current level of 53 days. "The world is
consistently failing to produce as much grain as it uses," said Qualman. He
continued: "The current low supply levels are not the result of a transient
weather event or an isolated production problem: low supplies are the 
result
of a persistent drawdown trend."

In addition to falling grain supplies, global fisheries are faltering.
Reports in respected journals Science and Nature state that 1/3 of ocean
fisheries are in collapse, 2/3 will be in collapse by 2025, and our ocean
fisheries may be virtually gone by 2048. "Aquatic food systems are
collapsing, and terrestrial food systems are under tremendous stress," said
Qualman.

Demand for food is rising rapidly. There is a worldwide push to proliferate
a North American-style meat-based diet based on intensive livestock
production-turning feedgrains into meat in this way means exchanging 3 to 7
kilos of grain protein for one kilo of meat protein. Population is
rising-2.5 billion people will join the global population in the coming
decades.

"Every six years, we're adding to the world the equivalent of a North
American population. We're trying to feed those extra people, feed a
growing livestock herd, and now, feed our cars, all from a static farmland
base. No one should be surprised that food production can't keep up," said
Qualman.

Qualman said that the converging problems of natural gas and fertilizer
constraints, intensifying water shortages, climate change, farmland loss 
and
degradation, population increases, the proliferation of livestock feeding,
and an increasing push to divert food supplies into biofuels means that we
are in the opening phase of an intensifying food shortage.

Qualman cautioned, however, that there are no easy fixes. "If we try to do
more of the same, if we try to produce, consume, and export more food while
using more fertilizer, water, and chemicals, we will only intensify our
problems. Instead, we need to rethink our relation to food, farmers,
production, processing, and distribution. We need to create a system
focused on feeding people and creating health. We need to strengthen the
food production systems around the world. Diversity, resilience, and
sustainability are key," concluded Qualman.

For More Information:
Darrin Qualman, Director of Research:
652-9465
Stewart Wells, NFU President:
773-6852

Backgrounder to the NFU's May 11, 2007 news release

The United States Department of Agriculture reports recent grain supply and
demand numbers on its World Agriculture Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE)
website at
http://usda.mannlib.cornell.edu/MannUsda/viewDocumentInfo.do?documentID=1194

 
<http://usda.mannlib.cornell.edu/MannUsda/viewDocumentInfo.do?documentID=119

4>

The longer-term data on world grains supply and demand is at
Production, Supply, and Demand Online (PSD) at
http://www.fas.usda.gov/psdonline/psdhome.aspx 
<http://www.fas.usda.gov/psdonline/psdhome.aspx>

The NFU created the graph below using USDA data from the above-noted sites.
The graph takes stocks/use ratios ("ending stocks" divided by "total use")
and multiplies these percentages by
365 to get a more intuitive "days of supply" number.

Note that the graph projects supplies for the upcoming year to hit their
lowest record levels-lower even than the 1973 levels that spurred a rapid
price increase. Note also the unprecedented and
steep downward trendline for the past 8 years.