World Food Crisis, Peak Oil, Stagflation and Other Disasters

While reading the headlines about violence around the world caused by food shortages, I started to think that my blog about America's obsession with bio-fuels was a little too tame. After all, besides the shifting of the Chinese diet higher up the food chain (it requires 8 calories of grain to create 1 calorie of beef, and the Chinese are consuming larger amounts of beef now that they can afford it, thus producing an eight-fold displacement of dietary grain for each unit of meat consumed), the other major contributor to world food shortages is the larger allocation of agricultural land designated for bio-fuel feedstock production in lieu of food production.

Further aggravating this situation is the view by some that the world is already past peak oil, or Hubbard's Peak, and we are headed towards an imminent economic crash triggered by fuel shortages. How can we solve that? Well, in the United States we will produce more ethanol from corn.

Of course, our second favorite bio-fuel is biodiesel, which for the most part is produced from virgin oils, also know as good, edible foods. The irony is that the U.S. government subsidizes biodiesel derived from virgin oil feedstocks at the rate of $ 1.00 per gallon at the time this blog was written.

"So what" you say? I'll answer with another question: Why does our government subsidize biodiesel made from virgin oil at $ 1.00 per gallon while it subsidizes biodiesel made from used vegetable oil, aka fryer grease at only $ 0.50 per gallon? What's the difference? The former is valuable as a food for humans while the latter is a toxic goop which clogs up sewer systems and is otherwise difficult to dispose of. Don't you think it makes sense to prioritize the creation of fuel from garbage rather than from food?

If you haven't guessed it yet, the answer is that our agricultural lobbies are to blame. Why should you care? Because your tax money is being used to subsidize the creation of a fuel which causes food shortages and thus higher food prices for you. Get it now? Yes, you are paying twice for this travesty! Once in your taxes, and once at the grocery store.

Now what happens when high fuel prices cause a domino-effect of price increases throughout the economy? Inflation!

What happens when high fuel prices cause an economic slowdown? Recession!

Put it together and you get stagflation, that ugly beast last seen during President Carter's administration when the country was also experiencing high fuel prices. So then why is the government trying to solve stagflation by tweaking the interest rates which will only aggravate once side or other of the equation, but not solve the problem? Because it does not want to deal with the real issue: Energy policy. This time another lobby holds the keys.

So, it looks like we are stuck in this mess unless we take responsibility ourselves and stop waiting for the government to do something.

We have seen that government meddling has not created a viable solution, so let's start with one good solution we can implement ourselves, at a grass-roots level:

CONSERVATION