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  • From: "Frances and David" <fdnokes@hotmail.com>
  • To: "permaculture" <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] The US is no longer food self-reliant?
  • Date: Thu, 16 Aug 2012 11:45:03 -0700

Food for thought here. Thank you.
What I am wondering is how might real estate be affected.
I have some very mixed feelings as someone interested in moving out of a lovely town residence and into a country homesteading scenario.
Wondering how big a risk to sell one's home at this time.
Of course, it's all just anybody's guess, but I have not seen anything much on this topic at all.
Anyone?
Thanks again for this interesting post, Toby.
Best,
Frances


My bet is on a brief, extreme currency collapse (loss of faith in the dollar) rendering the dollar essentially worthless for a few months while things get sorted out. Put your wealth in things that are tangible. A currency collapse will wipe out the paper wealth of everyone with investments and a bank account--and disrupt commodities markets, which can disrupt food deliveries and make farmers plant more or less, depending. But, as in the USSR, Argentina, and lots of other places, currency collapses get repaired in a few months or, at worst, a year or two. You just have to plan to survive that, and adjust to the new system. It doesn't fall apart for long.

The US is much more food secure than almost any other nation. We've got other things to worry about. Focus on what's likely, not on what scares you.

Toby
http://patternliteracy.com


On Aug 15, 2012, at 12:57 PM, Marjory wrote:

Micheal,

You are so right.

Looks like of all the various scenarios, economic collapse is pretty
high on the list. Doesn't matter which thing causes it though ....
food and water will become paramont. Thos who have any knowledge at all
will be called to teach, share, give. I am doing what I can to
prepare. Hope everyone else is too.

Marjory


On 7/4/2012 1:31 PM, Michael Pilarski wrote:
Several years ago I read a news report that the US had just changed from being a net exporter of agricultural products to a net importer. We now import more value of ag imports than value of ag exports.

Now bearing in mind that currencies are manipulated and that the currencies of exporting countries in Africa, South America, etc are kept low in comparison to dollars and euros, that the situation is probably worse than officially stated.

Bearing in mind that in the event of a dollar collapse there would be a lot less oil, food and other imports coming into the US.

Bearing in mind that when the Soviet Union collapsed that their industrial food production dropped 80% and that home gardens had to pick up the slack.

We should have plans laid for what to do in such an eventuality. Some years back I proposed that in such a crisis that all permaculturists should undertake train the trainers programs in their neighborhood to vastly increase local food production using local resources and permaculture (and regular gardening) techniques.

Michael Pilarski

--- On Wed, 7/4/12, Marjory<forestgarden@gvtc.com> wrote:

From: Marjory<forestgarden@gvtc.com>
Subject: [permaculture] The US is no longer food self-reliant?
To: "permaculture"<permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
Date: Wednesday, July 4, 2012, 10:40 AM

Hi Everyone,

I just had this grim realization.

This blows up that 'Bread Basket To The World" story.

With very few exceptions, every bite of every American meal comes from
big Ag. And big Ag just coulndn't produce without massive amounts of
oil and natrual gas.

From Wikipedia, the US imports about 65% of the oil it uses.

So could the US produce enough food to feed it's population without
imported oil? It doesn't look likely.

I know each of us is all about change towards local sustainability, but
as it stands /today/, the US is *not food self-reliant.*

Is there some problem with the logic here?

The US does export about 15%-20% of the biggest crop it produces -
corn. But we also import a lot of other food stuffs (fruits and
vegetables) The US is not really a big net exporter.

Am I missing something here...

Marjory


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