OT: U.C. Davis Ag Econ. Professor claims America Ag is dead

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Are you an American and do you eat? If so, this topic may be of interest. It looks like globalism in our economy will solidify into a parody of the old Imperial/colonial model. It appears in the future that all of our food and natural resources are destined to be imported.

As someone who works with small agriculturalists, I can verify that the trend of American policies is serving to kill home production. ***************

From www.metrofarm.com

"America, the most efficient producer of food in the world, is going out of the business because it can no longer compete."

According to Steven Blank, Ph.D., in "The End of Agriculture in the American Portfolio," America is going out of the business of agriculture and he has the numbers and projections to prove it. Blank, a professor with the Agriculture and Resource Economics Department at UC Davis, maintains that America simply cannot afford to participate in high-risk, low-return industries like agriculture, and for that reason, agricultural production in America is destined to end.

"America doing agriculture is a bit like a Ph.D. doing child's work-- its a waste!"

The January 15, 2000 edition of Saturday Morning Agriculture will feature a conversation with Steven Blank about the end of agriculture in the American portfolio of industries. The show will air at 9am Pacific and may be heard throughout Central California on AM 1080 KSCO and AM 1340 KOMY.

Questions are expected to include: If America is the most efficient producer of food in the world, why can it no longer compete? What specific economic forces are at work to end the production of food in the U.S? Are these economic forces also at work in other developed nations? Which nations will then produce our food?

This edition of Saturday Morning Agriculture will be archived for your leisure-time listening on the radio page at www.metrofarm.com. The archived show will include a discussion board so that you may ask questions of Dr. Blank and leave comments for others interested in the subject.

-- marsh (siskfarm@snowcrest.net), January 13, 2000

Answers

This is truly sick. So unreal, it's probably all too true. Good thing I never finished that PhD; would have been overqualified fer sure.....

So we'll have all our food grown overseas and import it; and in case of shipping problems we'll just eat our stock mergers or something.......

-- farmer (hillsidefarm@drbs.com), January 13, 2000.


Andy -- Sorry to have to ask again -- but what was the source and exact quote of:

We're doomed -- doomed I tell ye!

Ravi Batra in "The Crash of the Millennium" shows how and why the problem. His solution, I think, is government. But that to me, is the "fox guarding the henhouse". Thus my pessimism. Don't eat up that freeze dried food yet. It lasts years. Rotate your stock.

-- A (A@AisA.com), January 13, 2000.


1) The US government often pays farmers for not growing stuff...

2) Small family farms are becoming a thing of the past...except for organic and similar specialty farms...

3) Large corporate farms are becoming larger...often growing one or a few crops.

4) Much ag land is being converted to urban use.

5) The population of the US is expected to double in the next 100 years (one study said in the next 50 years...). That will further impact land use.

6) Some ag land is being lost to erosion, pollution, etc.

7) Some ag land is being converted back to forest...

8) Much of Hawaiian ag is priced out of the market by labor costs.

Is it any wonder that he came to these conclusions?

-- Mad Monk (madmonk@hawaiian.net), January 13, 2000.


Ag is based on oil: tractors, fertilizer, transportation. This ignores the prediction that we would have severe oil shortages due to embedded chips shutting down wells, refineries, pipelines. As INFOMAGIC said, we need to wait a couple of months for this prediction to manifest. If this happens, Ag will become small scale in short order.

The latest in Ag horrors is genetically engineered seeds. These seeds produce sterile crops, and seeds must be purchased annually; they cannot be saved. These seeds have to be soaked in a petrochemical solution in order to sprout. Right now we are the producers of this seed and it is marketed heavily to the third world. We are making them dependent on us for seed.

-- John Littmann (littmannj@aol.com), January 13, 2000.


Ok, so why is food so cheap? The answer is because it is so plentiful. The answer to this riddle is that the agriculture industry has been so highly successful that it has put itself out of business. It is producing more and more food, cheaper, on less and less land. The outcome of this situation is that the smaller producers who cannot compete go out of business, same as in any other industry.

FACT: U.S. Agriculture will only go out of business because the U.S. government and U.N. want it to. They want to turn the U.S. into a natural environmental park. They want all the people off the land. (Don't believe me? Go to un.org and read their documents.) Moral of this story is: Notice to all eaters (U.S and international): start growing your own food or you won't have anything to eat.

-- Y2kObserver (Y2kObserver@nowhere.com), January 13, 2000.



Marsh:

Davis is a good school, but Steven BLANK. For a response see

Explaining Blank

Best wishes,,,

Z

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), January 13, 2000.


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