Population Growth – Global Farmer in Australia

It’s time to say “Thank you”, to Agriculture.

There was a car sticker around many years ago which said, “Don’t criticise farmers with your mouth full”. That sticker is truer today than it was then and just as true long before car stickers were the fashion.

Some of us have been fortunate to have lived through and been part of the last half century or so of agriculture. Farming today is unrecognisable to what it was when I went to college in the early 60s and even more so looking back back at the fifties.

But it is in the last fifty years or so that I believe an agricultural revolution has taken place and it has gone unrecognised by many of today’s farmers who have inherited the past and totally unappreciated by the happy, unaware shoppers as they wander round their supermarket filling their trolleys.

So why the Protests?

Militant activists around the world consider farmers to be fair game. Mobs, of vegans and anti GM demonstrators often supported by the left wing press, believe it is their ‘right’ to enter a farmer’s premises to damage crops, ‘liberate’ stock, daub graffiti and generally cause chaos. They do this without any care or concern regarding the financial loss incurred by and the trauma caused to, those who feed them and the world. Then they go home, take off their makeup and uniforms, have a feed and go to bed replete.

There are those who believe farmers do not care for their land but they are not farmers themselves. There are those who believe that all crop protection chemicals are bad and that low input organic farms can produce as much as conventional farms, yet they cannot present the evidence and they also go to bed replete.

Over the last sixty years as the population of the world has doubled and the arable land has halved, farmers and their scientists have fed the world to abundance; so isn’t it time we all said, ‘Thank you’?

oOo

Do you remember or have you ever heard of Paul Ehrlich the American biologist of fifty years ago?

In 1970, Ehrlich in his book ‘The Population Bomb’ predicted the end of the world as we knew it.

He was not the first in the modern era to make that prediction. Bible thumpers on a soap box in the park have mostly disappeared, mainly to avoid abuse for being Christian and the world is poorer for this loss of free speech.

There are new religions these days and they are indoctrinating the young and the gullible. Extinction Rebellion leads the pack convincing many young people that the world will end within a decade due to man-made global warming. They encourage the young into civil disobedience to ‘change the world and save it from Armageddon’ and they show no remorse when those same kids suffer anxiety and depression and need medication.

Then the world leaders at Davros and the United Nations invited the modern day St Joan of Arc, Greta Thunberg to talk to them about the end of the world and they sat at her feet enthralled by her wisdom. ‘How could a 14 year old have such wisdom’, they asked.

Climate change warrior Al Gore’s Nashville estate expends ’21 times more energy than the average US home uses per year’ A conservative think-tank published a report claiming Gore ‘guzzles’ electricity It claims Gore’s Nashville estate used 230,889 kilowatt hours over the last year Ex-vice president also spends about $22,000 on electricity bills a year, it claims The study was released ahead of the premiere of Al Gore’s latest environmental documentary film, An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power, on Friday By Dailymail.com Reporter Published: 02:20 AEST, 4 August 2017 | Updated: 02:26 AEST, 4 August 2017

Before poor Greta the world was held in wonder by that Ringmaster of Barnum and Bailey’s circus, Al Gore, the American politician — the man who received the Nobel Prize by telling lies about the climate and predicting how we are all doomed because of our past excesses. Gore is the man who wrote the script to his fictitious film ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ while flying round the world in his private jet and resting in one of his mansions, with all the lights on.

When he was proven wrong he showed no remorse. He had made his money.

Ehrlich, however, was the first to predict that the world would end because millions would die of starvation and what’s more he claimed, there was nothing we could do about it apart from what he called employing ‘population control’.

This is the Prologue from Ehrlich’s book ‘The Population Bomb’.

The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s and the 1980s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programmes embarked upon now. At this late date nothing can prevent a substantial increase in the world death rate, although many lives could be saved through dramatic programs to “stretch” the carrying capacity of the earth by increasing food production and providing for a more equitable distribution of whatever food is available. But these programs will only provide a stay of execution unless they are accompanied by determined and successful efforts at population control. Population control is the conscious regulation of the numbers of human beings to meet the needs not just of individual families, but of society as a whole.

Nothing could be more misleading to our children than our present affluent society. They will inherit a totally different world, a world in which the standards, politics, and economics of the past decade are dead. As the most influential nation in the world today, and its largest consumer, the United States cannot stand isolated. We are today involved in the events leading to famine and ecocatastrophe; tomorrow we may be destroyed by them.

In the last fifty years world agriculture has shown just how wrong Ehrlich was. The food producers of this world, the farmers, led, aided and abetted by some of the best scientists in the world are currently producing enough food to feed ten billion people or one and a half times more food than we need.

No other industry can match the startling performance of world agriculture and its farmers but that does not mean that the world can be complacent and sit back on its laurels. The world is changing as we shall see and the challenges will be just as great in the next half century as they have been in the last.

In the last fifty years meat production has increased by ~ 300% and cereals by ~180%. Over the same period the increases in the yields of all foods has been massive, from tomatoes to bananas to wheat and corn.

The state of Punjab led India’s Green Revolution and earned the distinction of being the “breadbasket of India. Photo Wiki.

Plant breeders led by the example of Nobel Laureate, Prof Norman Borlaug in the 1960s, have achieved what Ehrlich thought impossible. Borlaug and his team produced new and higher yielding varieties of wheat and corn and farmers grew them. It became known as the Green Revolution and it transformed agriculture from America to India to Australia and Europe and all places in between.

Better yielding crops and pastures have fed the world to abundance. Explore the link for some amazing performances.

But we have a problem — They are not making any more Land.

The problem is that it is not going to get any easier to keep on feeding the ever growing world population, even though we are now producing sufficient food to feed the projected peak in world population of around 9 billion in about sixty years. We have a few real problems on the horizon, which could affect food production.

To start with world isn’t getting any bigger. Urban sprawl, desertification and salinisation are eating up arable land and that is going to make feeding the world a little more difficult in the future. This is how difficult.

First of all, what do we mean by Arable Land?

Arable land is the land under temporary agricultural crops (multiple-cropped areas are counted only once), temporary meadows for mowing or pasture, land under market and kitchen gardens and land temporarily fallow (less than five years). The abandoned land resulting from shifting cultivation is not included in this category. Data for ‘Arable land’ are not meant to indicate the amount of land that is potentially cultivable.”

Arable land in the World now and in the future.

If I were to tell you that by 2050 there will less than 0.18 of a hectare of arable land for every person on earth on which to grow their food, what would you think? Would you believe me? You’d better, because it is true.

Gjerdrum, Norway. Family portrait of the Glad-Ostensen family with one week’s worth of food in June. The Hungry Planet project. Photo: Peter Menzel

A hectare is 10,000 M2. Measure it out, 1800 square metres is about a quarter of a soccer pitch. By 2050 you or the farmers of the world will have less than that area on which to grow ALL the food you need for a year. We don’t know how much is less.

That is all the land that will be available to grow all the cereals and vegetables you need for a year. Some of the grain will go to feeding livestock like hens and cows for milk and maybe for a beef animal(s) and don’t forget the cereals for the grog and the cotton for your clothes. Do you think you could do it on a quarter of a soccer pitch?

Will the people thrive in 2070?

In 1960 there was 0.361 of a hectare available for every person on earth, in 2018 it had dropped to 0.184 ha, so the available arable area to grow your food has about halved in the last fifty years. Will the area halve again in the next 60 years? We don’t know.

It gets worse. Twenty percent of the current arable area is irrigated, but 30 million hectares of that land is affected by salinisation and a further 80 million hectares affected by water logging.

The population of the world in 1960 was ~3 billion in 2019 it was ~7 billion and predicted to go to ~9 billion plus when it plateaus in about 2064.

So, the population of the world has doubled and the arable area has about halved in about 60 years and most 0f us have been fed to abundance — that is what our scientists and farmers have achieved.

In spite of that achievement globally, about 8.9% of the world’s population — 690 million people — go to bed on an empty stomach each night. Since 2014, the number of people affected by hunger has been slowly on the rise. If it continues at this rate, it’ll exceed 840 million by 2030.

There is no shortage of food, in fact we grow too much for our population so we throw away and waste an enormous amount. Ironically, obesity and diabetes are now the scourge of the Developed World, both ailments can be caused by eating too much of the wrong foods.

The cause of of hunger and starvation in this world is mainly war, but alarmingly there is an increase in the number of hungry people in the small nations in the Caribbean and in the dry corridor in South America . Men, women and particularly children go without food while politicians and world leaders fight wars and satisfy their own selfish agendas — they are all culpable, but they will never be called to account while the the citizens of the so-called free-world, look the other way.

When will the world Population Peak and can all the people be fed what they want?

The most up to date estimate that I can find on world population predictions is from ‘Lancet’, and published in Science Daily. Lancet, until they got very commercial and controversial during the Covid19 hiatus, have been a very reliable, science based organisation.

Their estimate in 2020 was that the world population will peak in 2064 at about 9.7 billion and then decline to about 8.8 billion by 2100, a figure which is about 2 billion less than previous estimates.

The question then is not can the world survive because it surely will, but can the world continue to produce the food that the people of the world are increasingly demanding as their standard of living continues to improve, or will there be an increase in hunger and starvation?

There is no doubt that the amount of arable land in the world will decline. This is a serious question for Australia when we consider that for the last thirty or forty years we have built another Canberra every year to house our increase in population, most of that growth has come from migration. We have to consider carefully whether we can afford to keep on building new towns on our precious arable land.

Salinity will always be a problem in Australia and particularly in the biggest grain growing state, Western Australia. In 2000 the Howard government budgeted together with the states to spend some $14 billion to fight salinity, I can’t remember over how many years. The programme was to be managed under the auspices of The National Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality. At that time it was estimated that in Australia we were losing a football pitch every HOUR to salinity.

The consensus is that the programme largely failed.

Australia is not alone in fighting or not fighting salinity. In California in 2017 it was estimated they were losing some 10% of crop yield or US$3.7 billion a year to salinity. They have an added problem that some of their irrigation water is going saline.

There seems to be agreement among the research fraternity that worldwide salinisation and sodicity are increasing, by how much nobody really knows. El Nino and La Nina seem to have an effect on Australia, and what is going on in China remains a mystery.

It is hard to predict how much arable land will be gobbled up as the population increases and cities become larger and new cities emerge. It has been estimated that between 2000 and 2030 global croplands will decrease somewhere between 1.8% and 2.4%. leading to a loss of production of between 3% and 4%.

It is also estimated that the ‘lost’ land will be used for new habitats for humans and what’s more it will the best land that is lost, land with productive capacity 1.7 times better than the average.

It’s not all bad news, researchers from communist China are claiming that their arable land will increase in the future as urbanisation of the people increases from 56% to 80% of the population between now and 2050.

This migration from the country to the city, the Chinese claim, will release another 5.8 million hectares of land for food production, an area equivalent to 4.2% of China’s cropland in 2015. Consequently the Chinese claim that food production, even off these low quality lands will increase in China by 3.1% to 4.2% by 2050 compared to 2015.

Science in the future will not be standing still.

The prospect of new discoveries and innovation in science continuing even accelerating agriculture’s capacity to increase production and keep pace with the ever increasing population, will only happen if the governments of the world increase the funds they make available for research and development (R & D). Tax dollars are the people’s money and the people must demand a say in where the money is spent.

The return on investment can be massive if we produce the food the world will certainly want.

Genetic Modification.

The very mention of genetic modification (GM) raises the temperature, the hackles and the ire of many, mainly because of the fear generated by activists predicting Frankenstein crops and animals which are totally without foundation in fact. Many don’t realise the contribution GM technology already makes, much of it not in food production but in medicine, keeping people alive, including:

vaccines
antivenoms
bacteria derived toxins
Immunoglobulins
monoclonal antibodies
allergens
blood products and clotting factors
hormones such as insulin, growth hormone,
enzymes such as pancreatins
heparins.

GM crops have been around for forty years and they have raised production in some cases many fold. During that time there has not been any evidence that has shown a deleterious or harmful effect on either man or animals or the environment during that time, none.

Some products have been abandoned it is true and that is the very purpose and nature of good science.

Scientists within organisations with the same views and ethics of the broader community develop GM technology. Claims that these scientists would be party to launching harmful food on the people of the world is ridiculous, ludicrous, simply because it would mean that by so doing, they would harm their own loved ones.

‘Winds of Change’.

It is well known that many parts of Africa struggle to grow enough food for their ever growing population. The forecasts are that population growth will accelerate in Africa in the future. Nigeria for instance, is predicted to have a larger population than China by 2100 with 791 million people , it will be the second most populous nation in the world only topped by India with 1.01 billion.

Since the ‘winds of change’ swept through Africa in the fifties and sixties there have been problems with insufficient food in many parts of that continent.

Scientists in Nigeria have just made a major contribution to improving the diets and welfare of all Africans by releasing a genetically modified cow pea which is resistant to the borer Maruca vitrata which has been known to reduce yield by as much as 80%.

This important food supplies much needed thiamine and iron as well as protein in the diet and this GM technology will help Nigeria fight its constant battle with malnutrition, especially among the young.

There are other saving as well, Nigeria, if all goes well, will no longer have to import, every year, up to 20% of the cow peas it needs.

Omega-3 oil.

Omega-3 oil has been known for a long time to be beneficial in our diet. The only source has been from wild, oily fish, now that has all changed, the CSIRO and the GRDC together with Nuseed in Australia, have developed an Omega-3 Canola, which is now being grown around the world. One hectare of canola replaces the oil from 10 tonnes of wild fish. The world-wide benefits from GM technology, like this one saving the wild fish stocks from over fishing, seldom make the main stream press.

GM North Atlantic Salmon.

The consumption of fish per head of population, world wide, has more than doubled in the last sixty years. In 1961 the average consumption per head was 9kg and in 2018 it was 20.5kg.

Global fish production was estimated to have reached 179 million tons in 2018. Total fish production is predicted to increase to 204 million tons by 2030 and consumption per head to increase 1kg.

Currently fish farms supply 52% of the fish for human consumption and this is forecast to increase. In fact it has to increase because wild fish stocks are at best being maintained and at worst being depleted by ocean harvesting, mainly by communist China. With their own waters depleted China’s fishing fleets are ranging far and wide in search of catch.

Consequently the global wild fish catch is increasing, up just 7% in the last decade. The challenge for the fish industry is to provide enough fish for the ever increasing demand and not obliterate the natural wild fish stocks. The global interest and the investment in fish farming, particularly in R & D is increasing.

For example in the 1990s two scientists genetically engineered the Atlantic salmon to grow twice as quickly as the conventional salmon while consuming less food.

That GE salmon has been on sale in Canada for a number of years and the producers have recently overcome the last hurdle to enable the GE North Atlantic salmon to be sold in America.

The time consuming debate on labeling was with those who catch the rapidly declining stocks of wild North Atlantic Salmon and with some of the regulators. Now resolved GE North Atlantic Salmon are being sold in Canada the USA and shortly they will be sold in Brazil.

There is no doubt that GE or GM or GMO (genetically modified organism) fish, of which some claim there are already about 20 species developed or under development will make a major contribution to the ever increasing world-wide demand for food and protein.

One of the most important factors breeding GM fish and all animals both GM and non-GM is the feed conversion rate or FCR that can be achieved. The FCR is how many grams of food it takes to produce a gram of weight in the animal or fish.

Pigs, for instance, have a feed conversion rate (FCR) of about 3 to 1. That means for every 3 grams or kilos of feed consumed by the pig it grows 1 gram or kilo. Cattle have an FCR of 5 – 7 to 1 , so they are not as good as the pig at converting food into meat.

The GM salmon has a FCR of 1.2 to 1 and a new GE trout has an FCR of 1 to 1. That seems impossible to me but that is what they have done. The sustainability of the fish farming industry and so the feeding of the ever growing population is greatly improved by gene technology.

The debate will continue and no doubt rage at times, what we must all remember is that compromise may be needed if future generations can live as well as we do now.

Scientist in America developed a GM potato which provides 42% of a child’s daily needs for vitamin A and 34% of the child’s daily needs for vitamin E all from just one 150-gram serve. Women of reproductive age get the same benefits. That is a huge step forward for the Developing World.

M98H61 ETHIOPIA, Amhara, Gondar, school for blind children

Twenty years after its invention and after many thousands of people have died from a Vitamin A deficiency, Golden Rice looks like it will finally be produced in the Bangladesh and the Philippines. It will save millions of people, mainly children from premature death, blindness and loss of their immune system.

I will never understand Greenpeace and others and their fight to never allow this life saving rice to be grown. Their nasty rumours and down right lies have now been overcome. Twenty years have been wasted in bringing this potentially life saving plant into production.

CRISPR technology.

I think CRISPR technology will answer more of the impending challenges of feeding more people off less arable land than will GE.

What is CRISPR? : The essence of CRISPR is simple: it’s a way of finding a specific bit of DNA inside a cell. After that, the next step in CRISPR gene editing is usually to alter that piece of DNA. However, CRISPR has also been adapted to do other things too, such as turning genes on or off without altering their sequence.

There were ways to edit the genomes of some plants and animals before the CRISPR method was unveiled in 2012 but it took years and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. CRISPR has made it cheap and easy.

Gene technology of one kind or another is obviously going to play a major part in answering the inevitable food production challenges that are heading our way in the next seventy years or so. Less arable land, changes in rainfall patterns whether they be caused by anthropogenic climate change or not doesn’t really matter, the people will have to be fed.

This is where CRISPR or gene editing technology, I think, will come into its own. Making plants resistant not only to insects but pathogens. Another area which is showing great promise for CRISPR is creating plants that use less water and even more exciting plants cereals that can use saline water and need less fertilizer. Plants that can convert sunshine better and so grow quicker, maybe enabling multiple crops in a season. Disease control without chemicals, so important because so many currently vital crop protection chemicals are derived wholly or in part from the petro chemical industry.

One of the great successes in CRISPR application has been with tomatoes. Remember this isn’t achieved by transferring genes from another entity it is just changing the plants susceptibility to all manner of diseases like botrytis and in some cases, like golden canola, getting the plant to produce better nutrition.

Now they have gone a step further and removed the need for constant pruning to maximise yield and they have done that as well as bringing the harvest date forward to an amazing 5 weeks. It’s a great story and one of many around for this technology.

What can ALL Australian governments do to meet the challenge facing agriculture and the fisheries of the future in Australia?

Fix the Roads.

First and foremost it will be a major challenge for agriculture to get both state and federal governments to recognise that Australia has got a major roll in global food production in the future — but it will not happen unless they embark on long term strategic planning and turn that planning into action.

Holding a conference in Sydney and calling it the Global Food Forum means nothing to the man and woman on the land when their truckload of stock or grain comes to grief on yet another poor, narrow and inadequate road.

Governments around Australia have for too long ignored the fundamental needs of agriculture for a highway system that works and is cost effective. Without better highways and roads agriculture cannot grow.

Good and at one time efficient railway systems have been allowed decay or have been deliberately and systematically dismembered by all state governments. They have done it with no consultation and with little thought for agriculture for which they were originally built. The result is that agriculture has been driven into using bigger and bigger trucks on roads which are demonstrably old and in poor condition and not fit for purpose.

All states need highways that can get farm produce, food, from the farm to the city quickly and efficiently.

Water – Harvest it – Move it.

Australia is not a dry continent, we have just lost our ability to harvest water and transport it to the places where it is most needed.

If water was moved from or harvested in the north of Queensland to the black soil country in that state and NSW, the production of food in this country would dramatically increase. There is almost nothing, nothing that cannot be grown in that vast region.

The same goes for Western Australia, all that state needs is water. We have had the late Ernie’s (Bridge’s) pipe dream and Colin’s ditch and many other moves to move water from the North to the agricultural areas.

I have watched the Fitzroy River in flood for months, goodness knows how many Sydney Harbours ran out into the Indian Ocean.

I have grown wheat in a dry year and watched it die before maturity. We have the answers to these challenges, it is about time we used them.

Make food Processing an industry to be proud of again.

We cannot continue to base our agricultural exports on produce to which we don’t add value and at one and the same time import food to which value has been added. We import potato chips from Europe and South Africa – how silly is that? We import pasta and export Duram wheat. I know! The amount of food we are importing is alarming and going up every year. Why is that when there is nothing I can think of that we cannot produce in this country? We did once upon a time, to find food from another country was unusual and usually a luxury item, now it is the norm and ever increasingly so.

If we are to be great food traders again our food processors need cheap power and good roads or rail to get their produce to well organised ports.

Coles, Woolworths and IGA.

The big three need to tell us why they scour the world for the cheapest food they can find, often at the expense of Australian producers. The farmers and the processors in Australia need their support – not just in trendy TV ads but in everything.

If ALDI becomes a force all over Australia we need to recognise that most of their food, apart from fresh food, is imported from the EU and mainly Germany – the trade must be reciprocal – Germany must take Australian produce – fairs fair.

Zero Carbon by When – 2050? -2035?

Nobody knows by when and nobody knows what it will cost. That is the world we live in.

According to the Royal Society it seem unlikely that increased levels of CO² to 550ppm will have any effect on crop yields of many of the crops important for harvestable food, known as the C4 group. So there is unlikely to be any benefit to food producers from climate change as it seems the world will rush headlong into carbon zero by 2050.

What farmers will almost certainly be challenged by is this rush to electrify everything. I have no idea and I don’t think anyone else has the foggiest idea what this will mean for agriculture – what will the change cost? Can today’s big trucks and huge tractors be electrified and presuming they can – what will it cost to change over?

Rural debt in Australia is increasing at about $1 billion a year and the real price of many crops like wheat have been in decline since the abolition of the Corn Laws in England in 1846. So your guess is as good as mine on prices producers will receive to pay for change.

Cheerio.

The Hard Lessons of History.

“Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” Winston Churchill.

By the end of World War II Britain had amassed an immense debt of £21 billion (£912 billion at 2020 value). Much of this was held in foreign hands, with around £3.4 billion being owed overseas (mainly to creditors in the United States), a sum, which represented around 30 per cent of annual GDP.

Britain settled the last of its World War II debts to the US and Canada in 2006, 75 years after they were incurred.

Due to the pandemic fiscal stimulus Australia’s net debt will increase by a third this year, swelling to roughly $507 billion by the end of June 2020, which is 26 per cent of annual GDP.

Getty — John Maynard Keynes 1945. John Maynard Keynes, 1st Baron Keynes, 1883 1946), British economist whose ideas have fundamentally affected the theory and practice of modern macroeconomics.

“If farming were to be organised like the stock market, a farmer would sell his farm in the morning when it was raining, only to buy it back in the afternoon when the sun came out.” John Maynard Keynes.

Britain was unprepared for War in 1939.

In 1939 the British were totally unprepared for war, just as we are to fight a war against the corona-virus (COVID 19) pandemic of 2020. We are also an island nation like Britain.

It is a revelation to many that we import, mainly from China and America, ninety per cent of the medicines we use. We are dependent on others for our health or, to put it another way, others could make us sick by denying us the medicines we need to stay alive.

In April last year I wrote on this site that we had less than thirty days fuel, petrol, diesel, AV Gas etc in this country, and that includes the ADF reserves. We depend on the Gulf of Hormuz remaining open and we depend on China allowing our tankers in and out of the South China Sea for the majority of our fuels. Nothing has changed, we still have less than a months supply of fuel in this country.

Life would be difficult without adequate medicines and even more difficult if not impossible with little or no fuel.

It would become damned hard without imported food. It is a nonsense to claim that we are self sufficient in food, because we are not, far from it.

Continue reading “The Hard Lessons of History.”

The National Farmers’ Federation and their Dreamtime.

The National Farmers’ Federation of Australia, the National Party and the Liberal Party, together with the Australian Labor Party, all believe that Australian agriculture can raise its production to $100 billion at the farm gate by 2030.

That is an increase of 66.6% on the production of 2018 or an annual increase of about 4%, and presumably, though they haven’t said as much, they all expect the producers to make a profit every year— which is more than they do now — but they don’t tell you that.

There are some truly grim truths about the financial ill-health of Australian agriculture and they are all produced by government statisticians and the Reserve Bank of Australia.

Why these grim truths were ignored by the NFF when they set their $100 billion target, and why that target was endorsed by those who determine the the agricultural policy of this country, is for them to answer.

It would appear that there isn’t a minister for agriculture in Australia today, at both the federal and state level, who had any qualifications or hands on experience in agriculture or (agricultural) economics prior to being appointed to their agricultural portfolio. Even worse they all seem to have many other portfolios and being only human, the time they can spend on agriculture has got to be limited.

This must mean that our ministers of agriculture rely on advice from the federal and state government agricultural bureaucracies, the state and national farmer organisations and those stalwarts of Australian agriculture, the MLA and the GRDC, who are kept fat by the millions of dollars of compulsory deductions levied on producers.

Ben Rees; B. Econ.; M.Litt. (econ.)

Ben is a seriously underutilized elder statesman in Australian agriculture, probably because he deals in facts, not emotional subjective dreaming in which many in the so-called high echelons of agriculture in this country indulge.

Ben recently presented a paper to the Royal Society in Queensland. For the complete article Rural Debt and Viability click on the link above and then at the bottom of the page when it comes up click on: Ben Rees on rural debt and viability. I will try and post the complete article on this website as soon as I can.

You may not agree with Ben’s opinion — but it will make you think and make you wonder what the so-called leaders of agriculture do in their working time — time, which we all pay for.

Just a glance at Graph 11, lifted from one of Ben’s papers, demonstrates that the problems facing Australian agriculture today have not been caused by drought and will not be fixed by building new dams — the rot started years ago — it’s called debt.

Compiled From: ABARES commodity statistics Australian farm returns, costs and prices, 2006& 2018. Rural Debt from RBA, Table D9 Rural Debt, RBA Statistical Tables, online. (Ben Rees)

This is what Ben writes about Rural debt, gross value of farm production and net value of farm production: Graph 11 illustrates the impotence of the RBA to deliver required real sector policy. By 1983, GVFP was rising at the expense of NVFP. Beyond 1983, any relationship between debt and GVFP NVFP evaporates. Upward inflections in the debt curve are identifiable in 1988 and 1993 following tariff reform. Any relationship between GVFP and debt cease to exist beyond 1993; and; finally in 2003-04 the debt curve rises steeply cutting through the GVFP curve. Finally the GFC effect slows down the rural appetite for debt. From 2017, the debt curve gradient begins rising more steeply than the GVFP curve indicating that rural production is again being funded by rising indebtedness. Some good old fashioned fiscal policy was badly missing. (Ben Rees)

Nobody involved in agriculture providing they can understand basic economics like 2 + 2 = 4 – 4 = 0 can fail to see the the agricultural tragedy contained in Graph 11.

Australian agriculture has been on a productivity binge for the last fifty years. Since 1990, the gross value of farm production has grown from about $20 billion to where it is today at about $60 billion, a growth of some $40 billion or 200% in thirty years. Whereas the net value of farm production has grown from about $5 billion to about $20 billion an increase of some 300% during the same period, which looks great until we examine the debt, (red line) which has grown from $10 billion to just under $70 billion during the same period, an increase of an astounding 600%.

This increase in farm production has occurred as the number of farms has decreased. In 1970 we can see from Graph 11 that rural debt was just a few billion dollars and there were about 180,000 farms, the numbers are too small to calculate. By 2016 farm numbers have reduced to 100,000 (the NFF claims there are just 85,000 farms) and the debt has risen to ~$77 billion and by 2019 that debt has risen to $80 billion.

If we divide 100,000 by $80 billion it gives us an average farm debt of $800,000, and that is for all farms producing over $25,000. It doesn’t end there. In a publication produced by the federal Department of Agriculture and Water Resources for the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking and Financial Services Industry in 2018, it is claimed that 70% of the aggregate broad acre debt was held by just 12% of farms.

On average these were large farm who produced some 50% of the total value of broad acre farm production in 2016-17. It should be noted that debt figure does not include the total credit facility limit which was estimated in the same paper at a whopping $86 billion. For many with large cropping enterprises an annual overdraft facility can, in the short term, double their debt exposure. No wonder so many feel as though they are standing on the edge of an abyss when the weather does not perform as planned.

The increasing debt levels have followed the increase in land values as shown in Figure 1. The ability to borrow against an asset, as we all know, has nothing to do with the ability to repay a debt. If the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking and Financial Industry revealed anything it was that the banks were more than willing to lend against rising equity levels without determining whether the debt could ‘reasonably’ repaid by the borrower. It also showed that they showed no mercy to those who, for whatever reason, defaulted. Rural debt continues to rise at over a billion dollars a year.

However, the alarming result of the spiraling debt, highlighted by Ben Rees, is that $1 of debt is now needed to produce 64 cents of production as shown in Chart 1. Whereas in 2003/4 one dollar of debt produced $1 of production and in 1989 one dollar of debt produced $2.14 of production. What kind of crazy economics is that?

The billion dollar question must be, ‘How many dollars of debt will be needed to generate one dollar of production on the road to achieving $100 billion at the farm gate?’ Maybe the NFF have the answer?

Have another look at Graph 11 at the widening gap between net value of production and gross value of production. That graph begs the question whether there will be an acceptable margin between costs and returns to repay what now seems to be an inevitable mushrooming of debt.

Figure 1Thatcherism

Not many in the Australian Labor Party today will recognise that those two great reformers, Hawke and Keating, were devout disciples of Margaret Thatcher, and as a result of their adoption of ‘Thatcherism’ and its mantra of ‘the market economy’ Australian agriculture suffered as market support was gradually reduced to where it is today — virtually non existent.

What Hawke and Keating and all successive Australian Governments have failed to recognise is that the adoption of the market economy philosophy around much of the free world in the eighties and nineties did not affect the huge ‘market support’ or subsidies paid to agriculture.

Without US$580 billion in annual subsidies farmers in the EU , the United States of America and almost every country around the world could not survive.

Australian producers receive world prices for their exports and have some of the highest costs and the lowest yields in the world, particularly in wheat production — their competitors also receive world prices for what they produce, but they also receive government subsidies.

Where price is king in the food markets of the world it isn’t rocket science to conclude that Australian producers face severe competition in both our domestic and overseas markets.

Have a look around the supermarket shelves in Australia and see what is imported, and what, once-upon-a-time, was grown and processed in Australia.

Australian supermarkets scour the world for the cheapest food they can buy and every time they bring more food into Australia, they put another nail in the coffin of Australian agriculture.

One of the reason that rural debt is increasing is because of land purchase. Farmers have been buying more land in an effort to benefit from an economy of scale. Fewer workers because the sheep have gone has meant bigger machinery, bigger machinery means bigger borrowing. Again, it ain’t rocket science. The quwstion is, has it worked?

The Cost of Debt Funded Production.

Let us now look through Ben Rees’ prism at farm debt over time and what producers have been able to produce with that debt, Ben writes:

Chart 1 below empirically analyses debt to output as a policy efficiency performance indicator. The orange curve is Debt/ Gross Value Farm Production (GVFP) whilst the blue curve is calculated by dividing GVFP/ Debt.

Compiled from; ABARES commodity Statistics 2017; and, RBA Rural Debt Table D9 online 2018. Ben Rees.

2.1 Performance Indicator Outcomes

Steeply positive gradient long term orange trend curve ( Debt/GVFP)
Orange curve suggest that production has been debt dependent
Steeply negative gradient blue long term trend curve ( GVFP/Debt)
From 1984, declining efficiency as debt relentlessly consumes production
In 1989, $1 debt produced $ 2.14 in output.
By 2003-04, $1 of debt produced $1 of output
In 2010, $1 of debt produced 64 cents in production
From 1993 to 2013, sectoral performance lies below the negative sloping blue trend curve.

By any reasonable assessment, Rural Adjustment has not delivered theoretically expected outcomes from economies of scale, increased efficiency and rising productivity. Post 2003-04, both curves identify debt funded output as inefficient and unstable. Any other sector would have demanded a change in policy direction; but, agricultural leaders appear to have strongly believed the rhetoric of market theology that reduced farmer numbers structuring economies of scale would ensure long term sectoral viability. That simplistic arithmetic approach by industry leaders, major political parties; and, commentators has been a gross violation of established economic knowledge.

Ben is right. We must conclude that there is no plan for agriculture in Australia apart from that being offered by the NFF and endorsed by all political parties. What does that say for their understanding of established economic knowledge?

Is debt going to strangle Australian agriculture?

In October 2018 the National Farmers’ Federation (NFF) presented Australian agriculture with an enormous challenge —a vision for the future:

17th October 2018

The National Farmers’ Federation (NFF) has laid down a bold vision for the industry: to exceed $100 billion in farm gate output by 2030.

Based on our current trajectory, we know industry is forecast to reach $84 billion by 2030. This suggests that we still have significant work to do over the next 12 years if we are to achieve our vision.

To support their plan, the NFF have developed a road map which tells us how Australian primary producers from wheat, sheep and beef producers to bee-keepers and everyone in between what the ‘road’ is to the national farm gate producing $100 billion by 2030.

The NFF road map is complicated. I wonder how many farmers, agricultural producers and their advisers and critically, their bankers, those who lend them money, have read it — and more importantly, been able to understand both the map and their position on it?

There is no doubt that agriculture in Australia requires re-structuring. Whether the NFF Road Map is the way forward I leave for you to decide.

Is $100 billion by 2030 now the clarion cry of Australian agriculture?

To produce $100 billion of farm gate output by 2030 will require a 66.6% increase measured in dollars of production across the face of Australian agriculture in a little over ten years. Seriously? Given our recent history of growth is that figure realistic? 66.6% growth would require an annual 4% nominal growth rate in the Gross Value of Farm Production (GVFP).

There are three ways of achieving the NFF vision:

Assume that the gross value of farm production (GVFP) will increase by 66.6% and assume that yields will not and producers will make a profit or:
Assume that yields by will increase by 66.6% and prices will do what they seem to have by-and-large done over the last ten years and remain constant or decline and producers will make a profit.
A mixture of both of the above and assume that rural debt will continue to increase and producers will still make a profit.

A 66.6% increase in the dollars generated at farm gate in what is now just 10 years is a massive ask. Maybe the NFF are banking on new rural industries to help reach the target and well they may, but realistically, surely, the heavy lifting will have to be done, as usual, by the producers of wheat and beef and to a lesser extent canola, wool and sheep meat.

If there is one common thread that runs through all of the research I have put into this article so far, it is that Australian agriculture faces global challenges from ernest competitors who can produce and ship product into markets where we are active at a price which Australian producers would find and more importantly are already finding, difficult to match.

Australia has a large range of different beef products to offer overseas consumers but needed to differentiate itself from competitors through better communications and messaging, the MLA said. Photo MLA.

Our reputation for quality is appreciated by those who can afford it, but as markets expand, like the exponential growth of the middle class in Indonesia and China, so too does the market for products of a lesser quality than that which is available from Australia. Prime examples are buffalo meat into Indonesia at the expense of Australian beef and Australia’s massive loss of market share to Argentina and the Baltic States in the wheat market of the same country. The last one is hard to explain when we can almost see Indonesia from two of our major export ports in Western Australia.

What do the Banks think?

The Commonwealth Bank are not as optimistic regarding growth as the NFF, their view, as a major lender, is that production will fall across all agriculture mainly due to a drop in rainfall. A 50% drop in grain production and a 40% drop in livestock by 2060 is predicted. If Australian agriculture is to reach the NFF target of $100 billion by 2030 it will need the support of the CBA.

In contrast to the Commonwealth Bank there is a publication called Australian National Outlook – 2019. The joint Chairmen of Outlook 2019 are Dr Ken Henry AM when he was Chairman of the NAB and David Thodey AO, Chairman CSIRO. The publication is a joint effort by over 50 contributors from some 24 organisations who forecast a better picture than the Commonwealth Bank, but with many challenges for agriculture and for the nation, it is worth a read.

Beware, it is complicated, ambitious and apart from some wild assumptions on climate change, (my personal bias) a very well thought out document, and in many ways it is a pity it is not a fundamental part of the national conversation on the future of agriculture.

It makes one wonder whether those in the NFF who claim to lead this fine industry really understand, seek or accept the considered opinion of others who are already major participants in the industry of agriculture in this country. What is of note is that the Australian National Outlook forecasts a far more modest growth to $80 billion in agricultural production but by 2060, rather than the NFF target of $100 billion by 2030.

The NFF say they consulted widely before settling on the $100 billion target: The NFF led a 6-month consultation effort to inform the Roadmap. It began with a Discussion Paper which distilled insights from leading experts, before commencing a nationwide roadshow, where we spoke to over 380 farmers and other industry experts to field their views. As we consolidated this feedback, we engaged regularly with industry stakeholders and experts to ensure the ideas we’re putting forward are credible and impactful.

The NFF say they have consulted with 380 farmers. They claim there are 85,681 farmers in Australia. So they consulted 0.4435055% of farmers in Australia in the preparation of their Road Map! Hardly statistically significant.

It is also reasonable to ask whether the NFF consulted with the CSIRO, the NAB and any the fifty other industry brains who contributed to the Australian National Outlook 2019 who have a different view of the future to that of the NFF.

The has been a massive loss of knowledge and skills in agriculture.

What really shook me from Ben’s analysis of the agricultural economy, is the loss over the last thirty years of experience and skill in agriculture — this must surely present this industry with a huge challenge? Again, this is from Ben’s paper:

4.1 Performance Indicator Employment

ABARES commodity statistics for 2018[i] , shows agricultural employment peaking historically in 1990-91 at 387, 000; but, falling to 279 000 in 2017-18 (29%). Meanwhile for Australia, over the same period, employment rose from 7.8 million to 12.5million (60.3%). It stretches the mind to think the decline in agricultural employment alongside such strong national employment growth is explainable by consolidation of farm size and applied technology. Agricultural policy needs to accept responsibility for this employment outcome.

The reality is that structural industry reform began with the 1988 tariff reductions which were ratcheted up again in 1991. Orderly marketing of both major industries wool and wheat were discontinued over 1989-90. It cannot be explained as mere coincidence that agricultural employment began to decline from its peak in 1990-91 as a result of technological adoption by the farm sector at the same time structural reform of agriculture began in earnest.

Chart 3 identifies empirically that agricultural employment contracted strongly across broad-acre agriculture; and, the self – employed small scale farmer. Broad-acre employment decline appears from 2002 coinciding with the worsening of the Millennium Drought. The real loss of employment though lies in the self -employed and owner manager classification from 1992 onwards. The impact of the self- employed owner manager is particularly important as that group comprised largely the part time skilled labour force residing in rural Australia. Policy driven policy of Rural Adjustment “shipping out” small inefficient farmers would seem a more logical contributor than technology.

[i] ABARES commodity statistics, 2018, Table 1.2 , Australian employment by sector.

Long term decline in broad acre employment 52% between 1992 -2018
Self-employed fall 71.4% between 1992 to 2018 (192 000 to 55 000)
Millennium Drought emerging1997-2009
GFC 2009- 2013
2013+ Current Drought

The decline in agricultural employment whilst employment in the wider economy continued to rise strongly is a damming policy indicator. If agriculture was likened to a private firm, a clean out of the board, senior management, and advisors would be expected.

How true!

In the next issue of Global Farmer we will examine whether our main agricultural industries of beef, sheep and grain, are capable of playing their part on the road to achieving $100 billion by 2030. The question must be asked can they do it and more importantly, who has already claimed they can, because somebody has? Haven’t they?

Has China got Australia by the short and curlies?

‘When you’ve got them by the balls their hearts and minds will follow.’

Theodore Roosevelt.

Australia and its sophisticated agricultural industry have to decide whether they want to be a feeder of others, or be fed by others. Don’t laugh at that. Of course the world can feed Australia— it’s already started as we increasingly become more reliant others for food. We have no more people in this country than there are in a couple of big Chinese cities and we are an attractive proposition to feed, if only for access to our resources and for what food we can produce that others can’t. I read somewhere recently that China would only have to increase its horticultural production by about 3% and it could feed Australia. Think about that and the global fresh food trade. There are Egyptian oranges for sale in my town. So how important are we to China and how important is China to Australia? You may be surprised.

Continue reading “Has China got Australia by the short and curlies?”

The Farmers in Europe are Revolting

There is a paradox, an absurdity of enormous proportions happening in agriculture in much of the Developed world. In spite of the US$486 billion a year being paid to farmers in the 21 top food producing countries in the world – heavily subsidised farmers in the European Union (EU) have embarked upon a civil disobedience campaign, some of it has been violent and massively disruptive to the rest of society. Their problem is that in spite of being paid over US$100 billion a year in subsidies, they are going broke. Their costs are greater than their returns. Across Britain, France, Germany, the low countries – everywhere in Europe, mainly family farmers are saying ‘enough is enough.’ They are taking to the streets and the supermarkets to show those who buy and consume the food what the difference is between what it costs to produce food, what the producers are being paid for it and what the consumers are paying for it at the supermarket. There is a sober lesson here for Australian agriculture as the value of the food we import goes up every year it is mostly from countries who subsidise their agriculture. According to the Worldwatch Institute, ‘Agricultural subsidies are not equally distributed around the globe. In fact, Asia spends more than the rest of the world combined. China pays farmers an unparalleled US$165 billion. Significant subsidies are also provided by Japan (US$65 billion), Indonesia ($US28 billion), and South Korea ($US20 billion).’

The value to Australian agriculture from Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) can be put into perspective when we contemplate having to compete against the home grown subsidised produce of much of Asia. If their ‘home grown’ produce, for instance beef, is subsidised, then to compete we have to be price competitive with a subsidised product – can we compete with subsidised agriculture? Only if we can sell at a price that is competitive, which may mean lower, than the subsidised product. For decades, since the seventies, Australian farmers have been duped by politicians of all colours and from agriculture, that ‘market forces’ and a ‘free market economy’ will eventually prevail. Fig 1 and Fig 2 (later) puts a lie to that propaganda and shows what it has cost. To compete we can see that Australian farmers ‘chased’ the ‘get big or get out’ mantra of the 70s with debt. More of that later.

As a child growing up in post-war Britain anything from Australian from wool to meat, to apples both fresh and dried, dried fruit and the delicious Sunday treat of Australian canned peaches, was a sign of absolute quality. The only exception to that rule was the processed cheese we were served in the army in the nineteen fifties. I am sure it had been imported during the war. Second World War, I think – maybe?

How times have changed. Britain is part of the EU, the European Union. This is what the EU say about themselves:

The EU is an attractive market to do business with:

We have 500 million consumers looking for quality good
We are the world’s largest single market with transparent rules and regulations
We have a secure legal investment framework that is amongst the most open in the world
We are the most open market to developing countries in the world

That is a proud boast and if you look at the link you will see the truth of it. They are indeed a powerful union – even a nation. To protect their agriculture the EU pays their farmers subsidies amounting to about US$100 billion a year.

In ‘Farming on Line’ a UK farming journal came this alarming news on Wednesday 29 July 2015. Copa and Cogeca warned at the EU Milk Market Observatory meeting today that the EU dairy market situation has deteriorated rapidly in the past 4 weeks, and without EU action, many producers will be forced out of business by Winter. Speaking at the meeting, Chairman of Copa-Cogeca Milk Working Party Mansel Raymond said “The market is in a much more perilous state than it was 4 weeks ago, with producer prices far below production costs. It’s a critical situation for many dairy farmers across Europe”.

Who or what are ‘Copa’ and ‘Cogeca’? ‘Copa’ was formed in 1959 to represent farmers within what we now know as the EU, it had 13 affiliates at that time. It now speaks in Brussels for sixty farmer organisation’s within the EU and another thirty six affiliates like Norway and Turkey, outside of the EU, but in Europe.

Cogeca? Straight off their website : On 24 September 1959, the national agricultural cooperative organisations created their European umbrella organisation – COGECA (General Committee for Agricultural Cooperation in the European Union) – which also includes fisheries cooperatives.

COGECA’ s Secretariat merged with that of COPA on 1 December 1962.

When COGECA was created it was made up of 6 members. Since then, it has been enlarged by almost six and now has 35 full members and 4 affiliated members from the EU. COGECA also has 36 partner members.

So ‘Copa & Cogeca’ to our antipodean ears may sound like a dance from South America, is in fact a very powerful agricultural lobby in Brussels and the Parliament of Europe. Stuck down here at the other end of the world we tend to forget that Europe is now a bigger trading bloc than America and China.

Vive la France !

French farmers are a passionate lot and in support of Copa & Cogeca, last month on warm summer days in the middle of the tourist season they dumped loads of animal manure in the middle of Paris and other cities. For those who don’t know what the machine below is, it’s a ‘muck spreader’. Normally filled with animal manure and coupled to the power take off on the tractor it ‘spreads’ the manure on the fields or paddocks. In this case it looks like it is being used to ‘clean’ windows – on a bank perhaps?

Continue reading “The Farmers in Europe are Revolting”

The China Enigma

Be not afraid of growing slowly; be afraid only of standing still

There is now no doubt, there is unquestionable evidence that the Premier of Western Australia, The Hon Colin Barnett, MEc. MLA. Minister for State Development; Science and the Hon Ken C. Baston, Minister for Food; Fisheries, are intent upon doing everything they can to secure more Chinese investment into West Australian agriculture. How they are going to do it?
They are going to hold an investment conference especially for the Chinese. Mr Barnett and Mr Baston are certainly not standing still:

Western Australia – China Agribusiness Cooperation Conference.
State Reception Centre, Kings Park, Perth
9 -11 April 2014

Premier Barnett with a hook for catching sharks.
Photo:WA Today.

Premier Colin Barnett is a passionate West Australian. There is also no doubt that Mr Barnett has determinedly used his Office, and the influence that goes with that Office, to secure major commitments from the Chinese to invest in West Australian industry, mainly into mining, but there have also been substantial Chinese investments in agriculture.

Mr Barnett has led delegations of business people from Western Australia to China to further cement relationships and to forge new ones.

I don’t think it would be unfair to call Colin Barnett a Chinaphile.

Premier Colin Barnett Southern China Airlines Gala Dinner — Premier Colin Barnett at Southern China Airlines Gala Dinner.
Photo: WA Tourism

There has always been a belief among the majority of West Australians that ‘Chinese’ investment in Western Australia in the past has been conditional upon the imprimatur, and investment of the Central Government of the People’s Republic of China.

In other words the Government of China is always involved somewhere in the deal as an equity partner. Mr Barnett must be aware of this and be unconcerned that a sovereign state is investing in and becoming an owner of, Australian freehold property.

As far as I am aware it has never been denied that the Chinese government will be a equity partner in any investment in Australia.

Recently Mr Barnett was critical of Australia’s foreign investment rules, claiming they were sending the wrong message to China. Mr Barnett said that the United States could invest more than $1 billion in Australia without being subject to Foreign Investment Review Board Rules, but it was different for China’s state owned enterprises where any level of investment from $1 up was subject to review.

Mr Barnett believed this caused resentment in China.

In July 2013 speaking from Zhejiang province in China Mt Barnett said he believed the Chinese were not seeking to own Australian land – they just wanted to protect their investment for food and have a secure relationship with Australia.

Yet the previous month, June 2013, the Queensland Country Life reported that Chinese investors had spent $757 million in the first quarter of 2013 buying land in Australia, with WA, according to Landmark – Harcourts, topping the charts with sales of $350 million. True or false? We may never know.

Well, whatever is the truth, what the Premier really believes will be revealed on April 9 2014. Continue reading “The China Enigma”

No more farmers?

There is every chance we will run out of farmers before we know whether we can feed the people of the world.

It’s a frightening proposition but just look at the evidence.

In 1968, Paul Ehrlich in his book ‘Population Bomb’ made the prediction the world faced massive starvation due to overpopulation. He wrote:

The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. At this late date nothing can prevent a substantial increase in the world death rate.

Then along came Dr Norman Borlaug, ‘the father of the Green Revolution’, and his team of plant breeders and the world was saved from starvation. In 1970, Borlaug became a Nobel Laureate.

The ‘Green Revolution saved India from certain disaster.

Between 1950 and 2004 world wheat yields rose from an average of 750kg/ha to 2750kg/ha (FAO), due to the worldwide adoption of high yielding, high input short straw wheat varieties, developed by Borlaug and his teams. Similar improvements were achieved in the yields of maize and rice.

This revolution in plant breeding, combined with new chemicals to control pests and diseases averted the global starvation tragedy predicted by Ehrlich.

In the last forty years the population of the world has doubled and, by and large they have all been fed.

The millions, who have died of starvation over that period, didn’t die because there wasn’t any food for them; they died because we spent our money fighting wars rather than getting food to those who needed it. Continue reading “No more farmers?”

The Horn of a Dilemma

Over the last week or so, leading up the Christmas 2013, I have watched the television and been filled with horror at the images of one child every three seconds dying of starvation on the Horn of Africa, part of the so-called Developing World. Yet, at one and the same time, obesity is killing people in the Developed World. Many people in the United States of America and no doubt in Australia, consume more than twice as many kilojoules every day, than they require for a healthy life.

In the lifetime of my grandchildren the population of the world will increase from six billion to nine billion. Most of that increase will be in the Developing World.

In our world, the Developed World, there is no shortage of food. In fact, we are so wealthy; we can choose what food we eat — the variety is endless and obesity is a major health problem, especially in children.

We can not only choose what variety of food we eat, we can choose what kind of food we eat — so vegetarians and vegans can purchase a balanced diet free of those items they have chosen not to eat, and meat eaters, carnivores as my daughter calls us, find our choices are almost endless.

As we wander the aisles of the supermarket taking our time making our choices, every three seconds one child dies of starvation on the Horn of Africa. Continue reading “The Horn of a Dilemma”

‘We’ll all be Rooned,’ said Hanrahan.

Australia is part of the Developed World and Australian agriculture has yet to answer the question as to whether it is capable of increasing food production to meet the projected global demands of the future. Are we capable of increasing food production by at least 40% and so help feed the world?

There is global consensus that by 2050 the world population will have grown from 6 billion to 9 billion. To feed the extra 3 billion people the world will have to increase food production by more than 40%. Eighty per cent of that increase will have to come from the Developed World.

There has to be some doubt whether we can. Terms of trade in agriculture are lousy and our debts are unmanageable. There has been and continues to be, a reduction in both federal and state funds for research and development (R & D) and in a later article we will tell the story behind some frightening figures on the spread of salinity in Western Australia and Australia. Continue reading “‘We’ll all be Rooned,’ said Hanrahan.”