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How is China able to provide enough food to feed over 1B people?

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Re: How is China able to provide enough food to feed over 1B people?

#212
post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A slight sea level rise will cripple farming in a large part of Bangladesh. I'm not optimistic about their future.

What can we do as computer scientists to best militate this risk and protect human life?

Pay for their plane tickets out of there

Re: How is China able to provide enough food to feed over 1B people?

#213
post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A slight sea level rise will cripple farming in a large part of Bangladesh. I'm not optimistic about their future.

What can we do as computer scientists to best militate this risk and protect human life?

It is up to their alley. Giving birth to less children, raising them better, solving poverty. Knowing Bangladesh, unlikely

Re: How is China able to provide enough food to feed over 1B people?

#214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think to many Chinese people, being forced to do something that is perceived as for their own good is seen as a good thing. It's kind of in the Asian culture that the end justifies the means, as opposed to Western culture where you are free to do as you choose but you bear the consequences. Not saying it's wrong, just a different perspective.

> being forced to do something that is perceived as for their own good is seen as a good thing I sometimes wonder if Los Angeles commuters would actually be better off and happier if the government (somehow) had the legal right to force us all to use buses and rail instead of individual cars.

The government(s) were the ones who built the roads and mandated minimum parking lots.

Re: How is China able to provide enough food to feed over 1B people?

#215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What can we do as computer scientists to best militate this risk and protect human life?

It is up to their alley. Giving birth to less children, raising them better, solving poverty. Knowing Bangladesh, unlikely

It's all but certainly too late for birthrate changes alone to reduce population within the anticipated timeframe.

That leaves emigration or mortality increases, barring further food miracles.

Re: How is China able to provide enough food to feed over 1B people?

#216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What can we do as computer scientists to best militate this risk and protect human life?

It is up to their alley. Giving birth to less children, raising them better, solving poverty. Knowing Bangladesh, unlikely

Or they could maintain the same birth rate and use technology that was well understood before anyone in this board was born. Huge portions of the Low Countries have been prosperous and below sea level for centuries. It requires dykes, ditches, windmills and uninterrupted competent engineering organisations. Dutch history shows that’s adequate for keeping land 2m below sea level inhabited and rich. Any rise greater than that and they might have to break out technology more advanced than windmills. It’s a massive engineering challenge but unless Bangladesh is built on limestone so the bedrock is porous it’s an engineering challenge that WWII technology would have been sufficient to.

Re: How is China able to provide enough food to feed over 1B people?

#217
post #155
post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I grew up in China and had all my education in China up until my undergrad. I got my PhD in a top US school. I consider myself highly educated even in US standards. When I was in China, I was very concerned about my country and my government. I was worried and feeling hopeless of my country. Man, was I young and naive. I have since lived in the US for almost ten years. Five years for my PhD and almost five years for…

I can appreciate your point, but I think it'd be good to say why. I'm European, so for example I found the GFW to be a refreshing and ultimately beneficial contribution to the world, simply because it maintains diversity - a global monoculture would cause serious problems. This isn't to say that Chinese policies are right, but rather that going against the West does not automatically signify malign intent. Indeed it…

The major powers attempting to put roadblocks in the way of China's ascent were quite instrumental in aiding China's decline over the past couple centuries.

I think the trust deficit coming from the East towards the West is more warranted than many in the west like to admit.

Re: How is China able to provide enough food to feed over 1B people?

#218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is up to their alley. Giving birth to less children, raising them better, solving poverty. Knowing Bangladesh, unlikely

Or they could maintain the same birth rate and use technology that was well understood before anyone in this board was born. Huge portions of the Low Countries have been prosperous and below sea level for centuries. It requires dykes, ditches, windmills and uninterrupted competent engineering organisations. Dutch history shows that’s adequate for keeping land 2m below sea level inhabited and rich. Any rise greater th…

Unfortunately the geology and geography of Bangladesh means that dikes won't be effective. What worked in the Netherlands won't work there.

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/the-unfoldin...

Closer to home, South Florida will eventually have similar problems. The whole region sits on permeable limestone so dikes are pointless.

Re: How is China able to provide enough food to feed over 1B people?

#219
post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> what does the Dalai Lama and Uighur oppression have to do with this The snark likely comes from the fact that Xinjiang is consistently portrayed in Western media as a nightmarish, dystopian, Orwellian hellhole suffering under the iron fisted oppression of the Communist Party. They ignore the very real benefits that have been afforded to millions of poverty-stricken people in Xinjiang via progressive government poli…

> Xinjiang is consistently portrayed in Western media as a nightmarish, dystopian, Orwellian hellhole suffering under the iron fisted oppression of the Communist Party That’s because it is, and if you visited you wouldn’t be so flippant about it. In large part because a tourist can’t even make a stop in the area without getting their own personal police minder. It’s little different than North Korea.

I prefer the approach to Xinjiang deradicalization over our methods in Iraq and Syria.

Re: How is China able to provide enough food to feed over 1B people?

#220
post #2

The country I don't understand how they do it is Bangladesh. A country the size of New York State with 164 million people. (50% of the US population). As I understand it, they generate 90% of the food they require.

The subcontinent, and especially India and Bangladesh, have ridiculous amounts of arable land. India has more than any other country in the world.

besides the US
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