The key pillar to the multi-decade dollar Ponzi scheme run
by the Treasury’s Exchange
Stabilization Fund is cheap food (see video series about the
ESF and its history). To understand just how crucial this is, just
look at what has happened since food prices started soaring in the middle of
2010:
Soaring food prices have lead to riots
across the globe, and Pro-US dictators (who help prop up the dollar by
buying billions of US weapons and treasuries year after year) like Egypt's
Mubarak got overthrown. Likewise, Nations like China, dealing
with nasty food inflation, are appreciating their currency (selling
dollars) in an effort to contain the situation. Finally, higher food
prices mean higher inflation putting upward pressure on interest rates (and a
government 14+ trillion in debt can’t afford higher interest rates).
So in order to keep the dollar alive little longer, the Treasury's ESF has been
using all the resources at its disposal (the propaganda network it controls and
the executive branch that it dominates) to keep food prices down. Below
are ten ESF schemes behind cheap food.
--------------------------------
1) The
substitution of inferior food (Fish Fraud, Fabricated Steak, etc)
Fake Designer Bags are cheaper than the real thing. The same applies to
food. When inferior food is substituted at every layer of the supply
chain and sold the unsuspecting consumers, the result is lower prices.
The Sun-Sentinel reports that Fish fraud means what's on your plate may be an impostor.
(emphasis mine) [my comment]
Fish fraud means what's on your plate may be an
impostor
June 16, 2011|By Peter
Franceschina, Sun Sentinel
… "seafood
fraud," [is] the substitution of one species of fish — usually of inferior quality — for another. The deception can be carried out anywhere in the
international supply chain…
Seafood fraud is a
problem in some parts of the industry, according to a recent report, "Bait and Switch: How Seafood Fraud Hurts Our
Oceans, Our Wallets and Our Health," issued by the national conservation group Oceana. The
report cites recent studies showing that 25 PERCENT TO 70 PERCENT OF THE TIME, FISH SOLD IN THE
UNITED STATES AS RED SNAPPER, WILD SALMON AND ATLANTIC COD IS ACTUALLY LESS
DESIRABLE, CHEAPER FISH
that is more readily available.
…
ONLY TWO OUT OF 20
SAMPLES OF RED SNAPPER WERE THE REAL THING. That
delectable fish – Lutjanus
campechanus, native to the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic waters – is one of the most frequently impersonated by a
fake.
After 35 years in the restaurant, retail and wholesale seafood business, Hugh
Ganter … knows his fish, and how
to sniff out seafood fraud. …
That's how he once discovered
3,000 pounds of "grouper" he had bought was actually
farm-raised catfish from Southeast Asia. There were clues: The fillets were not as thick as they
should have been, and the flesh didn't have grouper's characteristic reddish
tinge.
…
… when Shivji's students recently tested fish advertised as white tuna from 10 sushi
restaurants in Broward,
Miami-Dade and Palm Beach counties, they found eight had been improperly labeled. Escolar, an oily fish that can cause diarrhea, is frequently substituted for white tuna on sushi
menus…
…
"It is true in today's
world WE HAVE SUBSTITUTION, NOT ONLY IN SEAFOOD ITEMS BUT MANY TIMES IN
OTHER FOOD PRODUCTS," she said. …
Fish substitutions can
pose health risks,
potentially exposing consumers to naturally occurring toxins — such as ciguatera in reef fish — that cause
illness, according to the Oceana report. And if a less costly fish is substituted, CONSUMERS ARE PAYING
A HIGHER PRICE FOR SOMETHING THEY ARE NOT GETTING.
…
If you find cheap
prices on seafood … ,
there could be a good reason — a lesser fish is masquerading as a pricier cousin.
…
ABC News reports that Ingredients
in Taco Bell Beef and Fast Food Meat.
Today's Special: Ammonia-Treated Meat Scraps?
By ALAN FARNHAM
Feb. 7, 2011
How much meat is in your Taco Bell taco
filling? How much is in your McDonald's Quarter
Pounder or your Burger King Whopper? And is
this meat really meat--OR SOMETHING ELSE?
These questions took center stage in January when a California woman sued Taco
Bell, claiming its taco filling is only 35
percent ground beef. The rest, she alleges in
her class action suit, consists of edible
padding: binders, extenders, preservatives, additives and other non-meat
ingredients. …
Kantha Shelke, chief science officer of Corvus Blue LLC, a Chicago food science
and nutrition research firm, says it's
frankly impossible for a consumer to know how much meat is in a food item at Taco Bell, McDonalds, Burger King or any other fast
food restaurant. That's because such
disclosure is not required. Even when an item is touted as being
"all-beef," it may be only 70 percent meat and not run afoul of
regulations.
Non-meat ingredients in meat items include
ones that add flavor or promote consistency, and binders. "American consumers think they're being cheated out of
their money when they hear that term," says Shelke. …
As for the meat itself, some of it can
be…well, not exactly what you think of when you think of meat.
Bill Marler, an plaintiffs' attorney specializing in food safety lawsuits, says
that it's common for up to 10 percent
to 12 percent of that juicy burger you're about to pop into your mouth to be
"ammoniated beef product"—scraps and trimmings left over from slaughter THAT
USED TO BE RELEGATED FOR USE IN PET FOOD.
They no longer are, thanks to a treatment
process that uses ammonium hydroxide to protect meat made from scraps against
bacterial contamination, thus rendering it
fit--at
least according to regulators--for human consumption.
The product is produced by Beef Products
Inc. of South Dakota, whose website says that if you're eating a hamburger in a "quick-service
restaurant" (the food industry's
preferred term for fast food), "...chances
are you'll be eating product produced by BPI."
…
The fast-food industry's meat magic doesn't
stop at burgers: The steak you're eating may not be what you expect.
Shelke says some middle-market steak
house chains serve "FABRICATED STEAK"—an FDA term
referring to steak-like objects formed from pulverized flesh. "The end result looks like a beefsteak but in reality
has been extruded. Meat is broken down
into its components and then re-formed to look like the original. You think you're getting the same steak as if you were at
a real Texas steakhouse."
The telltale sign that you're not is the
meat's uniformity: all the steaks have the same look, size and same
consistency. Another clue: Steaks right off the steer have marbling; they have
tendons. Fabricated steaks have neither.
Shelke sees such products as the result of
the public's demand for CHEAPNESS and consistency. …
Achieving consistency the old fashioned way is labor intensive and expensive. …
Fabricating them is easier and
CHEAPER.
…
Independent Online explains The
truth about food fraud.
The truth about food fraud
November 20 2006 at 10:40am
By Kate Ravilious
…
Food fraud is big business. The UK Food Standards Agency believes that around 10 per
cent of our weekly shopping may be counterfeit. Many of the everyday goods that we buy - honey, orange juice, ham, butter and coffee - generate serious money for the food criminals. From printing misleading labels to diluting or modifying
the food itself, it's easier than ever
for suppliers to dupe consumers.
… Are you still sure that you know exactly what you're buying?
Tuna
There's tuna and there's tuna - and then
there's bonito. Bonito … , due to its average quality … , is significantly cheaper than its chunky cousin, tuna. The trouble is, in
products that are generically labelled "tuna", some manufacturers
exchange cheaper species for more expensive ones. This is especially prevalent in processed tinned tuna…
Chicken
Bulking up a chicken breast with water is an
old supplier's trick, but the FSA had not
realised how widespread the problem was
until it conducted a snap survey in 2001. Its investigation
found that almost half the frozen
chicken breasts they examined had a meat content of between 5 and 26 per cent
less than appeared on packaging, and
that some chicken breasts contained as
much as 43 per cent added water.
…
Eggs
Breakfasts around the country were spoilt by two recent announcements from Defra. The first was that, following an investigation of imported
eggs in north London, one in 30 boxes
was found to contain salmonella. The second was that around 30 million eggs may have been
wrongly labelled as free range.
…
Lean mince
Watch out, bolognese enthusiasts: that
extra-lean mince might not be so low-fat after all. The Association of Public Analysts' recent survey suggests
that much of the minced beef, lamb,
pork, turkey and chicken that claims to be a reduced-fat alternative is, in fact, just as
unhealthy as "standard" mince.
A total of 27 per cent of all mince types are now labelled as "lean"
and "extra lean".
…
Scallops and scampi
A 2002 survey by the FSA found worryingly high levels of water in raw scallops
and peeled scampi tails - nearly half the
scallops contained 10 per cent added water or more, while some contained
as much as 54 per cent. The situation
with scampi was far worse - 86 per
cent of ice-glazed peeled scampi had more than 10 per cent added water. …
Honey
…
An investigation revealed a world of
shady dealings in the honey industry.
Some farmers, for instance, were administering too many antibiotics to poorly
bees. More significantly, the quality of imported
honey was put under a harsh spotlight. Whole batches from India and China
were found to be contaminated with chloramphenicol, an antibiotic banned in
food production the world over. …
King Edward potatoes
… Recently, the FSA took samples from shops, wholesale markets and catering
suppliers and found that 35 per cent
of its samples had been wrongly labelled King Edward. …
Rice
Genetically modified rice should not be on
sale in Britain. It is illegal here, just as
it is in all EU countries. But in September, several types of GM rice were
found in British supermarkets. The problem started when the Bush administration admitted it had found genetically
modified material in some American long-grain rice that was ready for export. This GM rice had been developed by Bayer CropScience to
tolerate weedkiller and had spread around the US as a result of
cross-pollination. The European Commission has since stated that this GM rice has been found in 33 out of 162 samples of
imported US rice.
Organic meat
… An investigation launched into the
sale of bogus organic meat carried out
earlier this year revealed that many
farmers and traders are passing off non-organic meat as the more expensive
organic variety.
…
Thanks to what-used-to-be-dog-food
being sold at fast food restaurants around the world, food is prices are
cheaper.
--------------------------------
2) Distructive, unsustainable
farming techniques
As with anything, it is possible to go over the limit to achieve short
gains at the expense of sacrificing the future (for example: an athlete can
ignore an injury to win a tournament, but do permanent damage to his body in
the process). The same is true in agriculture.
To keep food cheap, the ESF has promoted the use of high-yielding, destructive
farming techniques in arid regions which could not support them. This
increases production initially, but then slowly turns the land into a desert
where nothing will grow.
Treasury interference in US market corrupted corporate culture. Bankers started
behaving like there was no tomorrow because they knew something was
fundamentally wrong with the system. They started pursuing business
practices which can only be described as "picking up pennies in front of a
steamroller".
Most the world has adopted intensive farming techniques which is degrading
farmland. I have already written about how disaster
is Feared As Desertification Spreads.
…
What is desertification
1) Desertification is the degradation
of dryland ecosystems through a combination of
natural and human causes.
2) Desertification occurs when
human beings try to take too many resources from land that can sustain very
little human life. When too many
people try to plant crops, graze cattle and harvest firewood in a fragile
dryland ecosystem, they tip the balance of sustainability.
3) When we talk about desertification, we're not only talking about the
slow spread of existing deserts, but the creation of entirely new ones.
1930's Dust Bowl is a perfect example
of desertification
1) In the 1920s, when the United States entered an economic recession, farmers in Western states tried to raise profits by plowing
and planting more acreage with new mechanized farming methods.
2) Within a decade, a massive drought hit the entire country. Strong
winds swept across the Great Plains, stirring up loose topsoil that had been displaced
by overplowing and overgrazing of cattle. The results were dozens of epic dust storms that swallowed whole
cities in blinding black clouds. The
semiarid soil of the plains, which had fed generations with its fertile soil, was now A LIFELESS DESERT KNOWN AS THE DUST BOWL.
Disaster Feared As Desertification
Spreads
1) New deserts are growing at a
rate of 20,000 square miles (51,800
square kilometers) a year.
2) Save for the Antarctica, desertification
affects all continents.
3) Nearly half of the world's total
land mass is composed of dryland ecosystems
(areas defined by low annual rainfall and high temperatures), and 10 to 20 percent of these regions are already degraded -- unsuitable for human, animal or plant life.
4) Dryland regions are also home to billions of the world's poorest, most
marginalized populations. As these people are displaced by new deserts, they
are forced into even more unstable regions, where the desertification process
continues.
5) More than 70 percent of
drylands in Africa, Asia and Latin America that are being used for
agricultural purposes are already
experiencing the effects of desertification.
6) Desertification was one the sources
of the global food crisis of 2008. Degradation
of available farmland contributes to less food production and higher prices for
staple crops like rice, wheat and corn.
7) Desertification leads to
famine, mass starvation and
unprecedented human migration.
…
Desertification will created economic
deserts
1) The UN is warning that parts
of the world may have to be abandoned because severe water shortages will leave
them uninhabitable
…
Lets first be clear about something: the desertification happening around
the world isn’t the result of global warming (thought it is possible global
warming is making it worse). The
desertification we are seeing, in
every case, is clearly the result of
reckless and extensive overuse of drylands around the world.
Even if the world miraculously cuts carbon emissions to a fraction of their
current level, desertification will
continue as long as rampant farming and wasteful irrigation practices remain
common in regions that do not support them.
Desertification means lower food
production in the near future
Governments have two choices:
A) Do nothing and let food
output slowly drops as agricultural land turns into sand dunes.
B) Restrain rampant farming, wasteful
irrigation, and other harmful practices, stemming
desertification at the cost of a drop in production
No matter what actions governments take, the
only certainty is that global grain output will drop significantly.
…
The Treasury's ESF is directly responsible for
the destructive farming techniques wrecking havoc in the world today.
Take, for example, ESF's
intervention (through the CIA) in Indian agriculture.
Appendix I: Ford Foundation - A Case Study of the Aims of
Foreign Funding
"Someday someone must give the American
people a full report of the work of the Ford Foundation in India. The several million dollars in total Ford expenditures in
the country do not tell one-tenth of the story." - Chester Bowles (former
US ambassador to India).
…
Ford and the CIA
The fact is that the
US Central Intelligence Agency has long operated through a number of
philanthropic foundations; most prominently Ford Foundation. …
…
The CIA's infiltration of US foundations in
general was massive. A 1976 Select
Committee of the US Senate discovered that during 1963-66, of 700 grants each
of over $10,000 given by 164 foundations, at least 108 were partially or wholly
CIA-funded. According to Petras, "The
ties between the top officials of the FF and the U.S. government are explicit
and continuing. A review of recently funded
projects reveals that the FF has never
funded any major project that contravenes U.S. policy."
…
Ford Foundation intervention in Indian
agriculture
Given the background of the Chinese revolution and
the Telangana struggle, the US priority in
India was to find ways to head off agrarian unrest. …
In 1959, a
team led by a US department of agriculture economist produced the Ford Foundation's Report on India's Food Crisis and Steps to Meet It. In place of institutional change (ie redistribution of
land and other rural assets) as the key-stone to agricultural development, this report stressed technological change (improved seeds, chemical fertilisers, and pesticides) in small, already irrigated, pockets. This was the
'Green Revolution' strategy. Ford even funded the Intensive Agricultural Development
Programme (IADP) as a test case of the strategy, providing rich farmers in irrigated areas with subsidised inputs,
generous credit, price incentives, and so on. The World Bank too put its weight
behind this strategy.
Soon it was adopted by the Indian government, with far-reaching effects. Agricultural production of rice and wheat in the selected
pockets grew immediately. …
The 'Green Revolution' strategy
has lead to disaster in India. The Wall Street Journal reports that Green
Revolution in India Wilts as Subsidies Backfire.
FEBRUARY 23, 2010
Green Revolution in India Wilts as Subsidies Backfire
By GEETA ANAND
SOHIAN, India—India's Green
Revolution is withering.
In the 1970s, India dramatically increased food
production, finally allowing this giant country to feed itself. But government efforts to continue that miracle by encouraging farmers to use fertilizers have backfired, forcing the country
to expand its reliance on imported food.
Popularized during the Green Revolution of the
1960s and 1970s, fertilizers helped boost crop yields and transformed
India into a nation that could feed itself. But
now their overuse is degrading the farmland.
India has been providing farmers with heavily subsidized fertilizer for
more than three decades. The overuse of one
type—urea—is so degrading the soil that yields on some crops are falling and
import levels are rising. So
are food prices, which jumped 19% last year. The
country now produces less rice per hectare than its far poorer neighbors:
Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.
…
Farmers spread the rice-size urea granules by hand
or from tractors. They pay so little for it that in some areas they use
many times the amount recommended by scientists, throwing off the
chemistry of the soil, according to multiple studies by Indian
agricultural experts.
Like humans, plants need balanced diets to thrive. Too much urea oversaturates plants with nitrogen without replenishing
other nutrients that are vitally important, including
phosphorus, potassium, sulfur, magnesium and calcium.
…
As the soil's fertility has declined, farmers under pressure to increase output have spread
even more urea on their land.
Kamaljit Singh is a 55-year-old farmer in the town of Marauli Kalan in the
state of Punjab, the breadbasket of India. He says farmers feel stuck. "The soil health is deteriorating, but we don't know how to make it better,"
he says. "As the fertility of the
soil is declining, more fertilizer is required."
…
[Before India’s “Green Revolution”]
In the early years after India gained independence in 1947, the country couldn't even dream of feeding its
population. Importing food wasn't possible because India lacked the cash
to pay. India relied on food donated by the U.S. government.
[India’s “Green Revolution” begins in 1967]
In 1967, then-Prime Minister Indira Gandhi imported 18,000 tons of hybrid wheat
seeds from Mexico. The effect was miraculous.
The wheat harvest that year was so bountiful that grain overflowed
storage facilities.
Those seeds required chemical fertilizers to maximize yield. ...
…
[India’s “Green Revolution” today]
In the northern state of Punjab, Bhupinder Singh, a turbaned, gray-bearded
55-year-old farmer, stood barefoot in his wheat field in December and pointed
to the corner where he had just spread a 110-pound bag of urea.
"Without the urea, my crop looks
sick," he said, picking up a few stalks of the young wheat
crop and twirling them in his fingers. "THE
SOIL IS GETTING WEAKER AND WEAKER OVER THE LAST 10 TO 15 YEARS. We need MORE AND MORE UREA TO GET THE SAME
YIELD."
Mr. Singh farms 10 acres in Sohian, a town about 25 miles from the industrial
city of Ludhiana. He said his yields of rice have fallen to three tons per
acre, from 3.3 tons five years ago. By using
twice as much urea, he's been able
to squeeze a little higher yield of wheat from the soil—two tons per
acre, versus 1.7 tons five years ago.
He said both the wheat and rice harvests should be bigger, considering that
he's using so much more urea today than he did five years ago. ADDING UREA DOESN'T HAVE THE EFFECT IT DID IN THE PAST,
he said, but it's so cheap that it's better than
adding nothing at all.
…
"The future is not good here,"
he said, shaking his head.
…
Deteriorating soil health had lead to desertification in
India. Caritas.org reports about desertification
in India.
Desertification
in India
…
Half the land in India is now affected
by desertification and this
impairs the ability of land to support life. It is particularly devastating because of its
self-reinforcing nature.
The causes of desertification are extensive cultivation
of one crop, use of chemical fertilisers and pesticides, shifting cultivation
without adequate period of recovery, industrial and mining
activities, overgrazing, logging and illegal felling, forest fires and
unsustainable water management.
…
Gentledude.blogspot.com reports about Desertification
In South India.
Wednesday,
May 02, 2007
Desertification
In South India
…
Kannekal and Bommanahal are like any other village in South India 150 years
ago. A fertile soil that yielded two crops a year, abundant rainfall, and
plentiful of grass for the livestock. Centuries
ago wars have been fought for the fertile lands. But Hagari, the
river that flows by the villages had severe floods for a couple of years. And
with the floods came sand. The sand dunes spread
across the area pretty quickly, thanks to strong winds in the area. Thus started the process of desertification. Soon rainfall decreased in the area and the sand dunes
started spreading quickly. The inhabitants of these villages continued
with indiscriminate use of water and
instead of taking steps to conserve water, used up even more water for
irrigation using bore wells. This resulted in an even faster spreading of sand
dunes. Now thousands of acres of land is
covered by these sand dunes.
As I have written before, India faces a bleak future.
The Chart below shows worldwide growth in fertilizer
use. Notice India’s 54 percent
increase in fertilizer use over the last ten years.
Chart below shows India’s wheat output. The
red bar highlights the last ten years (where India's fertilizer use
increase 54 percent). The green
bar highlights the start of India’s “green revolution”.
…
Now look at what happened with India’s
population since the Green Revolution began.
Seems like India has two choices:
1) Switch to more sustainable farming methods and try to feed twice the population with pre-“green
revolution” grain production levels.
2) Continue “green revolution” farming
methods and watch deteriorating soil
health and desertification slowly eat away at grain production.
Both of these choices involve a lot of
people not having food any more.
Seems India is somewhat screwed.
For more on this, try googling overshoot-and-collapse
food economy…
--------------------------------
3) Boosting supply by exausting
NONREPLENISHABLE resources
By tapping your savings, it is possible to live above your means, temporarily.
In its quest for cheap food, The ESF has promoted the use of nonreplenishable
resources (the world’s “savings”) to boost agricultural production. Two
examples of this are the overpumping aquifers and the use natural gas (fossil
fuel) to produce nitrogen fertilizer.
Like most ESF schemes, this is now reaching the breaking point. The Encyclopedia
Of Earth reports about aquifer depletion.
Aquifer
depletion
Last Updated: September 14, 2006
Scores of countries are overpumping aquifers as they struggle to
satisfy their growing water needs, including each of the big three grain
producers-China, India, and the United States. These three,
along with a number of other countries where water tables are falling, are home
to more than half the world's people. (See Table at end of article.)
There are two types of aquifers: replenishable and nonreplenishable (or fossil)
aquifers. Most of the aquifers in India and the shallow aquifer under
the North China Plain are replenishable. When these are depleted, the maximum
rate of pumping is automatically reduced to the rate of recharge.
For fossil aquifers—such as
the vast U.S. Ogallala aquifer, the deep aquifer under the North China Plain,
or the Saudi aquifer—DEPLETION BRINGS PUMPING
TO AN END. Farmers who lose their irrigation water have the
option of returning to lower-yield dryland farming if rainfall permits. In more arid regions, however, such as in the southwestern United States or the Middle
East, THE LOSS OF IRRIGATION WATER MEANS THE END OF AGRICULTURE.
Falling water tables are already adversely
affecting harvests in some countries, including
China, the world's largest grain producer. A groundwater survey released in Beijing in
August 2001 revealed that the water table under the North China Plain, which
produces over half of that country's wheat and a third of its corn, is falling
faster than earlier reported. Overpumping has largely depleted the shallow
aquifer, forcing well drillers to turn to the region's deep fossil aquifer,
which is not replenishable.
The survey, conducted by the Geological Environmental Monitoring Institute
(GEMI) in Beijing, reported that under Hebei
Province in the heart of the North China Plain, the average level of the deep
aquifer was dropping nearly 3 meters (10 feet) per year. Around some
cities in the province, it was falling twice as fast. He Qingcheng, head of the
GEMI groundwater monitoring team, notes that as the
deep aquifer is depleted, the region is losing its last water reserve-its only
safety cushion.
He Qingcheng's concerns are mirrored in a World Bank report: "Anecdotal
evidence suggests that deep wells [drilled] around
Beijing now have to reach 1,000 meters [more than half a mile] to tap fresh
water, adding dramatically to the cost of supply." In unusually strong language for a Bank report,
it foresees "CATASTROPHIC CONSEQUENCES
FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS" unless
water use and supply can quickly be brought back into balance.
The U.S. embassy in Beijing reports that wheat
farmers in some areas are now pumping from a depth of 300 meters, or nearly
1,000 feet. Pumping water from this far down raises pumping costs so
high that farmers are often forced to abandon irrigation and return to less
productive dryland farming.
Falling water tables, the conversion of cropland to nonfarm uses, and the loss
of farm labor in provinces that are rapidly industrializing are combining
to shrink China's grain harvest. The wheat crop, grown mostly in
semiarid northern China, is particularly vulnerable to water shortages. After peaking at 123 million tons in 1997, the
harvest has fallen in five of the last eight years, coming in at
95 million tons in 2005, a drop of 23 percent.
The U.S. embassy also reports that the recent
decline in rice production is partly a result of water shortages.
After peaking at 140 million tons in 1997, the harvest dropped in four of the
following eight years, falling to an estimated 127 million tons in 2005. Only corn, China's third major grain, has thus far
avoided a decline. This is because corn prices are favorable and because
the crop is not as irrigation-dependent as wheat and rice are.
Overall, China's grain production has fallen from its historical peak of 392
million tons in 1998 to an estimated 358 million tons in 2005. For perspective,
this drop of 34 million tons exceeds the
annual Canadian wheat harvest. China largely covered the
drop-off in production by drawing down its once vast stocks until 2004, at
which point it imported 7 million tons of grain.
A World Bank study indicates that China is
overpumping three river basins in the north--the Hai, which
flows through Beijing and Tianjin; the Yellow; and the Huai, the next river
south of the Yellow. Since it takes 1,000 tons of
water to produce one ton of grain, the shortfall in the Hai basin of
nearly 40 billion tons of water per year (1 ton equals 1 cubic meter) means
that when the aquifer is depleted, THE GRAIN
HARVEST WILL DROP BY 40 MILLION TONS--enough to feed 120 million Chinese.
Of the leading grain producers, only China has thus
far experienced a substantial decline in production. Even with a
worldwide grain crunch and climbing grain prices providing an incentive to
boost production, it will be difficult for China to
regain earlier grain production levels, given the loss of irrigation water.
Serious though emerging water shortages are in
China, they are even more serious in India simply because
the margin between actual food consumption and survival is so precarious. In a
survey of India's water situation, Fred Pearce reported in the New Scientist
that the 21 million wells drilled in this global epicenter of well-drilling are
lowering water tables in most of the country. In
North Gujarat, the water table is falling by 6 meters (20 feet) per year.
In Tamil Nadu, a state with more than 62 million people in southern India,
wells are going dry almost everywhere. According to Kuppannan Palanisami of
Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, falling water
tables have dried up 95 percent of the wells owned by small farmers,
reducing the irrigated area in the state by half over the last decade.
As water tables fall, well drillers are using
modified oil-drilling technology to reach water, going as deep as 1,000 meters in some locations.
In communities where underground water sources have dried up entirely, all
agriculture is rain-fed and drinking water is trucked in. Tushaar Shah, who
heads the International Water Management Institute's groundwater station in
Gujarat, says of India's water situation: "When
the balloon bursts, untold anarchy will be the lot of rural India."
At this point, the harvests of wheat and rice, India's principal food grains,
are still increasing. But within the next few
years, [in 2011 (five years since
article was written, it has already begun] the loss of irrigation water could override
technological progress and start shrinking
the harvest in some areas, as it is already doing in China.
In the United States, the USDA reports that in
parts of Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas--three leading grain-producing states--the
underground water table has dropped by more than 30 meters (100 feet).
As a result, wells have gone dry on thousands of farms in the southern Great
Plains. Although this mining of underground water
is taking a toll on U.S. grain production, irrigated land accounts for
only one-fifth of the U.S. grain harvest, compared with close to
three-fifths of the harvest in India and four-fifths in China.
Pakistan, a country with 158 million people that is
growing by 3 million per year, is also mining its underground water. In
the Pakistani part of the fertile Punjab plain, the drop in water tables
appears to be similar to that in India. Observation wells near the twin cities
of Islamabad and Rawalpindi show a fall in the water table between 1982 and
2000 that ranges from 1 to nearly 2 meters a year.
In the province of Baluchistan, water tables around the capital, Quetta, are
falling by 3.5 meters per year. Richard Garstang, a water expert with the World
Wildlife Fund and a participant in a study of Pakistan's water situation, said in 2001 that "within 15 years Quetta will run out of
water if the current consumption rate continues." [It is now 2011. About four years left]
The water shortage in Baluchistan is province-wide.
Sardar Riaz A. Khan, former Director of Pakistan's Arid Zone Research Institute
in Quetta, reports that six basins have exhausted
their groundwater supplies, leaving their irrigated lands barren.
Khan expects that within 10-15 years virtually all the basins outside the
canal-irrigated areas will have depleted their groundwater supplies, depriving
the province of much of its grain harvest.
Future irrigation water cutbacks as a result
of aquifer depletion will undoubtedly reduce Pakistan's grain harvest.
Countrywide, the harvest of wheat--the principal food staple--is continuing to
grow, but more slowly than in the past.
Iran, a country of 70 million people, is
overpumping its aquifers by an average of 5 billion tons of water per year, the
water equivalent of one-third of its annual grain harvest. Under
the small but agriculturally rich Chenaran Plain in northeastern Iran, the
water table was falling by 2.8 meters a year in the late 1990s. New wells being
drilled both for irrigation and to supply the nearby city of Mashad are
responsible. Villages in eastern Iran are
being abandoned as wells go dry,
generating a flow of “water refugees.”
Saudi Arabia, a country of 25 million people, is as water-poor as it is
oil-rich. Relying heavily on subsidies, it
developed an extensive irrigated agriculture based largely on its deep
fossil aquifer. After several years of using oil money to
support wheat prices at five times the world market level, the government was
forced to face fiscal reality and cut the subsidies.
Its wheat harvest dropped from a high of 4.1 million tons in 1992 to 1.2
million tons in 2005, a drop of 71 percent. [Saudi Arabia is phasing out wheat production entirely by
2016]
Craig Smith writes in the New York Times, “From
the air, the circular wheat fields of this arid land’s breadbasket look like
forest green poker chips strewn across the brown desert. But they are
outnumbered by the ghostly silhouettes of fields left to fade back into the
sand, places where the kingdom’s gamble on agriculture has sucked precious
aquifers dry.” Some Saudi farmers are now
pumping water from wells that are 4,000 feet deep, nearly
four-fifths of a mile (1 mile equals 1.61 kilometers).
A 1984 Saudi national survey reported fossil
water reserves at 462 billion tons. Half
of that, Smith reports, has probably
disappeared by now. This suggests that irrigated
agriculture could last for another decade or so and then will largely vanish
[Saudi Arabia is phasing out wheat production by
2016], limited to the small area that can be irrigated with water from
the shallow aquifers that are replenished by the kingdom’s sparse rainfall. It is a classic example of an overshoot-and-collapse
food economy.
In neighboring Yemen, a nation of 21 million, the water table under most of the
country is falling by roughly 2 meters a year as water use outstrips the
sustainable yield of aquifers. In western Yemen’s Sana’a Basin, the estimated
annual water extraction of 224 million tons exceeds the annual recharge of 42
million tons by a factor of five, dropping the water table 6 meters per year.
World Bank projections indicate the Sana’a
Basin-—site of the national capital, Sana’a, and home to 2
million people—-will be pumped dry by 2010.
In the search for water, the Yemeni government has
drilled test wells in the basin that are 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) deep-—depths
normally associated with the oil industry—-but
they have failed to find water. Yemen must soon decide whether
to bring water to Sana’a, possibly by pipeline from coastal desalting plants,
if it can afford it, or to relocate the capital. Either alternative will be
costly and potentially traumatic.
With its population growing at 3 percent a year and with water tables falling
everywhere, Yemen is fast becoming a hydrological
basket case. Aside from the effect of overpumping on the capital, World
Bank official Christopher Ward observes that “groundwater
is being mined at such a rate that parts of the rural economy could disappear
within a generation.” [See
Google Archive News results for Yemen
water]
Israel, even though a pioneer in raising
irrigation water productivity, is depleting both of
its principal aquifers—-the coastal aquifer and the mountain aquifer that
it shares with Palestinians. Israel’s
population, whose growth is fueled by both natural increase and
immigration, is outgrowing its water supply.
Conflicts between Israelis and Palestinians over the allocation of water in
the latter area are ongoing. Because of severe
water shortages, Israel has banned the irrigation of wheat.
In Mexico-—home to a population of 107
million that is projected to reach 140 million by 2050—-the demand for water is outstripping supply. Mexico City’s
water problems are well known and rural areas are also suffering. For example,
in the agricultural state of Guanajuato, the water table is falling by 2 meters
or more a year. At the national level, 51 percent of all the water extracted
from underground is from aquifers that are being overpumped.
Since the overpumping of aquifers is occurring in
many countries more or less simultaneously, the depletion of aquifers and
the resulting harvest cutbacks could come AT ROUGHLY THE SAME TIME.
And the accelerating depletion of aquifers means this day may come soon,
creating potentially UNMANAGEABLE FOOD
SCARCITY.
The New York Times reports about the
shortages threaten farmers' key tool: fertilizer.
April 30, 2008
Shortages Threaten Farmers’ Key Tool: Fertilizer
By KEITH BRADSHER and ANDREW MARTIN
… the widespread use of
inexpensive chemical fertilizer,
coupled with market reforms, helped
power an agricultural explosion here that had already occurred in other parts
of the world. Yields of rice and corn
rose, and diets grew richer.
Now those gains are threatened in many
countries by spot shortages and soaring prices for fertilizer, the most essential
ingredient of modern agriculture.
Some kinds of fertilizer have nearly
tripled in price in the last year,
keeping farmers from buying all they need. That is one of many factors contributing to a rise in food prices that, according to the United Nations' World Food Program,
threatens to push tens of millions of poor people into malnutrition.
Protests over high food prices have
erupted across the developing world,
and the stability of governments from
Senegal to the Philippines is threatened.
In the United States, farmers in Iowa eager to replenish nutrients in the soil
have increased the age-old practice of spreading hog manure on fields. In
India, the cost of subsidizing fertilizer for farmers has soared, leading to
political dispute. And in Africa,
plans to stave off hunger by increasing crop yields are suddenly in jeopardy.
The squeeze on the supply of
fertilizer has been building for roughly five years. Rising demand for food and biofuels prompted farmers
everywhere to plant more crops. As demand grew, the fertilizer mines and factories of the world proved
unable to keep up.
Some dealers in the Midwest ran out of
fertilizer last fall, and they
continue to restrict sales this spring because of a limited supply.
“If you want 10,000 tons, they’ll sell you
5,000 today, maybe 3,000,” said W. Scott Tinsman
Jr., a fertilizer dealer in Davenport, Iowa. “The rubber band is stretched really far.”
…
Agriculture and development experts say the
world has few alternatives to its growing dependence on fertilizer. As population increases and a rising global middle class
demands more food, fertilizer is among
the most effective strategies to increase crop yields.
“Putting fertilizer on the ground on a
one-acre plot can, in typical cases, raise an extra ton of output,” said Jeffrey D. Sachs, the Columbia University economist
who has focused on eradicating poverty. “That’s
the difference between life and death.”
…
Fertilizer is plant food, a combination of nutrients added to soil to help
plants grow. The three most important are nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium.
The latter two have long been available. But nitrogen in a form that plants can absorb is scarce, and
the lack of it led to low crop yields for centuries.
That limitation ended in the early 20th century with the invention of a procedure, now primarily fueled by natural gas,
that draws chemically inert nitrogen from the air and converts it into a usable
form.
As the use of such fertilizer spread, it was accompanied by improved plant
varieties and greater mechanization. From
1900 to 2000, worldwide food production jumped by 600 percent. Scientists said that
increase was the fundamental reason world population was able to rise to about
6.7 billion today from 1.7 billion in 1900.
Vaclav Smil, a professor at the University of Manitoba, calculates that WITHOUT NITROGEN FERTILIZER, THERE WOULD BE INSUFFICIENT
FOOD FOR 40 PERCENT OF THE WORLD'S POPULATION, at least based on today’s diets. [KEY POINT]
…
“This is a basic problem, to feed 6.6
billion people,” said Norman Borlaug, an
American scientist who was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 for his role in
spreading intensive agricultural practices to poor countries. “Without chemical fertilizer, forget it. THE GAME
IS OVER.”
The thing about living beyond your means by tapping your
savings is that it is very painful when those savings run out.
--------------------------------
4) GM Technology
GM Technology is an integral part of the ESF cheap food strategy (it is an
extension of the “green revolution”). If you don’t have a negative
opinion of GM food, that is thanks to the ESF. Below is a
video showing how the news about GM Technology is controlled.
Media Corruption & The "Big Six"
For the truth about GM Technology, watch the documentary below.
Must-see documentary about GMO ~~ Part 01 of 10
Must-see documentary about GMO ~~ Part 02 of 10
Must-see documentary about GMO ~~ Part 03 of 10
Must-see documentary about GMO ~~ Part 04 of 10
Must-see documentary about GMO ~~ Part 05 of 10
Must-see documentary about GMO ~~ Part 06 of 10
Must-see documentary about GMO ~~ Part 07 of 10
Must-see documentary about GMO ~~ Part 08 of 10
Must-see documentary about GMO ~~ Part 09 of 10
Must-see documentary about GMO ~~ Part 10 of 10
--------------------------------
5) Encouraging
the consumption of contaminated food
Whenever a food source is contaminated by some sort of disaster, there are two
choices
1) Close down production from the contaminated source, reducing the food
supply and raising prices.
2) Allow production to continue, letting contaminated produce into the
food supply and keeping prices cheap.
Guess which one the ESF encourages?
Below are two recent/current example (out of many) where the sales of
significant quantities of tainted food has been allowed (and encouraged)
Example #1: contaminated seafood from the Gulf of Mexico
Fishermen harvest some 1.3 billion lb per year of fish, crabs, oysters, and
shrimp from the Gulf of Mexico—about 20% of US commercial seafood
production. It is easy to understand that if seafood production
was shut down for a long period of time, it would drive prices higher.
Now, on the April 20, 2010, the explosion of BP's Deepwater Horizon oil rig
caused millions of barrels of oil to be dumped into the Gulf of Mexico.
This made worse by BP dumped millions of gallons of extremely
toxic dispersant (COREXIT) to make the oil dissolve (when you put sugar in tea,
it dissolves, but it’s still there).
Of course, within two weeks of the disaster the National Oceanic &
Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) began closing federal waters to
fishing. As long as miles of oil was visibly floating on the water’s
surface, no one could be tricked into eating toxic gulf seafood. However,
once BP started pouring its incredibly lethal toxic dispersant into the gulf,
making the oil “disappear”, NOAA began to reopening large areas, and, by April
19, 2011, the entire gulf was open to fishing. While this
helped the ESF keep seafood cheap, it should never have happened.
Stuarthsmith.com reports that the fish in the Gulf of Mexico are
very sick (and you will be too if you eat them).
Gulf Update: Sick Fish, Human Risks and a Federal Agency
Trying to Keep the Lid on a Crisis
June 07, 2011
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA) has confirmed – for the
first time since the BP disaster – that fish
are sick in the Gulf of Mexico. In
fact, the number of “sick fish”
sightings has risen so dramatically, primarily in federal waters off Alabama,
and the risks to humans are becoming such a serious concern that NOAA has released
guidelines on what anglers should do when they come across visibly sick fish, including a “minimal to no handling” warning.
Many of the reports describe large
lesions on the fish, particularly red snapper. And with the June 1 opening of recreational red snapper
season, the reports of sick fish are bound
to keep rolling in and the risk of human exposure will grow exponentially.
Some experts, including many with whom I work, suspect the BP oil spill is connected to the spike. Not much of a surprise there. We’ve been seeing AN UNDENIABLE TREND TOWARD
"UNEXPLAINED" OCCURRENCES OF SICK, STRANDED AND DEAD MARINE LIFE
– like record numbers of dead dolphins and sea
turtles – for months now. The prime suspect, of course, is the 200
MILLION GALLONS OF CRUDE AND THE 2 MILLION GALLONS OF THE TOXIC DISPERSANT
COREXIT that continue to foul the Gulf of Mexico.
From a May 25 article in the Pensacola News Journal (PNJ):
The reports of sick fish correlate with
areas most impacted by the BP oil spill, said
Jim Cowan Jr., the Louisiana State University Department of Oceanography and
Coastal Sciences scientist who is at the center of the sick fish studies off
the Alabama coast.
The “sick fish” sightings first raised
eyebrows nearly two months ago. An April 17
article in the St. Petersburg Times describes the severity of the deformities:
The fish had dark lesions on their
skin, some the size of a 50-cent piece. On
some of them, the lesions had eaten a
hole straight through to the muscle tissue. Many had fins that were rotting away and discolored or even striped skin. Inside, they had
enlarged livers, gallbladders, and bile ducts.
The St. Pete Times quoted Professor Cowan as saying: “The fish have a bacterial infection and a parasite
infection that’s consistent with a compromised immune system. There’s no doubt
it’s associated with a chronic exposure to a toxin.” Hmmmm, I wonder what that could be? Any ideas?
In September 2010, my research team sampled red snapper caught off the coast of
Pensacola – and the results are very much in
line with the “sick fish” epidemic we’re seeing now. The certified lab
results show (see link to my previous
post below) the viscera, or internal
organs, to be contaminated with nearly 3,000 PPM of total petroleum
hydrocarbons. That’s a dangerous level
by any standard.
Although NOAA is sticking by its claim
that Gulf seafood is safe to eat (see
link to HuffPo article below), the agency is recommending the following steps
be taken if you catch a sick fish:
Release the fish back into the water with
minimal to no handling. Use a
fishhook-remover device. Avoid contact with skin, especially if you have cuts
or sores on your skin.
Document where you caught the fish, and if possible, photograph it. A website
is being developed on which anglers may post their findings.
Anglers are not advised to keep the sick
fish because of the risks of the fish
transmitting disease to humans.
If you bring in a red snapper with lesions, it does count toward your fishing
quota.
The “minimal to no handling”
recommendation should concern us all,
signaling that it may be time take
another look at NOAA’s “all clear” declaration on seafood safety. After all, the
agency has publicly admitted that the fish shouldn’t be handled, and they may pose health risks if eaten raw.
Although Professor Cowan cautions that more research needs to be conducted
before a definitive connection can be established, he doesn’t hide his concern:
“I’m very worried because I’ve talked
to both commercial and recreational fishermen who have been in the business 30
to 40 years and no one has seen anything like this.” One such fishermen is Donnie Waters: “I’m seeing things I’ve never seen before. I’m deeply concerned about the long-term impact of the
fishery of the eastern Gulf.”
Like Waters, Professor Cowan also believes there are sick fish, not just off Alabama, but across the entire area
of the Gulf hit by the BP spill.
Research is taking place now to determine if the problem is, in fact, that
widespread.
From the PNJ article:
The Sea Lab is collecting fish samples this week for further scrutiny by the
FDA. A broader survey is poised to begin to determine whether the sick fish
extend to areas beyond Alabama coastal waters. And NOAA is setting up a website
on which recreational anglers can report any sick fish they find.
My guess is that NOAA and the FDA will
ultimately confirm that there are sick, contaminated fish all over the
northeastern quadrant of the Gulf of Mexico. This is a serious issue that has obvious implications for
seafood safety as well as for the
overall post-spill health of the Gulf. A
highly contaminated link in the food chain can wreak havoc on the rest of the
ecosystem.
If the government finally comes around to
addressing these marine life issues head-on, before
this is all through, we could very
well see the re-closing of waters once deemed “all clear” for fishing. Stay tuned…
Catch up on NOAA’s “sick fish” guidelines here: http://www.pnj.com/article/20110525/NEWS01/105250328/NOAA-confirms-sick-fish-Gulf
Read my previous post on the most urgent problems, including seafood safety,
that must be resolved before the Gulf Coast can realize a full recovery: http://www.stuarthsmith.com/a-year-into-the-nightmare-three-of-the-most-urgent-issues-facing-the-gulf-coast
Read my Dec. 16 post on exclusive test results that show red snapper samples
taken off the coast of Pensacola to be highly contaminated with petroleum
hydrocarbons: http://www.stuarthsmith.com/exclusive-test-results-red-snapper-sample-from-off-pensacola-shows-dangerously-high-levels-of-contamination-%E2%80%93-nearly-3000-ppm-of-total-petroleum-hydrocarbons
See the St. Pete Times story on sick fish here: http://www.tampabay.com/news/environment/wildlife/sick-fish-suggest-oil-spill-still-affecting-gulf/1164042
Read a good seafood testing story here at HuffPo: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/susan-buchanan/private-seafood-tests-unc_b_820002.html
Example #2: Radiation-Tainted food
Again, as with the Gulf of Mexico, if all the food contaminated by Fukushima nuclear
meltdown was removed from the market, it would significantly drive up
prices. This is why ESF is encouraging the distribution and consumption
of as much radioactive food as possible.
While US media like the New York Times have reported on radioactive food in
Japan (see Radiation-Tainted
Beef Spreads Through Japan’s Markets), there has been little reporting on radiation
in the US food supply.
Radiation in Our Food
By Chris Kilham
Published June 30, 2011 | FoxNews.com
Though the horrendous tsunami that hit Japan on March
12, 2011 seems like old news in the midst of today’s headlines, the crippled nuclear power plants at Fukishima
Daichi continue to spew radiation into water, air and soil, with no end
in sight.
Even as thousands of Japanese workers struggle to contain the ongoing nuclear
disaster, low levels of
radiation from those power plants have been detected in foods in the United
States. Milk, fruits
and vegetables show trace amounts of radioactive isotopes from the Fukushima
Daichi power plants, and THE
MEDIA APPEARS TO BE PAYING SCANT ATTENTION, IF ANY ATTENTION AT ALL. It is as if the problem only involves Japan, not
the vast Pacific Ocean, into
which highly radioactive water has poured by the dozens of tons, and not into
air currents and rainwater that carry radiation to U.S. soil and to the rest of
the world. And while
both Switzerland and Germany have come out against any further nuclear
development, the U.S.
the nuclear power industry continues as usual, with
AGING AND CRUMBLING POWER PLANTS RECEIVING EXTENDED OPERATING LICENSES
FROM THE NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION, as though it can’t happen here. BUT IT IS HAPPENING HERE, ON YOUR DINNER PLATE.
Taking a page from the BP public relations handbook, TEPCO (Tokyo Electric Power Company) and the Japanese government have downplayed the
extent of the nuclear disaster at Fukushima Daichi, in which three of six nuclear reactors are in
ongoing meltdown. According to Japanese nuclear engineer Naoto Sekimura, nuclear fuel rod meltdown at the damaged plants
began only hours after the tsunami, and the situation has not been
contained. There is
still an ongoing threat
of a total “China Syndrome” meltdown, and Japanese officials now say that THE THREE DAMAGED PLANTS MAY POSSIBLY CONTINUE TO
EMIT UNCONTROLLED RADIATION FOR ANOTHER YEAR.
According to Greenpeace, the
ocean around large areas of Japan has been contaminated by toxic radioactive
agents including cesium, iodine, plutonium and strontium. These radioactive agents are accumulating in sea life. Fish, shellfish and sea vegetables are absorbing
this radiation, while airborne radioactive particles have contaminated
land-based crops in Japan, including spinach and tea grown 200 miles south of
the damaged nuclear plants. Meanwhile, on U.S. soil, radiation began to show up in samples of
milk tested in California, just one month after the plants were damaged.
Radiation tests
conducted since the nuclear disaster in Japan have detected radioactive iodine and cesium in
milk and vegetables produced in California. According to tests conducted by scientists at the
UC Berkeley Department of Nuclear Engineering, milk from grass fed cows in Sonoma County was
contaminated with cesium 137 and cesium 134. Milk sold in Arizona, Arkansas, Hawaii, Vermont and
Washington has also tested positive for radiation since the accident.
Additionally, drinking
water tested in some U.S. municipalities also shows radioactive contamination. Is
the fallout from Fukushima Daichi falling on us? Yes, it is.
Thanks to the jet stream air currents that flow across the Pacific Ocean, the U.S. is receiving a steady flow of radiation
from Fukushima Daichi.
And while many scientists say that the levels of contamination in food pose no
significant threat to health, scientists are unable to establish any actual
safe limit for radiation in food. Detection of radioactive iodine 131, which
degrades rapidly, in California milk samples shows that the fallout from Japan
is reaching the U.S. quickly.
Though California is somewhat
on the ball regarding testing for radiation in foods, other states appear to be asleep at the switch with this
issue. Yet broad-leaf
vegetables including spinach and kale are accumulating radiation from rain and
dust. Some spinach,
arugula and wild-harvested mushrooms have tested positive for cesium 134 and
137 according to UCB, as have strawberries.
According to the U.S.-based group of medical doctors Physicians for Social
Responsibility (PSR), NO
AMOUNT OF MAN-MADE RADIATION IN WATER AND FOOD IS SAFE [KEY POINT]. “There is NO SAFE LEVEL OF RADIONUCLIDE EXPOSURE, WHETHER
FROM FOOD, WATER OR OTHER SOURCES, PERIOD,” [KEY POINT] said Jeff Patterson, DO, immediate past president
of PSR, in late March. “Exposure
to radionuclides, such as iodine 131 and cesium 137, INCREASES THE INCIDENCE OF
CANCER. For this
reason, every effort must be taken to minimize the radionuclide content in food
and water.”
Doctor Alan Lockwood MD echoes this. “Consuming food containing radionuclides is particularly
dangerous. If an individual
ingests or inhales a radioactive particle, it continues to irradiate the body as long as it remains
radioactive and stays in the body.”
“Children are
much more susceptible to the effects of radiation and stand a much greater
chance of developing cancer than adults,” states Andrew Kanter, MD, president of PSR’s board. “So it
is particularly dangerous when they consume radioactive food or water.”
… For while none of the 104 nuclear power plants in the U.S. are melting down
at present, we have had our own nuclear accidents. Remember Three
Mile Island? RADIATION
HAS MADE ITS WAY TO THE AMERICAN DINNER TABLE. …
Allowing the sale of lethal food,
again, keeps prices cheap.
--------------------------------
6) Letting the powerless starve
Feeding the starving, of course, requires food. Aid agencies, who are
trying to save the hungry, drive food costs up when they raise donations and
buy grain on the international market. This is why, whenever there are
millions people dying of famine, the ESF uses every tool at its disposal
to thwart aid agencies and let the powerless starve.
One of the MANY examples of this is North Korea where the
US is leading the effort to starve 6 million people.
North Korea's looming famine
The secretive rogue nation is reportedly facing its
deadliest food shortage in years. Why can't Pyongyang feed its people?
posted on July 18, 2011, at 4:34 PM
An undated North Korean poster encourages agricultural production: The secretive Asian nation is reportedly facing one of
its most lethal food shortages in years.
Photo: KCNA/CORBIS SEE
ALL 14 PHOTOS
As fears of famine
spread, desperate North Koreans are risking their lives to escape over the
border to China. …
Is North Korea's food shortage really that
severe?
The situation is bad, and getting worse. The
U.N.'s World Food Program says as many as 6
MILLION OF THE COUNTRY'S 24 MILLION CITIZENS ARE AT RISK OF MALNUTRITION.
Government rations have been slashed to give people just 10 percent of what
they need for a healthy diet. The European Commission last week offered
Pyongyang $14
million in emergency provisions, saying that 500,000
people, many of them already malnourished children, could die of starvation.
But THE U.N. SAYS IT WOULD TAKE $210 MILLION
IN AID TO PREVENT DIRE SHORTAGES.
How are the poor coping?
Increasingly, desperate families are risking their lives to cross the border
into China. "You see more people out in
the fields and on the hillsides digging roots, cutting grass or herbs,"
says Katharina Zellweger, head of the Swiss Agency for Development &
Cooperation in Pyongyang. Others are even more
desperate. "Some people are having to eat manure when they cannot
get rice or corn," said one refugee, 68-year-old Kim Yeong,
as
quoted by Britain's Telegraph.
Why can't the country's "dear
leader," Kim Jong Il, feed his people?
There are many contributing factors. The country's "Soviet-style planned
economy" is a disaster. MANY COUNTRIES, INCLUDING THE U.S., HAVE STOPPED SENDING
FOOD AID IN THE LAST FEW YEARS. … And to make matters worse, North Korea has been through a series of harsh winters
and floods, and harvested an unusually weak potato crop this
spring.
…
According to video captured by a North Korean man over the
course of several months, even the military has joined
the ranks of the starving.
N Korean children begging, army starving
North Asia correspondent Mark Willacy
Updated July 15, 2011 09:10:17
Footage shot inside North Korea and obtained by the ABC
has revealed the extent of chronic food
shortages and malnutrition inside the secretive state.
The video is some of the most revealing
footage ever smuggled out of the impoverished North Korean state.
…
The video shows YOUNG CHILDREN CAKED IN FILTH
BEGGING IN MARKETS, PLEADING FOR SCRAPS FROM COMPATRIOTS WHO HAVE NOTHING TO
GIVE.
"I am eight," says one boy. "My father died and my mother left me. I sleep
outdoors."
Many of the children are orphans; their
parents victims of starvation or the gulag.
…
… the all-powerful army - once
quarantined from food shortages and famine - is
starting to go hungry.
"Everybody is weak," says one
young North Korean soldier. "Within my troop
of 100 comrades, half of them are malnourished," he said.
…
-Editor's note: The ABC had
24-hour rights to publish the North Korean footage online, so it has now been removed from this story.
[If anyone knows where I can find a copy of
this video, please let me know.]
Things are so bad that people are
apparently resorting
to cannibalism.
The Stream - North Koreans Reportedly in Danger of Mass Starvation -
Christine Ahn [1 of 2]
The Stream - North Koreans Reportedly in Danger of Mass Starvation -
Christine Ahn [2 of 2]
Meanwhile, Washington
Wavers while North Koreans Starve.
North Koreans Starve while Washington Wavers
Morton Abramowitz
July 12, 2011
… we hear that North
Korea does not need food aid, or it will be siphoned off by the military, or we can’t
monitor it, or the regime has funds to take care of any food needs
itself, or the problem is perennial because the North Korean
agricultural system is awful or (most
recently) that the problem is inflated—often all of these claims at once. To be sure, even
if lots of kids get stunted and many more women produce defective babies, we
will never hear much about it or see it on the tube.
We can rest easy.
The U.S. government performance on this
issue the past three months is noteworthy and
deserves some recounting. In April a
group of American NGO officials with long humanitarian
experience in North Korea came back after investigating the food situation in a
number of provinces. They concluded that the situation was dire and that its
effects on the most vulnerable elements of the population could be disastrous. … Officials back in
Washington heard all this and—whatever the
internal debate—took no action. The concerns of American NGOs were echoed in the next few
months by the World Food Program (WFP), who saw an
even larger danger affecting six million people. …
… So far, Washington has not agreed to
provide aid or dispatch a team to negotiate monitoring
requirements, citing press reports that the food
problem is inflated and can be managed by the North Korean regime. … Other than a few in Congress like Senator Kerry and a
few editorials urging food aid, THERE
HAS BEEN LITTLE PUBLIC DISCUSSION. …
…
IT ISN’T JUST NORTH KOREA THAT IS STARVING…
The Telegraph reports that UN
DECLARES FIRST FAMINE IN AFRICA FOR THREE DECADES.
UN declares first famine in Africa for three
decades as US withholds aid
Tens of millions of dollars in urgently-needed US aid for Somalia are being
withheld even as parts of the country are set on Wednesday to be declared a
famine zone.
By Mike Pflanz, Nairobi
12:01AM BST 20 Jul 2011
The UN declaration will be
the first in a series of 'food crises' in the Horn of Africa Photo:
AFP/GETTY
Conditions in the
country, hit first by
war and then by drought, are
so severe in some places what was an "emergency" has now tipped into
a "catastrophe", the UN will say.
In parts of one of the two regions to be officially certified, 10 TIMES THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE ARE DYING THAN THE
OFFICIAL THRESHOLD CLASSIFYING FAMINE. Tens of thousands are believed to have already have died
in the south of the country.
The UN declaration will be the
first in a series of "food crises" in the Horn of Africa, and the first time the term famine has
officially been used since almost a million Ethiopians starved to death in
1984.
But Washington, the
world's biggest donor to Somalia until 2009, is
now barred from funding food appeals if its money risks "materially
benefiting" terrorists.
The new rules, FROM THE
US TREASURY'S OFFICE OF FOREIGN ASSETS CONTROL [The treasury is leading the campaign to let the poor
starve], came into force after reports that al-Shabaab, Somalia's
al-Qaeda-linked insurgents, were taxing food convoys, stealing supplies and
threatening agencies' workers.
Since then, US aid
spending in Somalia has fallen by 88 per cent, from more than £150m in 2008 to £13m this year.
…
"Avoiding aid diversion is important, but THE US'S OVERZEALOUS APPROACH LED TO A DAMAGING
COLLAPSE IN US HUMANITARIAN SUPPORT TO SOMALIA," he said.
"This has
undermined humanitarian response and preparedness and other donors have been
unable pick up the slack."
…
The Government has pledged another £90m for what David Cameron called "the most catastrophic situation for a
generation" in the Horn of Africa.
The scale of the
outstanding need, however,
meant that even
"something very creative that has not happened before, like Live Aid"
will not be enough,
said a senior adviser to one British charity.
"It is only government
level responses, from across all of the international community, that will have
an impact now," he said.
The withdrawal of US
funds for southern Somalia, coupled with al-Shabaab's long-held belligerence towards
foreigners, were
"now costing lives", said Mr
Konyndyk of Mercy Corps.
…
Under international law, there
is no mandated extra response which must follow from an "official"
declaration of famine.
But it is hoped that the
first official use of the term in Africa since Band Aid 27 years ago will stand
as a "wake-up call" to governments, including some in Europe and almost all in Africa,
who have so far failed
to respond.
…
The Telegraph reports that world's
richest countries guilty of 'wilful neglect'.
Africa famine: world's richest countries guilty of 'wilful neglect'
The world's richest countries are guilty of
"wilful neglect" in failing to fund appeals to save millions of
Africans from falling into famine, aid agencies said on Wednesday.
Less than a fifth of the £650m urgently
needed for the Horn of Africa has been pledged, Oxfam said, with
the response from most of Europe "surprisingly slow".
"THERE HAS BEEN A CATASTROPHIC BREAKDOWN
OF THE WORLD'S COLLECTIVE RESPONSIBILITY TO ACT," said Fran
Equiza, Oxfam's director in the Horn of Africa.
"Several rich governments [ie: the US] are guilty of wilful neglect as the aid effort to avert
catastrophe in East Africa limps along.
"THE WARNING SIGNS HAVE BEEN SEEN FOR
MONTHS, and the world has been slow to act. By the time the UN
calls it a famine it is already a signal of large
scale loss of life."
Aid agencies have taken out full-page advertisements in newspapers and launched
appeals on television and radio, as 11
MILLION PEOPLE ACROSS KENYA, ETHIOPIA AND SOMALIA FACE THE THREAT OF
STARVATION.
…
"It is time for the world to help but sadly
the response from many countries has been derisory and dangerously
inadequate," said Andrew Mitchell, the International
Development secretary. …
Mark Bowden, the head of the UN's operations in Somalia, said as he announced the first official famine in Africa since Live Aid
that "tens of thousands" of people had already died.
"I'm not going to say it's not going to
deteriorate further, it will," he said in Nairobi, Kenya's
capital and the headquarters of the aid effort across the Horn of Africa.
"Even if the world starts acting as
must, now, lives will be lost. But there are many more lives
that can be saved if we see the level of response that is desperately
needed."
Aid workers point out that weather reports
and famine early warning systems operating in Somalia had predicted extreme
shortages of food as long ago as January.
"The announcement of a famine across
much of east Africa is as tragic as it is predictable," said
Jeremy Hulme, chief executive of the Society for the Protection of Animals
Abroad.
…
"It's scandalous that we're seeing this
AVOIDABLE tragedy unfolding across the region," Mr Hulme
added.
...
Using its Wurlitzer (propaganda machine), the ESF censures
and downplays all news of famine to the best of its ability. This is
highly effective: people don't donate to or urge their governments to support a
cause they don't know exists. The result is that millions starve while
aid agencies bemoan the tragedy. It also makes global food prices a
little cheaper.
--------------------------------
7) Squeezing Farmers (The
"cheap food policy")
One easy way for the ESF to keep food cheap is the squeezing farmers. And
so the US has had a "cheap food policy" for a very long time.
(Google Archive News results for "cheap
food policy")
For a modern example of the continuing practice of squeezing farmers, The
Guardian reports that British
farmers forced to pay the cost of supermarket price wars.
British farmers forced to pay the cost of supermarket price
wars
As profits soar at the supermarkets, food
producers say they are being forced out of business by unfair buying practices
Alex Renton
guardian.co.uk, Saturday 2 July 2011 19.51 BST
Farmers are being forced out of
business by what they say are the unfair practices of major supermarkets. Photograph: David
Sillitoe for the Guardian
You can pick up a punnet of British
raspberries – at their best this weekend – on a two-for-one offer in most supermarkets. But as shoppers reach for that quintessential summer
treat, they should perhaps ponder the fact that it is the farmer,
not the supermarket, who is paying for
the generous discount.
The farmer may well be making no
profit at all, with no choice in the
pricing and little or no idea, when he picked and shipped the raspberries, how much
he would get for them. Or that the
packaging would be paid for by the farm, but done by a company chosen by the
supermarket – at up to twice the cost
of it being packaged independently.
Farmers do not talk about these things. Many of them, during a month-long investigation, told the Observer
that in the midst of the downturn they
dare not risk annoying the big processors and shops. There is a "climate of fear" – the National
Farmers Union's phrase – in the
monopolistic world of modern food retail: small producers are too frightened to speak out about the abuses that
are impoverishing them because they risk "reprisals", which may mean
losing the only customers there are. Very
few felt able to speak to us on the record.
Henry Dobell runs a fruit farm near Stowmarket in Suffolk. …
"One year Sainsbury's refused all my raspberries after we'd picked and
packaged them," he said. "So the producer organisation [the
intermediary the supermarkets insist on dealing with] sold them to Somerfield
and we had to buy new packaging. But they all went on as a two-for-one offer:
we had no say. At one point we were
being paid less per punnet than it cost to put a lid on it.
"I used to grow tree-matured Cox for Waitrose – in the last year with them the fruit got lost in the organisation's system and I got a much lower price than I'd been promised. It
took nine months to get paid. So I said I wanted to quit.
"There was no written contract, but the
producer organisation threatened legal action. They wanted a
£30,000-£40,000 payment if I didn't stay with them for another year, and said I had to
sign a confidentiality agreement. …
These and many more restrictive and
potentially illegal practices are blamed for driving 3,000 small and
medium-scale farmers in Britain into poverty or out of business over the past
decade. …
At least one dairy farmer has gone out
of business in Britain every day for the past decade, as supermarkets have more than doubled their share of the
price of a pint of milk. As many as 30
pig farmers have gone bust in the past year, according to the National Pig Association.
At the heart of the problem, say campaigners, is
public ignorance of how supermarkets buy produce and the system that allows
them to offer lower prices while increasing their profits. Tesco's profits were above £3.5bn for the first time last
year, and Sainsbury's rose by nearly 13%.
These results – despite the supermarkets' endless price wars – are achieved largely by getting suppliers to reduce their
prices. Most sectors of British farming, from eggs to fruit, vegetables and pork, have seen farm-gate prices drop in the past year, despite
record increases in costs.
"Supermarkets have handed the risk back to us: they charge ever-increasing markups, force us to take
part in promotions," one Welsh
farmer in vegetables and dairy told the Observer. "The farmer takes all the risk, pays all the
costs and gets virtually nothing above the price of production."
Discounts such as "buy one get
one free" are not a generous gift from the supermarket. What they mean is that the
farmer will be paid less – but he or
she has no ability to negotiate or even be informed if their crop is put on
special offer. If a crop has been
over-ordered and doesn't sell, the supplier may have to pick up the cost of
disposal.
Fruit farmers contacted by the Observer said they had seen their produce on sale in supermarkets FOR LESS
THAN IT WOULD HAVE FETCHED ON THE SAME DAY AT THE WHOLESALE MARKET. … Yet contracts still oblige them to continue supplying.
…
(For more, see Google Archive News results for Squeezing
farmers and Squeezing
farmers "cheap food")
Right now, the food consumers buy at the supermarket is artificially cheap,
thanks to the continuing “cheap food policy”. When the ESF’s dollar Ponzi
scheme collapses, this will end and farming will become more profitable.
--------------------------------
8) Naked short selling
Prices are set by supply and demand, and there are two types of demand for
agricultural commodities, end user demand and investment demand. In other
words, both soybean crushers (user demand) and pension funds (investment
demand) both “buy” for example soybeans (although they do it for different
reasons). The demand from soybean crushers (they actually want delivery
of soybeans) can’t be negated by financial means, but the investment demand
from pension can.
By naked short selling (commodity IOUs) agricultural and other commodities, the
ESF unnaturally removes the investment demand from the market, lowering prices.
As an example of how the government is shorting agricultural commodities, watch
my video on AIGFP's
Massive Short Position In Commodities (which now belongs to the government).
This naked short selling is reaching ridiculous levels. For example, look
below at the amount of soybean export sales outstanding (which is at absurd
levels for this time of year). There is a huge, growing backlog of unfilled
orders for US soybeans (soybean IOUs).
(the data comes straight
from the USDA)
--------------------------------
9) Distorting Perception of supply
and demand
The price of anything is heavily influenced by perception. It is really
simple to understand:
1) If people believe that there is a looming oversupply of something
(housing, oil, food, etc…), they will sell right way and hold off on buying in
anticipation of lower prices. This immediate selling and delayed buying
has an effect on supply and demand, lowering prices.
2) If people believe that there is a looming shortage of something
(housing, oil, food, etc…), they will buy right way and hold off on selling
(hoarding) in anticipation of higher prices. This immediate buying and
delayed selling has an effect on supply and demand, raising prices.
In its desperation to keep food prices down, the ESF, through the United States
Department of Agriculture (USDA), has been badly distorting the perception of
supply and demand in agricultural markets. This temporarily
delayed a rise in food prices but guaranteed a worse crisis later. I
described this dynamic in my article on the *****2010 Food
Crisis for Dummies*****.
Dynamics behind 2010 Food Crisis
Early in 2009, the supply and demand in
agricultural markets went badly out of balance. The world was
experiencing a catastrophic fall in food production as a result of the
financial crisis (low commodity prices and lack of credit) and adverse weather
on a global scale. Meanwhile, China and other Asian exporters, in effort
to preserve their economic growth, were unleashing domestic consumption long
constrained by inflation fears, and demand for raw materials, especially food
staples, was exploding as Chinese consumers worked their way towards
American-style overconsumption, prodded on by a flood of cheap credit and easy
loans from the government.
Normally, food prices should have already shot
higher months ago, leading to lower food consumption and bringing the
global food supply/demand situation back into balance. This never happened, because the USDA, instead of
adjusting production estimates down to reflect decreased production, has been
adjusting estimates upwards to match increasing demand from china.
In this way, the USDA has brought supply and demand back into balance (on
paper) and temporarily delayed a rise in food
prices by ensuring a catastrophe in 2010.
Overconsumption is leading to disaster
…
The USDA, by manufacturing the data needed
to keep supply and demand in balance, has ensured
that agricultural commodities are incorrectly priced, which has lead to
overconsumption and has guaranteed disaster next year when
supplies run out.
…
USDA estimates for 2009/10 make no sense
All someone needs to do to know the world is headed is for food crisis is to
stop reading USDA’s crop reports predicting a record soybean and corn harvests
and listen to what else the USDA saying.
Specifically, the USDA has declared half the
counties in the Midwest to be primary disaster areas this year,
including 274 Midwest counties in the last 30 days alone. These
designated are based on the criteria of a
minimum of 30 percent loss in the value of at least one crop in a county.
The chart below shows counties declared primary disaster areas by the Secretary
of Agriculture and the president of the United States.
…
The same USDA that is predicting record harvests is also declaring disaster
areas across half because of catastrophic crop losses! To eliminate any
doubt that this might be an innocent mistake, the
USDA is even predicting record soybean harvests in the same states (Oklahoma,
Louisiana, Arkansas, and Alabama) where it has declared virtually all counties
to have experienced 30 percent production losses. It isn’t rocket scientist to realize something is horribly wrong.
The 2010
food crisis began last June, and food prices have been going straight up
ever since (look at graph at the top of this entry).
MarketSkeptics.com has been tracking USDA dishonesty since the
middle of 2009. Here are list of some of my entries on the subject:
USDA
Deliberately Misleading Investors To Hide Looming Food Shortage (June 17,
2009)
More USDA Propaganda (June 30,
2009)
*****The
Divide Between USDA Estimates And Reality Grows Again***** (October 13,
2009)
*****USDA Estimates Are
Wrong***** (October 18, 2009)
Harvest
From Hell VS USDA’s “Biggest Crop Ever” (November 6, 2009)
*****Ida
Adds Misery To 2009 Harvest While USDA Commits Fraud***** (November 10,
2009)
Skeptical Response
To USDA Crop Report (November 12, 2009)
Mainstream
Waking Up To Miserable 2009 Harvest (November 23, 2009)
More
Ag Disaster Areas, Emergency Aid For Farmers, And Latest USDA Propaganda
(December 1, 2009)
*****Strategically
Placed USDA Disaster Declarations***** (December 7, 2009)
*****Soybean
Supply/Demand Numbers For 2009/10 Don’t Add Up***** (December 8, 2009)
Argentina Soybean Crop Estimates? See The Madness
(December 19, 2009)
*****USDA
Insanity Reaches New Heights***** (January 12, 2010)
Florida Freeze VS USDA
Optimism (February 12, 2010
*****Latest
USDA Propaganda And The Reality***** (April 12, 2010)
PURE
PROPAGANDA: The U.S. is an island of supply for world grain demand (August
17, 2010)
“USDA
is not restrained by second grade math rules” (September 10, 2010)
Again, No Record Crops
This Year (September 12, 2010)
*****USDA
Has Succeeded In Losing All Credibility***** (October 5, 2010)
*****Riots
spread as global food shortage worsens***** (January 20, 2011)
USDA Estimates kept prices cheap for a while until physical shortages
started showing up in the middle of 2010.
--------------------------------
10) Propaganda to change our diets
Lets start with a recent example. Earlier this year every major media
(controlled by the ESF) began blasting
a study linking diet soda to stroke and heart attacks.
CBS News reports that we should
all drink water.
February 10, 2011 5:19 PM
Diet Soda Stroke Risk? Will Health Police Let Us Drink ANYTHING?
By David W Freeman
(CBS) Think diet soda is a healthy
alternative to sugar-sweetened pop? Think again. The
health police are out with a new study showing that people who drink diet soda are much more likely to have a
heart attack or stroke than are people who don't drink soda of any kind.
… given her findings - and given the fact that diet soda has no nutritional
value - the study's lead author said GIVING
UP SODA MAKES SENSE.
"Eliminating it from your diet isn't
necessarily a bad idea," Dr. Hannah
Gardener, an epidemiologist at the University of Miami Miller School of
Medicine, tells CBS News.
…
So what else is there left to drink?
Says Gardener, "I'm a big fan of
WATER."
Of course, the link between Diet Soda and stroke is utter
nonsense.
Diet Soda and Stroke Study is Seriously Flawed
ATLANTA (February 10, 2011) – The Calorie Control Council stated today that
research findings presented during a poster session at the International Stroke
Conference claiming an association
between diet soft drink consumption and increased risk of stroke and heart
attack are critically flawed.
"The findings are so speculative and preliminary at this point that they
should be considered with extreme caution. In fact, the study has not been peer reviewed by any independent
scientists and has not been published in a scientific journal," stated Beth Hubrich, a registered dietitian with the
Council.
The research, as well as the publicity regarding the study abstract, is drawing a growing body of criticism and skepticism
from experts in the field of nutrition
and science.
"I have to say, this is one of
the worst studies I've seen capturing headlines in a long time,” said Dr. Richard Besser, Chief Health and Medical Editor
at ABC News, commenting during a February 10 segment on Good Morning America.
"It's bad because of the
science, but it's also bad because of
the behavior that it can induce and the fear that people have. I DON'T THINK PEOPLE SHOULD CHANGE BEHAVIOR BASED ON THIS
STUDY."
Pointing out some of the flaws in the
study, Besser added, "They didn’t
look at how much salt they took in, they didn't look at what other foods they
ate. Those things we know are associated with stroke and heart
attack. They didn't even look at obesity over time. And so to conclude from this, that it's all from the diet
soda, just makes no sense whatsoever."
…
The diet soda is sweetened by high fructose corn syrup and
corn prices were
hitting record highs when "diet soda=stroke" propaganda was
launched. Getting Americans to switch from diet soda to water would lower
demand and help bring down soaring corn prices.
Another larger and ongoing example of the effort to contain food prices through
propaganda is the vegan movement. Since livestock production requires
more resources to feed the same number of people that crops do, anyone
switching to a vegan diet is
helping the ESF lower food prices.
How does going vegetarian save animals? - Yahoo! Answers
…
IT DOESN'T.
…
Meat producers (farmers) operate with
a high fixed-cost, low variable-cost business model. In other words, their profits are volume driven, and are
usually constrained primarily by the size of their facility. As a result, their
profits are highest when they produce as much livestock as possible. Since
livestock is a commodity, the individual producers have little control over
price, but they have buyers for as much as they can produce. Therefore, they will not reduce output in response to demand
fluctuations. THEY WILL,
however, SELL AT A LOWER PRICE if
necessary, to sell all of their output.
SO IF COLLECTIVELY VEGETARIANS
REDUCE DEMAND FOR MEAT, production is not lowered,
PRICES ARE. However, meat prices
continue to rise, as demand increases.
So no, vegetarians do not save animals by reducing demand. …
Besides, even if they DID reduce
output, you cannot save something that never existed. That would be like me saying that I have saved children
from miserable lives by wearing a condom.
As long as farmers aren't providing care for
unsold livestock until their natural death, vegetarians aren't saving
animals.
Like so much of what the ESF does, the consequence
of its vegan propaganda are deadly.
Death by Veganism
By NINA PLANCK
Published: May 21, 2007
WHEN Crown Shakur died of starvation, he was 6 weeks old and weighed 3.5
pounds. His vegan parents, who fed him mainly soy milk and apple juice, were convicted in Atlanta recently of murder, involuntary
manslaughter and cruelty.
Skip to next paragraphThis particular
calamity — AT LEAST THE THIRD SUCH CONVICTION OF VEGAN PARENTS IN
FOUR YEARS — may be largely due to
ignorance. But it should prompt frank
discussion about nutrition.
I was once a vegan. But well before I became pregnant, I concluded that a vegan
pregnancy was irresponsible. You
cannot create and nourish a robust baby merely on foods from plants.
Indigenous cuisines offer clues about what humans, naturally omnivorous, need
to survive, reproduce and grow: traditional vegetarian diets, as in India, invariably
include dairy and eggs for complete protein, essential fats and vitamins. THERE ARE NO VEGAN SOCIETIES FOR A SIMPLE REASON: A VEGAN
DIET IS NOT ADEQUATE IN THE LONG RUN.
Protein deficiency is one danger of a vegan diet for babies. Nutritionists used
to speak of proteins as “first class” (from meat, fish, eggs and milk) and
“second class” (from plants), but today this is considered denigrating to
vegetarians.
The fact remains, though, that HUMANS
PREFER ANIMAL PROTEINS AND FATS TO CEREALS AND TUBERS, because they contain all the essential amino acids needed
for life in the right ratio. This is not
true of plant proteins, which are inferior in quantity and quality — even soy.
A vegan diet may lack vitamin B12, found only in animal foods; usable vitamins
A and D, found in meat, fish, eggs and butter; and necessary minerals like
calcium and zinc. When babies are deprived
of all these nutrients, they will suffer from retarded growth, rickets and
nerve damage.
Responsible vegan parents know that breast milk is ideal. It contains many
necessary components, including cholesterol (which babies use to make nerve
cells) and countless immune and growth factors. When
breastfeeding isn’t possible, soy milk and fruit juice, even in seemingly
sufficient quantities, are not safe substitutes for a quality infant formula.
Yet even a breast-fed baby is at risk. Studies show that vegan breast milk lacks enough docosahexaenoic acid, or
DHA, the omega-3 fat found in fatty fish. It is difficult to overstate the importance of DHA, vital as it is for
eye and brain development.
A vegan diet is equally dangerous for
weaned babies and toddlers, who need plenty of protein and calcium. Too often, vegans turn to soy, which actually inhibits
growth and reduces absorption of protein and minerals. That’s why health officials in Britain, Canada and other countries
express caution about soy for babies.
(Not here, though — perhaps because our farm policy is so soy-friendly.)
Historically, diet honored tradition: we ate
the foods that our mothers, and their mothers, ate. Now, your neighbor or sibling may be a meat-eater or
vegetarian, may ferment his foods or eat them raw. This fragmentation of the
American menu reflects admirable diversity and tolerance, but food is more
important than fashion. Though it’s not politically correct to say so, ALL DIETS ARE NOT CREATED EQUAL.
An adult who was well-nourished in utero and in infancy may choose to get by on
a vegan diet, but babies are built from protein, calcium, cholesterol and fish
oil. Children fed only plants will not
get the precious things they need to live and grow.
Thanks to ESF propaganda, the diets of millions have been
artificially distorted with tragic consequences. This has helped lower
food prices.
--------------------------------
My reaction:
If you have read and understand the ten “cheap food” schemes outlined
above, a few things should be clear:
1) The dollar’s collapse is imminent. The current food crisis
(remember millions are starving) will only grow worse, and it will ultimately
force a mass liquidation of foreign reserves (selling of dollars) by central
banks (like China) who are desperate to contain domestic unrest (food riots).
2) Once the ESF’s dollar Ponzi scheme is over and its frauds/propaganda
exposed, the effects of all its “cheap food” schemes will begin to
reverse. There will be a crackdown on food substitution, a switch to more
sustainable farming practices, contaminated food will be taken off the market,
etc… This will drive food prices much higher on a permanent basis.
3) This will have a drastic effect on the global economy (separate from
the effects of the dollar’s collapse). You see, when food prices go up,
demand for everything else goes down. Sales of all types of consumer
goods will suffer as the world goes back to spending a lot more money on food.
Farming will become much more profitable.
4) Of all the ESF frauds, nothing rivals the harm it has done through its
“cheap food” scheme. The world has 6.9 billion people BECAUSE food has
been artificially cheap and plentiful. Once food prices and availability
go back to normal, there is going to be an unbelievable loss of life.
--------------------------------
Concluding Remarks
Before I got sidetracked (see the video series on the
ESF's history), I was working on setting an
investment in Russian agriculture. I am now picking up where I left
off. Nothing (even gold) will outperform farmland over the next few
years, and Russian farmland is ridiculously cheap. Please email me if you’re
interested.
Also, having wrapped up most of what I needed to blog about (this entry, the
ESF's history, etc…) and with the dollar’s collapse getting near, I is soon
time for me to start looking for a real job. If anyone has any ideas
about this, please email me.