permaculture

["John D'hondt" <dhondt@eircom.net>]

What is the draught doing in your calculations Tony. I miss that so far.
I live in Ireland where our personal productivity for 2012 will be 30 % at 
best of most other years due to weather and it could still turn into a real 
disaster where we have to cut back on every aspect of our farming 
drastically. If I would make use of the 2011 statistics this would not show 
up at all.
john

> On Aug 17, 2012, at 7:13 AM, Marjory wrote:
>
> > Toby,
> >
> > The US is NOT food self-reliant.  It take IMPORTERD oil to grow all the
> > food the US produces.  Currency collapse means no way to buy feul, means
> > the combines quit rolling, and the shelves go bare.
>
> We trade for that imported oil; there's linkage there. The people who sell 
> it to us are dependent on the food, and everything else, we trade them for 
> it (the dollars are just markers--it's goods that trade). Trade is a 
> stabilizing force, not destabilizing. The "oil independence" position is 
> no more rational than "I have to grow all my food by myself." And, almost 
> half of our imported oil and LNG (for fertilizer) comes from Mexico and 
> Canada, our most stable trading partners, with whom we have immense 
> political leverage, even in a currency collapse. Canada and Mexico need to 
> trade oil even more badly than we need to get it.
>
> Look at the numbers: In 2011 we imported 45% of our oil. Our 
> food--growing, processing, shipping, cooking--uses about 17% of our oil 
> consumption. We produce 4200 calories per day per person in the US, 
> delivered. If we lost half our oil (really unlikely!), we could cut food 
> production in half and still deliver 2000 calories a day. Diverting that 
> amount of oil use--8% if needed--to food will be a critical priority; 
> gov'ts know that hungry people topple regimes. Yes, it could happen, but 
> food is really the simplest need to take care of after shelter. I can see 
> short term shocks, and they would be followed by martial law to deliver 
> food and payments to corporate farmers to produce; the plans are in place 
> (we're not the only ones who know this!). And rapid conversion to local 
> food production has been demonstrated countless times: Cuba, Russia, 
> Argentina, Victory Gardens, etc, etc. Food is too simple to fix, compared 
> to finance, health care, insurance, law enforcement, education, a
> nd the rest that is far more ready to collapse. They are far more complex 
> systems; they'll go first. I'm much more worried that my fire department 
> will fail than I am of running out of food.
>
> Obviously we need to be putting a lot of effort into food security. And 
> funny thing is, we are already. That's why everyone, from the USDA and 
> Homeland Security on down, talks about it so much. I'm grateful to all the 
> food activists who have put the issue on the radar screen. I think it's 
> taking care of itself at just about the right pace. To me, food looks like 
> a problem, which is solvable and being solved, unlike a predicament, like 
> Peak Oil, which is not.
>
> The obvious problems--and food is very, very obvious--and are rarely the 
> ones that get you.
>
> Toby
> http://patternliteracy.com
>
>
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