Food Crisis 2011

US farmers fear the return of the Dust Bowl

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/8359076/US-farmers-fear-the-return-of-the-Dust-Bowl.html

For years the Ogallala Aquifer, the world’s largest underground body of fresh water, has irrigated thousands of square miles of American farmland. Now it is running dry.


There is not much to be happy about these days in Happy, Texas. Main Street is shuttered but for the Happy National Bank, slowly but inexorably disappearing into a High Plains wind that turns all to dust. The old Picture House, the cinema, has closed. Tumbleweed rolls into the still corners behind the grain elevators, soaring prairie cathedrals that spoke of prosperity before they were abandoned for lack of business.

Happy's problem is that it has run out of water for its farms. Its population, dropping 10 per cent a year, is down to 595. The name, which brings a smile for miles around and plays in faded paint on the fronts of every shuttered business – Happy Grain Inc, Happy Game Room – has become irony tinged with bitterness. It goes back to the cowboy days of the 19th century. A cattle drive north through the Texas Panhandle to the rail heads beyond had been running out of water, steers dying on the hoof, when its cowboys stumbled on a watering hole. They named the spot Happy Draw, for the water. Now Happy is the harbinger of a potential Dust Bowl unseen in America since the Great Depression.

Some Vegetable Seeds Are Already Cleaned Out


http://www.standeyo.com/NEWS/11_Food_Water/110303.seed.picked.over.html

Here are a few examples of out of stock seeds: Arkansas Traveler Heirloom Tomato, Tuffy Acorn Squash, Sugar Baby Watermelon, Purple Dove Bush Bean, Nutri-Bud Broccoli, Cassius F-1 Cauliflower, Invento F-1 Cabbage, Dolce Vita F-1 Spinach, Tyee Spinach, Renegade Spinach, Small Sugar Heirloom Pumpkin, Cherry Belle Radish, and Oregon Giant Snow Pea. Many others were also noticeably sold out.

Ei Yei Yei...

Got two Freezers packed - Seeds bought and packed into Air Tight Freezer Bags - Then placed into Air Tight containers - Backup Generator purchased - Plus a great deal more of prep...

I just hope I'll never use it for what It was intended...

And if on a budget;

Raman Noodles and Peanut Butter

Raman is cheap cheap...

NO NEED TO COOK!

You just eat the raman like a giant cracker.

I know, but I lived that way for a while, and it works.....


(also, water + Cheyenne pepper + lime juice + maple syrup grade B) fasting drink

Don't forget to stock up on vitamins.

Already done. Vitamin D @ 1000IU per Pill - Vitamin A @ 500IU per Pill - Centrum Multivitamins to take care of the rest of the Vitamins missed & Colloidal Silver @ 25PPM...

Wholesale prices up 1.6 pct. on steep rise in food

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Wholesale-prices-up-16-pct-on-apf-3777454020.html?x=0&.v=1
On Wednesday March 16, 2011

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Wholesale prices jumped last month by the most in nearly two years due to higher energy costs and the steepest rise in food prices in 36 years. Excluding those volatile categories, inflation was tame.

The Labor Department said Wednesday that the Producer Price Index rose a seasonally adjusted 1.6 percent in February -- double the 0.8 percent rise in the previous month. Outside of food and energy costs, the core index ticked up 0.2 percent, less than January's 0.5 percent rise.

Food prices soared 3.9 percent last month, the biggest gain since November 1974. Most of that increase was due to a sharp rise in vegetable costs, which increased nearly 50 percent. That was the most in almost a year. Meat and dairy products also rose.

Energy prices rose 3.3 percent last month, led by a 3.7 percent increase in gasoline costs.

Capitalism and Hunger - The Food Speculators
By BORIS KAGARLITSKY

About one-sixth of the world's population — 1 billion people — suffers from malnutrition. Stories about global hunger tend to get ignored by the media even though the number of hungry people has been increasing rapidly in recent years. This problem remains acute even as nations report renewed economic growth and as global food production remains stable.

Liberal economists love to claim that food shortages stem from ineffective state regulations. They argue that the liberalization of food markets is the surest way to achieve abundant food supplies. Alas, three decades of continuous economic liberalization have not led to an abundance of food, but to hunger on a scale never before seen in the history of mankind.

Of course, governments sometimes play a role in creating these problems, but the worst crop failures occur in free markets. Shortages of grain and other products only motivate businesspeople to indulge in profiteering. As prices skyrocket, profiteers — anticipating even higher prices — find it more advantageous to hold on to their goods than to sell them to consumers. And the longer a particular foodstuff can be stored, the faster the price for it soars.

Most of the huge sums of money the government allocated to fight the economic crisis from 2008 to 2010 never reached the real sector but were used for speculating on the market. Prices are outpacing demand, thereby creating new imbalances and hampering economic development. Rising prices have made food an unaffordable luxury for entire social groups and even countries. In Russia, where hunger has thankfully not reached epidemic proportions, high food prices have quickly lowered the standard of living, disrupted consumption patterns and sharply aggravated social conditions.

In the Middle East, the food crisis has already turned into a social explosion. The "bread revolutions" shaking Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, Libya and Algeria are the natural outcome of many years spent developing a system in which human needs, and even the right to life itself, are subordinated to the whims of the market.

Boris Kagarlitsky is the director of the Institute of Globalization Studies in Moscow.

SOURCE: http://www.counterpunch.org/kagarlitsky03182011.html

Worst Texas Drought in 44 Years Damaging Wheat Crop, Reducing Cattle Herds

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-03-24/worst-texas-drought-in-44-years-eroding-wheat-beef-supply-as-food-rallies.html

The worst Texas drought in 44 years is damaging the state’s wheat crop and forcing ranchers to reduce cattle herds, as rising demand for U.S. food sends grain and meat prices higher.

Texas, the biggest U.S. cattle producer and second-largest winter-wheat grower, got just 4.7 inches (12 centimeters) of rain on average in the five months through February, the least for the period since 1967, State Climatologist John Nielsen- Gammon said. More than half the wheat fields and pastures were rated in poor or very poor condition on March 20.

Dry conditions extending to Oklahoma, Kansas and Colorado may cut crop yields in the U.S., the world’s largest exporter, as too much moisture threatens fields in North Dakota and in Canada. Wheat futures in Chicago are up 50 percent in the past year, after drought in Russia and floods in Australia hurt output and sent global food prices surging. Wholesale beef reached a record this week, and the U.S. cattle herd in January was the smallest since 1958.

New True Food Shoppers’ Guide Mobile Application to Avoiding GMOs






There is a new True Food Shopper’s Guide to avoiding genetically engineered (GE) foods. It is free, available to download, or as a mobile application for iPhone and Android.

The mobile app was created to help customers find and avoid GE ingredients wherever they shop. The guide gives them valuable information on common GE ingredients, brands to look for, and look out for, and common sense tips to keep them in the know.

Today, thousands of products on supermarket shelves are made with ingredients from genetically modified (also known as genetically engineered [GE]) crops.
But GM foods are not labeled in the U.S., despite warnings from doctors and scientists that these foods may not be safe in the diet or the environment. This lack of mandatory labeling can make it difficult to determine which products are made with GM ingredients and which are not. The True Food Shoppers Guide is designed to give you the tools people need to make informed purchasing decisions.

The True Food Shoppers Guide also arms customers with valuable information regarding common GM ingredients, as well as brands to look for, and to look out for. The application includes a “Four Simple Tips” section, which offers easy ways to avoid GM ingredients, a “Supermarkets and GMOs” section to help consumers identify GM and non-GMO private-label store brands, and a rbGH and rbGH-free dairy guide.

In addition to a list of brands that produce foods with no GM content, the application also offers contact information for companies that do use GM ingredients. This feature enables consumers to personally voice their opposition to the use of GM foods directly to the parties involved. As a result, the app serves not only as a shopping guide and teaching tool, but one that can be used for widespread advocacy as well. The app also has a “Take Action” section allowing people to contact state and federal agencies and officials to demand better regulatory oversight, safety testing and labeling laws for GM foods and crops.

App Features:

“Four Simple Tips” section gives consumers easy ways to avoid genetically modified ingredients in any product.

“What’s New” brings an always-updated feed of the Center for Food Safety’s latest news and campaign developments on GMOs and other important food issues.

The “Action” center brings consumers the latest action alerts on simple things they can do to demand True Food!

“Supermarkets and GMOs” lists major supermarket chains across the US and their policies on GMOs and rbGH use. Here you can find non-gmo and rbGH-free store brands, and supermarkets that are entirely non-gmo in their private-label brands!

You can browse the Shoppers Guide by category (16 categories in all) in a simple “Green” and “Red” list format, or search for products by brand name or food type.

The Shoppers Guide also includes the ability to call or email companies listed in the “Red” (those who do not avoid GM ingredients in their products) to let them know you will not buy their products until they drop GMOs

Users can learn about the risks of gm crops and foods, the benefits of and where to buy organics, gm crops in development, rbGH, and more in “More Info”



Read more: http://truefoodnow.org/campaigns/genetically-engineered-foods/ge-crops/

Generically Modified Foods

http://woodridge.wordpress.com/2009/07/29/genetically-modified-foods/

In Florida, tomatoes by the truckload are stolen

The high price of produce, especially for tomatoes after the deep winter freezes, has attracted more than heightened attention from consumers. A ring of sophisticated vegetable bandits was watching, too. Late last month, a gang of thieves stole six tractor-trailer loads of tomatoes and a truck full of cucumbers from Florida growers. They also stole a truckload of frozen meat. The total value of the illegal haul: about $300,000.

http://www.businessreport.com/news/2011/apr/15/florida-tomatoes-truckload-are-rsnt1/

Germans have been told not to eat cucumbers, tomatoes and lettuce. Other countries, such as the Netherlands, are also worried about losses amid warnings that exports to Germany could collapse.

Javier Diaz, the commercial director of a farming co-operative in southern Spain, said it could take months to restore consumer confidence. Vegetable farmers, he said, "are going to have serious troubles to plan the next year because they are going to have enormous losses."











http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/health/news/article_1643312.php/WHO-E-coli-outbreak-spreads-to-12-countries


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-13637130


This seems to be an orchastrated outbreak in my opinion. The following link is very interesting also. Cause fear and get people to volunterily destroy their food.


starts at 10 min mark.

Here is the latest from Natural News

NaturalNews) Even as the veggie blame game is now under way across the EU, where a super resistant strain of e.coli is sickening patients and filling hospitals in Germany, virtually no one is talking about how e.coli could have magically become resistant to eight different classes of antibiotic drugs and then suddenly appeared in the food supply.

This particular e.coli variation is a member of the O104 strain, and O104 strains are almost never (normally) resistant to antibiotics. In order for them to acquire this resistance, they must be repeatedly exposed to antibiotics in order to provide the "mutation pressure" that nudges them toward complete drug immunity.

So if you're curious about the origins of such a strain, you can essentially reverse engineer the genetic code of the e.coli and determine fairly accurately which antibiotics it was exposed to during its development. This step has now been done (see below), and when you look at the genetic decoding of this O104 strain now threatening food consumers across the EU, a fascinating picture emerges of how it must have come into existence.


The genetic code reveals the history
When scientists at Germany's Robert Koch Institute decoded the genetic makeup of the O104 strain, they found it to be resistant to all the following classes and combinations of antibiotics:

• penicillins
• tetracycline
• nalidixic acid
• trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazol
• cephalosporins
• amoxicillin / clavulanic acid
• piperacillin-sulbactam
• piperacillin-tazobactam

In addition, this O104 strain posses an ability to produce special enzymes that give it what might be called "bacteria superpowers" known technically as ESBLs:

"Extended-Spectrum Beta-Lactamases (ESBLs) are enzymes that can be produced by bacteria making them resistant to cephalosporins e.g. cefuroxime, cefotaxime and ceftazidime - which are the most widely used antibiotics in many hospitals," explains the Health Protection Agency in the UK (http://www.hpa.org.uk/Topics/Infect...).

On top of that, this O104 strain possesses two genes -- TEM-1 and CTX-M-15 -- that "have been making doctors shudder since the 1990s," reports The Guardian (http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentis...). And why do they make doctors shudder? Because they're so deadly that many people infected with such bacteria experience critical organ failure and simply die.


Bioengineering a deadly superbug
So how, exactly, does a bacterial strain come into existence that's resistant to over a dozen antibiotics in eight different drug classes and features two deadly gene mutations plus ESBL enzyme capabilities?

There's really only one way this happens (and only one way) -- you have to expose this strain of e.coli to all eight classes of antibiotics drugs. Usually this isn't done at the same time, of course: You first expose it to penicillin and find the surviving colonies which are resistant to penicillin. You then take those surviving colonies and expose them to tetracycline. The surviving colonies are now resistant to both penicillin and tetracycline. You then expose them to a sulfa drug and collect the surviving colonies from that, and so on. It is a process of genetic selection done in a laboratory with a desired outcome. This is essentially how some bioweapons are engineered by the U.S. Army in its laboratory facility in Ft. Detrick, Maryland (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nation...).

Although the actual process is more complicated than this, the upshot is that creating a strain of e.coli that's resistant to eight classes of antibiotics requires repeated, sustained expose to those antibiotics. It is virtually impossible to imagine how this could happen all by itself in the natural world. For example, if this bacteria originated in the food (as we've been told), then where did it acquire all this antibiotic resistance given the fact that antibiotics are not used in vegetables?

When considering the genetic evidence that now confronts us, it is difficult to imagine how this could happen "in the wild." While resistance to a single antibiotic is common, the creation of a strain of e.coli that's resistant to eight different classes of antibiotics -- in combination -- simply defies the laws of genetic permutation and combination in the wild. Simply put, this superbug e.coli strain could not have been created in the wild. And that leaves only one explanation for where it really came from: the lab.


Engineered and then released into the wild
The evidence now points to this deadly strain of e.coli being engineered and then either being released into the food supply or somehow escaping from a lab and entering the food supply inadvertently. If you disagree with that conclusion -- and you're certainly welcome to -- then you are forced to conclude that this octobiotic superbug (immune to eight classes of antibiotics) developed randomly on its own... and that conclusion is far scarier than the "bioengineered" explanation because it means octobiotic superbugs can simply appear anywhere at any time without cause. That would be quite an exotic theory indeed.

My conclusion actually makes more sense: This strain of e.coli was almost certainly engineered and then released into the food supply for a specific purpose. What would that purpose be? It's obvious, I hope.

It's all problem, reaction, solution at work here. First cause a PROBLEM (a deadly strain of e.coli in the food supply). Then wait for the public REACTION (huge outcry as the population is terrorized by e.coli). In response to that, enact your desired SOLUTION (total control over the global food supply and the outlawing of raw sprouts, raw milk and raw vegetables).

That's what this is all about, of course. The FDA relied on the same phenomenon in the USA when pushing for its recent "Food Safety Modernization Act" which essentially outlaws small family organic farms unless they lick the boots of FDA regulators. The FDA was able to crush farm freedom in America by piggybacking on the widespread fear that followed e.coli outbreaks in the U.S. food supply. When people are afraid, remember, it's not difficult to get them to agree to almost any level of regulatory tyranny. And making people afraid of their food is a simple matter... a few government press releases emailed to the mainstream media news affiliates is all it takes.


First ban the natural medicine, then attack the food supply
Now, remember: All this is happening on the heels of the EU ban on medicinal herbs and nutritional supplements -- a ban that blatantly outlaws nutritional therapies that help keep people healthy and free from disease. Now that all these herbs and supplements are outlawed, the next step is to make people afraid of fresh food, too. That's because fresh vegetables are medicinal, and as long as the public has the right to buy fresh vegetables, they can always prevent disease.

But if you can make people AFRAID of fresh vegetables -- or even outlaw them altogether -- then you can force the entire population onto a diet of dead foods and processed foods that promote degenerative disease and bolster the profits of the powerful drug companies.

It's all part of the same agenda, you see: Keep people sick, deny them access to healing herbs and supplements, then profit from their suffering at the hands of the global drug cartels.

GMOs play a similar role in all this, of course: They're designed to contaminate the food supply with genetic code that causes widespread infertility among human beings. And those who are somehow able to reproduce after exposure to GMOs still suffer from degenerative disease that enriches the drug companies from "treatment."

Do you recall which country was targeted in this recent e.coli scare? Spain. Why Spain? You may recall that leaked cables from Wikileaks revealed that Spain resisted the introduction of GMOs into its agricultural system, even as the U.S. government covertly threatened political retaliation for its resistance. This false blaming of Spain for the e.coli deaths is probably retaliation for Spain's unwillingness to jump on the GMO bandwagon. (http://www.naturalnews.com/030828_G...)

That's the real story behind the economic devastation of Spain's vegetable farmers. It's one of the subplots being pursued alongside this e.coli superbug scheme.


Food as weapons of war - created by Big Pharma?
By the way, the most likely explanation of where this strain of e.coli was bioengineered is that the drug giants came up with it in their own labs. Who else has access to all the antibiotics and equipment needed to manage the targeted mutations of potentially thousands of e.coli colonies? The drug companies are uniquely positioned to both carry out this plot and profit from it. In other words, they have the means and the motive to engage in precisely such actions.

Aside from the drug companies, perhaps only the infectious disease regulators themselves have this kind of laboratory capacity. The CDC, for example, could probably pull this off if they really wanted to.

The proof that somebody bioengineered this e.coli strain is written right in the DNA of the bacteria. That's forensic evidence, and what it reveals cannot be denied. This strain underwent repeated and prolonged exposure to eight different classes of antibiotics, and then it somehow managed to appear in the food supply. How do you get to that if not through a well-planned scheme carried out by rogue scientists? There is no such thing as "spontaneous mutation" into a strain that is resistant to the top eight classes of brand-name antibiotic drugs being sold by Big Pharma today. Such mutations have to be deliberate.

Once again, if you disagree with this assessment, then what you're saying is that NO, it wasn't done deliberately... it happened accidentally! And again, I'm saying that's even scarier! Because that means the antibiotic contamination of our world is now at such an extreme level of overkill that a strain of e.coli in the wild can be saturated with eight different classes of antibiotics to the point where it naturally develops into its own deadly superbug. If that's what people believe, then that's almost a scarier theory than the bioengineering explanation!


A new era has begun: Bioweapons in your food
But in either case -- no matter what you believe -- the simple truth is that the world is now facing a new era of global superbug strains of bacteria that can't be treated with any known pharmaceutical. They can all, of course, be readily killed with colloidal silver, which is exactly why the FDA and world health regulators have viciously attacked colloidal silver companies all these years: They can't have the public getting its hands on natural antibiotics that really work, you see. That would defeat the whole purpose of making everybody sick in the first place.

In fact, these strains of e.coli superbugs can be quite readily treated with a combination of natural full-spectrum antibiotics from plants such as garlic, ginger, onions and medicinal herbs. On top of that, probiotics can help balance the flora of the digestive tract and "crowd out" the deadly e.coli that might happen by. A healthy immune system and well-functioning digestive tract can fight off an e.coli superbug infection, but that's yet another fact the medical community doesn't want you to know. They much prefer you to remain a helpless victim lying in the hospital, waiting to die, with no options available to you. That's "modern medicine" for ya. They cause the problems that they claim to treat, and then they won't even treat you with anything that works in the first place.

Nearly all the deaths now attributable to this e.coli outbreak are easily and readily avoidable. These are deaths of ignorance. But even more, they may also be deaths from a new era of food-based bioweapons unleashed by either a group of mad scientists or an agenda-driven institution that has declared war on the human population.


Additional developments on this e.coli outbreak
• 22 fatalities have so far been reported, with 2,153 people now sickened and possibly facing kidney failure.

• An agricultural ministry in Germany said that even though they now know the source of the outbreak is a German sprout farm, they are still not lifting their warnings for people to avoid eating tomatoes and lettuce. In other words, keep the people afraid!

• "The German variant of E coli, known as O104, is a hybrid of the strains that can cause bloody diarrhoea and kidney damage called 'hemolytic uremic syndrome'." (http://www.independent.ie/world-new...)

• A total of ten European nations have reported outbreaks of this e.coli strain, mostly from people who had visited northern Germany.

• The following story is in German, and it hints that the e.coli outbreak might have been a terrorist attack (http://www.aerztezeitung.de/medizin...). Yeah, a terrorist attack by the drug companies upon innocent people, as usual…



Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/032622_ecoli_bioengineering.html#ixzz1OXDT7IyS

Whether one believes the bible's book of Revelation word for word or not, much of what is written seems to be coming true. We all know the list of events that have taken place.

Whether it is prophecy, or the PTW using it as a script for their manipulation, is certainly up for debate.

Anyways my point is beware of the Pale Horse.

Pale Horse


The fourth horseman (with scythe) as depicted in a stained glass window in Schuld.When the Lamb opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature say, "Come and see!" I looked and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth.
— Revelation 6:7-8˄ NIV

The fourth and final horseman is named Death. Of all the riders, he is the only one to whom the text itself explicitly gives a name. Unlike the other three, he is not described carrying a weapon/object, instead he is followed by Hades. However, illustrations commonly depict him carrying a scythe (like the Grim Reaper), sword, or other implement.


The verse beginning "they were given power over a fourth of the earth" is generally taken as referring to Death and Hades,[12][18] although some commentators see it as applying to all four horsemen.[3]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Horsemen_of_the_Apocalypse

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-13688683

8 June 2011
Foreign firms are snapping up farming land in Africa,
Hedge funds are behind "land grabs" in Africa to boost their profits in the food and biofuel sectors, a US think-tank says.

In a report, the Oakland Institute said hedge funds and other foreign firms had acquired large swathes of African land, often without proper contracts.

It said the acquisitions had displaced millions of small farmers.

Foreign firms farm the land to consolidate their hold over global food markets, the report said.

They also use land to "make room" for export commodities such as biofuels and cut flowers.

"This is creating insecurity in the global food system that could be a much bigger threat than terrorism," the report said.

The Oakland Institute said it released its findings after studying land deals in Ethiopia, Tanzania, South Sudan, Sierra Leone, Mali and Mozambique.

'Risky manoeuvre'

It said hedge funds and other speculators had, in 2009 alone, bought or leased nearly 60m hectares of land in Africa - an area the size of France.

When I visited Lungi-Lol in rural Sierra Leone I saw men hoeing thousands of hectares of farmland owned by Addax, a Swiss-based bio-energy company.

They are growing sugarcane to produce biofuels.

Campaigners say this contributes to food insecurity, but many people here welcome Addax's presence.

Francis Koroma, who works on the farm, says: "We thank God for Addax. I am gainfully employed and I receive about $70 (£46) a month. Before, I spent a whole year without getting $50."

Villagers are unaware of the controversy surrounding biofuels.

Abdulai Conteh, a local traditional leader, said: "Some people are doing business here but I have no idea what they are doing with our land. I see them growing sugarcane. That's all I know."
"The same financial firms that drove us into a global recession by inflating the real estate bubble through risky financial manoeuvres are now doing the same with the world's food supply," the report said.

It added that some firms obtained land after deals with gullible traditional leaders or corrupt government officials.

"The research exposed investors who said it is easy to make a deal - that they could usually get what they wanted in exchange for giving a poor tribal chief a bottle of Johnnie Walker [whisky]," said Anuradha Mittal, executive director of the Oakland Institute.

"When these investors promise progress and jobs to local chiefs it sounds great, but they don't deliver."

The report said the contracts also gave investors a range of incentives, from unlimited water rights to tax waivers.

"No-one should believe that these investors are there to feed starving Africans.

"These deals only lead to dollars in the pockets of corrupt leaders and foreign investors," said Obang Metho of Solidarity Movement for New Ethiopia, a non-governmental organisation in Addis Ababa.

silver*

The Hidden Cost of Ethanol Subsidies

By mandating 40% of our corn crop be dedicated to ethanol, we've created domestic shortages that may turn the U.S. into a net importer of corn and destroy our dominance in one more area of the world economy.



There has been much talk in recent weeks about corn subsidies in Iowa: Former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty had the guts to suggest the elimination of the subsidies in the heart of the Corn Belt, and Sarah Palin has also mentioned an end to farm subsidies as well.

It would seem corn is back on the radar after having fallen off after the 2008 election, when ethanol was no longer a convenient club with which to beat the Bush administration.

Before that particular fight was over, however, former President George W. Bush had signed legislation which required 40 percent of the U.S. corn harvest to be slated for ethanol production, and for massive subsidies to make corn economically viable.

We are now reaping the unintended consequences of those decisions. Accepting as fact that American farmers are the most productive in the world, and also accepting as fact that the agriculture sector is one of the few sectors of the economy which is performing well, we’re still faced with a problem.

Coming off the third-highest corn harvest in U.S. history in 2010, the carryover (unsold corn still in the elevators) is a bare two weeks’ worth of grain at current and projected usage rates.

This is precariously low, the lowest in modern history. The only time the carryover was lower was in the 1930s — during the height of the Dust Bowl.

The problem here is the mandate, which assumes that corn — which is used in pretty much everything from plastics to baby powder to animal feed — will continue to see record yields. I live and grew up in Kansas, the heart of the Farm Belt, and the idea that every year will be a bumper crop is what we call urinating into a moving air mass.

This year could be a bad year; much of the corn in the eastern cornbelt is late getting into the ground, and from west Texas into Nebraska we’ve got the worst drought in 40 years. Parts of western Kansas have gotten no more than a quarter-inch of rain since the beginning of the year. This means the corn stocks could slip still lower.

Why is this a problem? Much like the price of oil, the price of grain worldwide is based on the dollar. In the case of oil, it’s because we’re the world currency and the largest user of oil. In the case of corn and indeed all grains, it’s because we’re the world’s largest producer and exporter.

Think of the carryover stocks as the strategic oil reserve — it’s there in case we have a bad year. Should that happen we still have grain to sell, and we still basically control the price.

Now imagine we have to start importing grain. Suddenly Brazil or Argentina is setting the price, not us. Once you become a net importer of grain, you cease to be a world player in agriculture.

http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/the-hidden-cost-of-ethanol-subsidies/?singlepage=true

FORT LAUDERDALE— The only community garden in downtown Fort Lauderdale has been bulldozed by bankers. A group of residents from the townhomes and condos in the Flagler Heights neighborhood started the garden a year ago on a plot of land near the federal courthouse. They said they had no warning when work crews last week razed their crops of tomatoes, eggplant, yucca and herbs.

Developer Charlie Ladd gave his permission for the garden, but turned the Northeast Third Avenue lot over to City National Bank of Florida in May rather than face foreclosure. The bank cleared the land after city code inspectors complained of weeds. Kate Sheffield, who helped organize the garden, said residents thought they had cleaned up the property and that the inspectors agreed with the garden remaining. "We all worked so hard and were devastated when we didn't even get a chance to collect our plants," she said.

The Flagler Heights project was part of an urban farming trend across South Florida. Similar gardens have sprouted up in vacant lots, city parks and church yards in both inner-cities and suburbs.

A spokeswoman for City National said the bank was unaware of the garden when they cleared the land and would like to help the group start a garden elsewhere. But she said the bank wouldn't allow that lot to be used because it hopes to sell it soon.

Carol wrote:Bulldozer uproots downtown Fort Lauderdale's only community garden[/size]
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/broward/fort-lauderdale/fl-garden-downtown-gone-20110611,0,389739.story[/center]

What complete tossers..

$1 billion lost to rain, flooding
-- 20 per cent of cropland too wet to be seeded

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/breakingnews/1-billion-lost-to-rain-flooding-123898389.html

This is the first year rain and wet fields will keep Hubert Preun from seeding his entire 6,500-acre farm near Selkirk.

And he won't be alone.

Manitoba farmers are facing the worst year in history with 2.5 million acres expected to be too wet to seed. Typically, farmers in the province plant about 12 million acres.

"We got creamed (with rain) again (Monday) night," Preun said Tuesday from his farm west of Selkirk. "Some of the fields I have seeded have gone under water twice already."

With more than 20 per cent of Manitoba's cropland overtaken by excessive rain and widespread flooding, it could mean close to $1 billion in lost revenue for the province this year -- 25 per cent of Manitoba's typical gross agricultural receipts.

Bruce Burnett, the Canadian Wheat Board's director of weather and market analysis, expects it will be the second-largest loss of cropland across the Prairies due to excessive soil moisture in 50 years.

Last year was the worst.

Preun is getting sick and tired of it. This year he'll have to leave 1,500 acres unseeded. Last year, he lost half of his crop.

"It's very tough because this year we've got good prices," he said. "It's an opportunity lost. It's not the year you want to be left with fields unseeded."

Burnett estimates between six million and eight million acres will go unseeded across the Prairies, with Manitoba and Saskatchewan bearing the brunt of the damage.

About 10 million acres were lost in 2010, but Saskatchewan was hit harder than Manitoba. Last year, half as many fields, about one million, in this province were impacted.

"It's definitely grim," said Doug Chorney, president of Keystone Agricultural Producers. "For the affected producers it's devastating."

Chorney said as recently as a week ago, it was estimated more than five million acres would be impacted in Manitoba. But a few sunny days over the past week made a big difference.

"You'd be surprised," he said. "There is an amazing capacity to seed when there is a window of opportunity."

In figuring out the financial impact of lost acreage, Chorney uses $300 in gross revenue per acre as the mean. Using that calculation, the agriculture industry on the Prairies could take a hit of about $2.5 billion this year.

"Many farmers in the wettest areas have planted next to nothing this spring, while others are watching their newly emerged crops drown," Burnett said at a grain industry event on Tuesday.

Simply put, this superbug e.coli strain could not have been created in the wild. And that leaves only one explanation for where it really came from: the lab.

Yep, with this on top of food shortages, some no doubt caused by manipulated weather events, seems they're really in earnest about depopulating the planet now aren't they.

Great work Micjer.

And so it has begun. I hope people are smart enough to buy flour, rice, beans, sugar, oatmeal, dry noodles, sauces and dry pet food in bulk and store it in those large seal lock plastic dog food containers. There is probably still time to buy seeds for sprouting. Add peanut butter and jelly... canned tuna, salmon, spam, chicken, sardines, Chocolate..

Beef cow slaughter, drought - 2011-07-13

http://www.southernstates.com/sscinfo/news/2011/07/beef-slaughter.aspx

Beef cow slaughter has surged the past two weeks as cow-calf operations from Arizona to Maryland try to cope,
with, in many areas, one of the most severe droughts in years. While beef cow slaughter remains below the level of 2010 on a year-to-date basis, cow numbers for the weeks of June 19 and 26, the latest week for which we have cow slaughter data, show slaughter up 5.8% and 7.9%, respectively, from last year’s levels.

And we think the map at the bottom shows very clearly why that is happening — there simply is not enough grass to support cow herds. Add to that the fact that this drought has been in place since last fall and we get a situation where there is little hay on hand and the hay that is available is very expensive. Even with a positive outlook for the beef sector — which we still hold — many cattlemen simply do not have the necessary resources to hang on.

And it is impacting a LARGE portion of the nation’s beef cow herd. The states in the map that contain any areas of
drought (yellow or brown) and no areas of higher-than-normal moisture (shades of green) stretch from Arizona on the west all the way to Maryland on the east. Tennessee is excluded since, on this map, the entire state is classified as having about normal soil moisture.

There are 16 states that meet the criteria. Those 16 states had 14.439 million beef cows on January 1 according to USDA. That number represents 46.8% of the total January 1 U.S. beef cow herd. It also includes the two largest beef cow states, Texas and Oklahoma. There are implications beyond the cow herd, though. We must give some thought to how these dry conditions may impact feedlot placements and inventories as we go through the summer.

We have written several times questioning just how long higher placements and inventories could continue given
USDA’s last two Cattle (inventory) reports that pointed to lower supplies of cattle outside of feedlots and the smaller and smaller calf crops we’ve seen over the past few years. Wheat pasture conditions last fall and winter forced more cattle into yards, keeping feedlot inventories significantly higher than we, and most other
analysts of which we are aware, expected.

May placements which were 10.8% lower than last years suggested that the feeder cattle well may have finally run dry. It now appears that the drought and high fertilizer prices have reduced available grass pastures enough to push more cattle — even some spring calves— into yards.

Our contacts tell us to not be surprised to see June placements at or above year-ago levels and easily high
enough to keep feedlot inventories above year-ago levels. That would suggest higher fed cattle numbers, year-on-year, through the end of this year. But there must be a reckoning. Cow-calf producers in the southern U.S. have been holding on as long as possible because they, like we, see that this cannot go on forever.

Unless USDA has badly miscounted the past two years’ calf crops and subsequent feeder cattle supplies, the number of available calves must fall, setting up a potentially-explosive situation for calf prices and, eventually, cattle, fed cattle and beef. We remain bullish for the long term but cautious as the impact of this drought plays out.

U.S.-CANADIAN BORDER DEAL TO STREAMLINE GMO APPROVAL CONFIRMED



Canada-U.S. Regulatory Co-operation Council under border deal coverage would put Canada under draconian Food Safety Modernization Act, fast track GMO approval.

Aaron Dykes
Infowars.com
December 3, 2011

Our report sounding the alarm that Obama and Harper’s secretive border deal, due to be signed next week, would be used to fast track GMO acceptance has been confirmed. The details have been kept under wraps, but recent reports revealed that the ‘Beyond Borders’ security and law enforcement deal would also seek to ‘harmonize’ U.S. and Canadian regulatory standards for food, auto and other trade sectors.

The Globe and Mail confirms that the North American Union security perimeter initiative, sold to the public as new security measures at the border, has a second major component– the Canada-U.S. Regulatory Co-operation Council.

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Mr. Harper… said there are two issues on the joint security and economic agenda of the two countries. One, he said, is the border and perimeter initiative, and the other is Canada-U.S. Regulatory Co-operation Council.

“We are seeking ways of ensuring security in North America while at the same time making sure that we continue strong Canadian access to the American market,” Mr. Harper told reporters.

http://www.infowars.com/u-s-canadian-border-deal-to-streamline-gmo-approval-confirmed/

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It baffles me how Harper can do this without debate or approval from house and senate.