My illustrious friend and colleague Aaron has recently published a story on his blog about how the collapse of the Soviet Union was brought on by the government’s inability to feed the population. While I agree with Aaron in this regard, I think his statements about the situation are slightly off base when compared to America. I’ll take this moment to good naturedly disagree with him and state my case.
The his post Aaron attributes the end of the Soviet Union to an inability of the government to feed the people appropriately. Now, there are a ton of other political and economic reasons that the government collapsed, but he is right that the root of the problem was the Soviet Union’s need to borrow money to buy grain on the open market to feed its citizens. Aaron draws a parallel between the Soviet Union and their grain production and American farming because of the miniscule level of participation in the agriculture world by the citizens. Aaron is right again in this regard. The Soviet Union witnessed massive droves of people moving to their cities from the farms during the 70s and 80s and this led to a smaller number of people farming. America has witnessed the same thing. (At this point you are probably wondering when I will disagree with him.)
However, Aaron attributes the shortage in grain to feed the citizens from this lack of people farming on their own and living in rural areas, but I don’t see that this is the case. In the Soviet Union, as in America, huge industrial farming practices are used which provide most of the grain available for consumption. The difference between the two is that in the Soviet Union they had a population that outstripped the availability of the food supply. Here in America we have no such problem. The Soviet Union made up for this shortfall by buying grain on the open market, which worked well while they had the money, but when they had to borrow to do it they ran into trouble. America currently has such an overabundance of grain that we export it to the world, feed it to animals and turn it into utterly worthless food products. In the event of a crisis we could stop exporting grain, stop feeding it to animals and stop using it for worthless food products and still have enough grain to feed our population, even if there was a large drop in yields of grain. By my estimation, given current consumption of grain for real food products, we could survive a drop in grain production of 60% before we would start to have less grain available as actual food.
The primary reason that I think grain isn’t an issue in the American food supply is because it is so portable and can last for a very long period of time. In a world without rapid transportation networks this grain could be shipped by boat, horse, wagon, train etc and still be a valuable food product. (I do have some concerns over how all this grain might be milled in the future with a shortage of electricity, but that’s a different essay. Right now we are just talking farming.) The food items that I do think will be an issue in the future is the perishable items, namely milk, meat and fruits and veggies.
Milk and meat are items that are over consumed in America today. Most Americans eat about 200% more meat products than their body really demands (if not more). With a few chickens in the backyard and the use of whole grains, and some legumes and such, most Americans can get enough protein that even in a crisis they will have adequate protein levels (and this is coming from a meat eater). But, there is no real substitute for fruits and vegetables. And it’s this product that I think should be the most concerning to Americans. Without massive energy input to grow these products on a huge scale and to pump irrigation water these products couldn’t be grown on the scale they are today. Add to that the massive energy used to transport them to the grocery stores either in fresh format, or even processed into cans or frozen, and you can clearly see that it’s not a sustainable activity in an energy starved world. We can’t expect most people to grow a sustaining amount of grain products in their suburban backyard, but it is possible to dig up the lawn and grow a sustaining amount of produce in a standard suburban back yard. Using some of the methods available with our current knowledge of gardening you can grow a massive amount of produce in your back yard.
Imagine you went to the local Piggy Wiggly and they didn’t have any produce? What would you do if all the cans and frozen foods were cleared out? If you are growing your own produce you don’t have to worry about this. Think this can’t happen? Maybe not, but how vulnerable are you if it does happen? Do you even have 2 weeks worth of meal supplies at your house? Maybe a month? What if there was a hiccup? What if Iran decided next month to stop all export? Or Venezuela? How much will oil prices climb as Mexico’s export to us continue to decline in the coming years? One thing they teach us in business school is to always analyze your risks and make contingency plans for disasters. What’s your contingency plan?
So, what should you do to prepare?
Grow a victory garden. These worked fantastically during the wars to supply Americans with fresh produce (and produce to put up for the winter) and they will work now. In fact. They are less work than all the time people spend in their yards anyway. And it’s easy to use organic methods in a small area and exceed the yields that real farmers get on their fields. Start small and you won’t be overwhelmed. It’s actually fun and incredibly rewarding to grow your own food. Not to mention, it’s nice to have plants that are decorative and also make food. Why just support plants that just sit there looking pretty? That only works for babies in my book.
Use a farmer’s market now for produce. Farmer’s markets are great tools to prepare for a potential food crisis. Their holdback is that they are sized to the given market now. If the market expanded by 100% overnight they wouldn’t be able to keep up. So start using them now so they can grow at a pace that is reasonable.
Demand that your local grocery store buy locally. Stop using the mega marts to buy all your food and shop at the smaller stores. You’ll probably enjoy the experience more anyway, but local places will buy from local farmer’s more readily than the huge mega mart next to the Interstate where a can of corn is $.05 less per can.
Search out a CSA to join. It’s late in the season now to join, but you can start socking away a little each month to pay for it next spring. From what I’ve read, CSA memberships can save you 40% or more over the same produce at a grocery store. And the food is local and fresh, and it’s great to know the farmer personally and it’s even better to get new foods to try out throughout the summer. The more diverse your food supply the more varied your nutrient profile is.
Even better, check out the Bull’s-eye Diet. Or you can check out Sharon’s information about eating a truly local diet based on what will grow in your area naturally. There are a lot of things you can do to Be the Change!
8 responses so far ↓
Sharon // August 9, 2007 at 7:36 am
Hi Matt - Interesting essay. You are certainly right that the situation is different in the US, but I’m curious - do you know that the SU had overstretched its growing *capacity* - that is, that it truly required more grain than it could grow? I know it was dependent upon imports for decades, but I was under the impression that that was a product not of insufficient grain capacity but of industrialization policies and mismanagement. I’m no expert, however, although I’m trying to catch up quickly before the book in question comes out.
I personally think the grain/vegetable issue is more complex - I mean yes, vegetables in their formal sense are very nice, and for those of us in cold climates, some kind of green stuff is important. But 8 months of the year even here in icy upstate NY I can walk out in my yard and find some edible green that I didn’t plant that grows there naturally - dandilion, chicory, plantain, lambs quarters, etc… , and I think that’s true in most places. We *like* the variety we have, but if we ate mostly greens, rather than cultivated fruits and vegetables, we’d all live just fine.
I also think that the grain infrastructure is more vulnerable than you suggest. I think 60% is a fair estimate for us (although the numbers would be smaller if you included non-Americans who derive needed calories from American agriculture), but with climate change predicted to create a 1/3 worldwide drop in grain yields in the next few decades, and the predictions for water management suggest much western food production will have to migrate east because of sheer lack of water - the present drought is predicted to last to the end of the *century* and I’m less convinced that we won’t see either shortages, or people simply priced out of the food market by the rising costs associated with scarcity and rising energy costs in production. It wouldn’t be difficult for us to be rioting over the price of bread, as Mexicans were over tortillas this year.
That said, I think we need both - staple foods (not all grains - staple vegetable crops as well), and produce.
Really nice article.
Sharon
Bart // August 9, 2007 at 9:21 am
Good article, Matt.
As you & Dan pointed out in comments on one of my recent posts (and Sharon points out here), water is going to be a critical factor in determining how large the grain harvests in the USA will be in the future. Availability and cost of fertilizer will also play a big role…
Much of the farmland in the Midwest has been subjected to decades of erosion, pesticides, fertilizers and irrigation. The combination of these factors means that much of our farmland is more or less ‘biologically dead’ and can’t grow much without large chemical inputs.
This situation can be reversed if we put our mind to it, but it’ll take time. If we follow our normal path, we won’t take any meaningful action until there’s a crisis, and that means a period of some years where things get iffy.
I’m looking at buying a grain mill of some sort for my home and then keeping several unmilled grains in bulk. They keep very well, and when you do grind it, the fresh flour tastes better and is better for you.
Aurelius // August 9, 2007 at 5:54 pm
G’day
I came here ready to argue with you about the causes of the collapse of the Soviet Union. Then I found myself caught up in what you were saying, and I liked the post - it targets questions I’ve been pondering lately - I call them “lifeboat strategies” but they’re the same kind of thing you address with your “what if you went to the store and the shelves were bare?” scenario.
Cheers
- Aurelius
daddy mustache // August 9, 2007 at 6:14 pm
a lot of things to ponder in your articles.wish “government” would be more intune to planet earth and start to be more about getting stuff done instead of taking care of BIG BUSINESS and porking up their buddies’ pocketbooks . change starts at the grassroots–get the message out poy dad
karl // August 9, 2007 at 10:22 pm
years ago i spent a few months in russia, st petersburg and admired the russian culture and their closeness to the land. most people in the city had a dacha (summer cottage) the would leave during the hottest month of summer while the public utilities shut everything down for repair. this meant that they grew and stored much of their food for winter from their own hands.
fatguyonalittlebike // August 10, 2007 at 3:36 am
Aurelius and Daddy Mustache-Thanks for stopping by.
Bart–Oddly enough I’ve been mulling over purchasing a grain mill. You’ll have to let me know how that goes.
fatguyonalittlebike // August 10, 2007 at 4:00 am
You raise a good point Sharon. I guess the lack of local grain resources could have been from mismanagement, although there was certainly some neglect there from politicians choosing to import grain instead of grow it locally, even if it was on a large industrial farm. A political leader after seeing a steady drop in local grain production and a reliance on imports should have taken the initiative to determine a cause and resolve it.
I think most people believe that the grain shortfall was from poor management, but I haven’t seen anything that says that was strictly the case. We may never know because the society was so closed and the records of grain harvests may not be available.
I found this information on the USDA site that details grain harvests and how much is used for which purpose.
http://usda.mannlib.cornell.edu/MannUsda/viewDocumentInfo.do?documentID=1194
(check the statistics in the back starting around page 10)
Reading through that I’m even more convinced that even allowing for a large drop in grain production there is excess capacity in the American farm system, as long as we stop exports, stop feeding it to animals and stop using it to make ethanol (for corn). I understand that stopping the exports will lead to starvation around the world, but what else could possibly happen? There likely wouldn’t be fuel enough to ship the grain anyway, and more than likely the demand of the grain in America would be enough to force it all to be sold here. (or maybe politically it is decided not to export and stockpile it for the future.)
Sharon // August 11, 2007 at 8:19 am
I guess I personally would like to see stopping exports be one of our last choices - although I’m not convinced that *in present circumstances* the world would starve. Frances Moore Lappe et al in _World Hunger: Twelve Myths_ (well worth a read for those who haven’t, btw) argue that in fact, the myth that America actually feeds the starving of the world is just that - that the vast portion of our exports are actually fed to livestock in other countries, and in many cases, our net exports to poor countries are often considerably lower than the country’s own net grain exports.
For example, during the famous famine in Ethiopia in the 1980s when we were growing up, Ethiopia was still a net *exporter* of food.
So in the short term, cutting off exports probably wouldn’t hurt the world too much, particularly if we cut out *IMPORTS*, stopped growing corn for ethanol and stopped feeding grain to livestock.
But in the long term, it really gets complicated as Lester Brown over at the Worldwatch Institute points out. China is about to/may already have surpassed its capacity to feed itself. But China also is holding billions of dollars in US funds hostage - a hostage situation they made absolutely clear a few days ago, when they announced that plans to raise the value of the yen would cause a massive sell-off on their part, trashing our economy. And the economy also depends on their continuing to keep buying. So there’s a real question as to whether we *can* stop exporting grain - not for humanitarian reasons, but for purely economic ones. And if we’re postulating continuing grain production as is, with combines and massive tractors (that is, we’ll prioritize the energy for that), I don’t see why we wouldn’t also prioritize the energy for exporting crops.
So if you are envisioning grain production going on much as it has, with nitrogen fertilizers and big tractors, I think we’re also envisioning export. If not, if we’re envisioning that we no longer have these things, then we’re likely to run up against other limits - like pumping for irrigation - only 17% of US agricultural land is irrigated, but that land produces almost 38% of all the food we eat in the US. And against limits like the low number of draft animals we actually have and the long, long time to breed more and train people in their use. And then you run into transport issues within the country - issues that are likely to be large - the eastern and midwestern part of the US, if you look at drought projections, are likely to have to feed most of the west and perhaps the southeast as well.
The US has a long and firm tradition of rationing just about everything by price - that is, if you are poor, tough patooties, not my problem. I doubt we’d do anything as rational as cease exports (and we might not have an option on that one) for a good long time while we still had any energy to keep going.
Sharon
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