PRE-CLASS NOTEs 6. GLOBAL FOOD CRISIS. 17 April 2009

Gasohol was done for the silly purpose of climate change; costs more to produce than it saves in gasoline.
	To reduce pollution and to reduce oil imports are valid.
Inconsistencies in text:
1.	70% agricultural land is for farm animals (free range)
	Later says only 12% more land to cultivate.
2. 	Cattle generate 18% of ozone-depleting gases
	What about buffalo to the horizon?
3.	Fuel is 30% of corn production
	70% corn goes to cows (she means cattle, livestock).  None to food
4.     Six months to deliver
World population doubled 1950 to 2000.  To double again by 2050.
	Hunger = function (food, population)
	Green revolution.	Food <- Population = hunger
					 Food -> Population = hunger
	Fix food or fix population? Which is the independent or dependent variables?  No win?
"Comprehensive approach" needed == Government and regulation (not free-market)
Cheap food in Marshalltown?	
	Donation of time = cheap food (got some spoiled beef)
	AngelFood thru churches == cheap food (seems good)
	Donation agencies.  (I stopped, encourage illegals.) [Class said mostly US poor.]
Marshalltown Schools website -- publish number of students on free lunches as 81%.
		Free lunch progrtam includes free breakfast.
		Keep cafeteria open on non-school days.
Education is solution?
		Our education dollars go for gymnasiums and feeding, not career building.
			MHS gym and auditorium has a  class room wing.
			MCC sports building with schools attached.
			U of IA	grass to million dollar artificial turf to million dollar grass again.
Food stamp increase is not a measure of poverty, but of government expansions and advertising.
		Same with health care for ALL children -- illegals.  Tax dollars.
Food prices:  Good Life, Have-More Plan, an acre provides food. 
	Good Life (Good Neighbors in US) food from the back lawn : No mow, grow.  
	Victory Garden.  Tomatoes among the peonies.  I have done it, one green/red follows another.
	I came to Iowa to get out of corporate rat race -- I found that Vice Presidents were not happy.
	Came to raise rabbits, but hogs were less work and more profitable. Cows were no work and
	beef is good, too.  Gardening -- good food, but I am a carnivore.  Potatoes: cut up a  spud and
	space eyes on the ground, cover with straw (dried grass?) and then go pull up ten potatoes from 
        each eye.  But a 50# sack of potatoes was going for $5.  Not worth even that minimal effort.
US aid distribution = bad ??? what does she mean ???
US aid is only of US agricultural products -- DUH !
US agricultural subsidies == millions to corporate farms and to get around death taxes.
	US founded to serve family farm.  $1/4 million annual cap,  Amen!
Global warming will increase moisture -- people tend to equate warmth with drought, Not True.
	Open millions of acres of Canada for croplands.
	Water wars - - predicted -- are from more population, not less water.
Where does water come from?  Ocean, rain, land, rivers, oceans.  Is it a fixed amount?
	Minerals dissolve in water.  Oceans become more salty?  The next AlGore can blame salted
		hamburgers for oceans being undrinkable and start another guilt campaign.
To halve undernourishment.  Note the bottom 16% shall always be with us.  Statistically required. 
      So is half the world substandard on anything.
Right to life -- every sperm spillith upon the ground by a teenager behind the barn could be a life --
		a potential Michael Angelo -- or an Idi Amin.  "All the children are above average."
		Proven by fact that school grades are above average.
OxFam - Oxford committee on Famine relief, founded 1942 to get food to people under Axis.
   Now an advocate:  anti-Starbucks, pro-Palestine, anti-3rd World Drug testing.
	"Has to get trade reform right" -- i.e. do it my way.
	Young children benefit from good  nutrition.  Ok.
US AID:  evil requirement to ship US's surplus on US ships.  
Book wants cash and to buy locally -- ie. bid up the price of local goods already in short supply. Dumb! 
   Providing for a merchant marine is a national security issue.  
       In WW2 we converted ocean liners -- no more, top heavy, unseaworthy.
"Shameful misuse of aid dollars must come to an immediate end" -- HOW?
	"up to 6-months"  Therefore average is less than 6-months ("How to Lie with Statistics")
 -- Marshall Plan July 1947, assume aid in 1948 ;three years. Should it not have been done?
	Non-US surplus and shipping will dilute congressional support for foreign aid.  -- I hope so.
	If provided other than food -- seed, (more than 6-months), fertilizer, credit, tractors,
	Seed takes greater than 6-months to customize; fertilizer (transport or use local manure ;
		credit into pockets of pols;  tractors better be JD and Cat.
GM Foods -- Genetically Modified.
	"accuse US biotech firms of using poorer countries..."  -- So?
	I hope GM foods supplied to requesting nations and is to also include medical aid (monitoring).
	Prince Charles is sort'a like Joe Bidden.  Everything he says is backwards.
	New seed variety testing is Cub Scout level -- plant, grow under conditions to be tested, and select best.
	I can remember anti-fluoride in water lectures.  Probably were some against Vit.D milk and iodine is salt.
Risk form GM bears close monitoring by several unaffiliated groups.
	I wish "failing states" also meant no population growth, but it means more children to support parents.
Laurie Garrett -- Pulitzer prize for Ebola outbreak in Zaire.
	"No agency responsible to declare a global food crisis" -- except press.
Doha Round.  Trade talks  started 2001 in Qatar. US wanted to ship patent medicines to Africa -- AIDS, 
	Had been illegal by rules.
	2008 session broke down over India, China protective tariffs and US farm subsidies.
Summary:
	"Good steward, resilient, elastic, equitable" -- Gee!, are these actionable items.

Class Participation :  What are causes of Global Food Prices?
	Weather, transportation, politics, fuel, fertilizer, subsidies, taxes, salaries/benefits, 
climate change, tariffs, piracy, insurance, fear of GMC, War (civil and), 
POPULATION [not a concern by under 40 crowd?], wealth =>meat, gasohol, Food aid, 
government programs such as food stamps, school lunch.
	[The Holstein shown in the movie as a source of meat is a milk cow, not an Hereford or angus for beef.]
"Even the playing field; enormous differences in income round the world ($30K vs. $3K)"   
	[Why the disparity? Fix the cause.  Typical bad response is to tax and give welfare.
	Raise the level of the under-achieving nations ; not lower the level of the accomplished nations.]
		{Used to be tax-and-spend; now days it is spend-then-borrow
Second person in two weeks to mention great need of micronutrients, Vit A, -- Send Vitamin Pills!!!
One year 1/5th US wheat went to India crisis.  They doubled production.  [Good example of DIY.]
Solutions:  peace corps-like hands on technology and know how.