Food & Water Shortage

March 27, 2008 From MSN sympatico
If it seems like you are paying more for your cereal, beer and pizza lately, shake your fist in the direction of Pakistan, Uganda and Argentina, because a weird confluence of international events are combining to slash the world supply of wheat and boost prices. The downside of globalization is that a crop failure 10,000 miles away can lead to pricier Bud Lites here.
It's actually a lot more serious than that. The New Scientist magazine reports that a wheat disease that started in central Africa actually threatens to destroy most of the world wheat crop, leaving millions to starve. A fungus called Ug99 has already spread from Africa to Iran and is bearing down on Pakistan, according to the report. This is bad news because Pakistan and Punjab wheat is extremely important to the entire food chain of the densely populous plains of South Asia.
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Food prices are on the rise. Oil price increases have not shrunk the human food supply, but biofuel production has! The more biofuels we produce, the less food we have
to eat, because we grow biofuel crops, even switch grass, using the same land, water, fertilizer, farm equipment, and labor we use to grow food. The world is running out of wheat because too many wheat farmers have switched to growing corn for ethanol production. The New Scientist magazine reports that a wheat disease called UG99 that started in central Africa actually threatens to destroy most of the wheat crop in that part of the world, leaving millions to starve. Add to that the cost of transporting food, droughts, and flooding and infections like UG99, and we have a scenario where food prices will climb drastically.

Wheat prices have more than doubled in the past couple of years. That means that loaf of bread for your morning toast, and your weekend pizza will cost a lot more. It’s likely that a lot of people are unaware of the price of rice hitting $760 a tonne. Part of a surge in global food costs, rice prices on world markets have jumped 50 per cent in the past two months and at least doubled since 2004. A sharp rise in the price of rice is hitting consumer pocketbooks and raising fears of public turmoil in the many parts of Asia where rice is a staple. Beef and poultry will also cost more as it costs more to feed cattle and chicken as well as transporting food. Add to that, the world population continues to grow and will soon approach seven billion, and by 2050 it is projected to reach nine billion. Just two hundred years ago it was slightly over one billion. The emerging countries of China and India have over 2 billion people combined. Where is the extra food coming from? It will simply be a case of supply and demand. Food shortages lead to higher prices. Escalating food costs could pose a greater problem than soaring oil prices for the North American economy because the average household spends close to three times as much for food as for gasoline.

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has released an extensive report on the current state of the global environment. Climate change, food and water shortage and a decline in biodiversity threaten humanity's survival. Immediate action is necessary, the report warns. So what do we do? Bury our heads in the sand and wait for some miracle? The answer lays in each one of us. We seem to sit around pointing fingers at other companies and countries while the situation becomes more dire. In North America we have not really been exposed yet to food shortages and the types of famines that they have in third world countries. There is an extreme lack of urgency, in North America especially, in regards to this issue. We all are going to be faced with a catastrophic food shortage soon if something is not done. Rising food prices could threaten political stability around the world. The security implications should also not be underestimated as food riots are already being reported across the globe. Current food price trends are likely to increase sharply both the incidence and depth of food insecurity. Rising food costs have been blamed for violent unrest in Egypt, Haiti, Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Mauritania, Mexico, Mozambique and Senegal. Protests have also occurred in Uzbekistan, Yemen, Bolivia and Indonesia. China, India, Pakistan, Cambodia and Vietnam have curbed rice exports to ensure there is enough for their own people.

Experts believe food insecurity should be treated as seriously as climate change.
In North America we seem to be more concerned with climate change, the price of oil and the financial crisis. The looming food shortage is something that requires immediate attention.