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‘Farms are failing’ as fertilizer prices drive up cost of food

wsj.com

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Re: ‘Farms are failing’ as fertilizer prices drive up cost of food

#71

Post by tinco »

Bostonian wrote: post #2

The climate change activists who want to cut oil and natural gas production should consider the consequences: "The price-increases stem partly from global energy costs, with the average natural-gas price in Europe for the October-December quarter 10 times as much as that for the year of 2020, according to World Bank data. Nitrogen production facilities rely heavily on natural gas to convert chemical raw materials int…

Although I agree cutting oil and natural gas production will in the short term result in more pain and suffering in the world, in the long term the production of oil and natural gas will result in much more suffering as climate changes wrecks our ecosystems. When the Amazon becomes a desert, and the Sahara covers half of Europe, it will be too late to change your mind on what the consequences are of cutting oil and natural gas production.

Most climate change activists are aware that they're making tough choices. They've probably been living their lives in less comfort and more expenditure than the average person for years trying to give the right example.

That neighbour you know, that installed solar panels on the roof of his house 15 years ago? He probably could have taken his family to Hawaii 3 times for the money they spent on that. And he's probably only recovered his initial investment a couple years ago if you live in a northern climate, if at all.

Re: ‘Farms are failing’ as fertilizer prices drive up cost of food

#72

Post by noduerme »

woodruffw wrote: post #46
octoberfranklin wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're talking about the death of half the world's population: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:World_population_sup...

Cheap synthetic fertilizer is one of the single greatest inventions of the 20th century, and is singlehandedly responsible for an enormous increase in our productive capacity and quality of life. At the same time, I think this chart is misleading: it shows our ability to support the current population as it currently consumes , which includes an extraordinary amount of crop diversion towards animal feed. The GP is de…

But this presupposes that the inefficient diversion to animal feed would work itself out in favor of keeping everyone fed if less grain were available. Since the inefficient systems of production and consumption are already deeply entrenched in areas with the highest savings and the most buffer against instability, there's no reason to think they would be the first thing to collapse, or even that the economics might not favor keeping livestock fed over reallocating grain to humans.

Re: ‘Farms are failing’ as fertilizer prices drive up cost of food

#73

Post by adrianN »

ploden wrote: post #30

Maybe we should end the government mandate to burn corn in car engines. Biden seems more pro-ethanol than Trump, I have no idea why.

Hopefully EVs will put a natural end to that madness. We could satisfy much of our primary energy demand simply by replacing energy crops with PV.

Re: ‘Farms are failing’ as fertilizer prices drive up cost of food

#74

Post by woodruffw »

noduerme wrote: post #72
woodruffw wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cheap synthetic fertilizer is one of the single greatest inventions of the 20th century, and is singlehandedly responsible for an enormous increase in our productive capacity and quality of life. At the same time, I think this chart is misleading: it shows our ability to support the current population as it currently consumes , which includes an extraordinary amount of crop diversion towards animal feed. The GP is de…

But this presupposes that the inefficient diversion to animal feed would work itself out in favor of keeping everyone fed if less grain were available. Since the inefficient systems of production and consumption are already deeply entrenched in areas with the highest savings and the most buffer against instability, there's no reason to think they would be the first thing to collapse, or even that the economics might…

I don't think there's any supposition of this sort in my comment: I haven't committed to any particular opinion on how we would (or whether it's politically feasible to) distribute the agricultural products that normally go into animal feed. Contemporary economic pressures, as you've correctly noted, don't help!

All I've observed is that the GP's conclusion doesn't necessarily extend from the data they've presented: it's just not the case that 3.5 billion humans would have to die if we didn't use as much synthetic fertilizer as we do. We can feed the entire world with much less indirection than we currently go through.

Re: ‘Farms are failing’ as fertilizer prices drive up cost of food

#75

Post by nostromo »

fennecfoxen wrote: post #69
nostromo wrote: post #61

Print several trillion dollars to induce demand while shutting down industry worldwide off and on for two years, which reduces supply. It’s obvious this will cause prices to rise dramatically.

Hello! Urea fertilizer has jumped from $400/ton to $1100/ton in a year. This is not consistent with the price jump being caused by inflation, which remains at much more modest rates. The prices are higher due energy prices rising in Europe and China, natural gas supply disruptions in Texas due to hurricanes and floods, and sanctions on Belarus. They are a driver of inflation, not caused by inflation.

Inflation is never evenly distributed. That doesn’t dispute the cause for widespread inflation.

Inflation is higher than it’s been in 40 years, and that timeframe includes several energy cost spikes, many of which were worse than the current spike.

Re: ‘Farms are failing’ as fertilizer prices drive up cost of food

#76

Post by Beached »

wallacoloo wrote: post #56
ploden wrote: post #30

Maybe we should end the government mandate to burn corn in car engines. Biden seems more pro-ethanol than Trump, I have no idea why.

i always assumed ethanol production was encouraged by the govt precisely to spur excess production of corn so as to make our food production more robust. i.e. during a bad year of food production, halt ethanol production and redirect that excess of corn back into the food supply; crisis averted. is that not the case?

the corn used for ethenol is not the same corn used for consumption.

Re: ‘Farms are failing’ as fertilizer prices drive up cost of food

#77

Post by kimixa »

catmanjan wrote: post #60
colordrops wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US, perhaps we could stop the obscene subsidies for petroleum, corn, and meat, and subsidize more sustainable, nutritious and humane crops and farming practices.

If those existed and were cheaper, that would be done

Of course they're not cheaper - they're not subsidized.

Re: ‘Farms are failing’ as fertilizer prices drive up cost of food

#78

Post by dehrmann »

nostromo wrote: post #61

Print several trillion dollars to induce demand while shutting down industry worldwide off and on for two years, which reduces supply. It’s obvious this will cause prices to rise dramatically.

I don't think the printed money induced food or fertilizer demand. It's not like laptops or dumbbells. The article calls out higher input prices due to energy and mineral costs. The pandemic didn't induce energy demand (it did cause it to yoyo), and the mineral costs are due, in part, to sanctions (the 2, 3, and 4th producers are Russia, Belarus, and China). Non-fertilizer uses are only 15% of demand, so this really wasn't driven by monetary policy inducing demand.

Re: ‘Farms are failing’ as fertilizer prices drive up cost of food

#79

Post by dqv »

goda90 wrote: post #49
Gigachad wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More production will be moved from grain for cattle to growing food for humans. We can massively scale up our food production if we remove beef from the average diet.

Most agricultural land can't support food crops but can support ruminants.

That’s not an argument against dedicating existing cropland to human food production. The GP isn’t talking about pasture and rangeland. Just the huge amount of cropland used to grow feed for animal ag. And while we’re at it, let’s reform the ~40M acres [0] cropland used for grazing back to growing human feed. Then we can take the 127M acres of crops used to grow animal feed [1] and also dedicate that to human feed. All while reducing the animal populations and helping with the overgrazing happening on ~50% of range and pasture [2]. And to pre-empt the argument that food animals are fed the byproducts of human-consumption crops, go back to [1]. But yes feel free to feed them the byproducts… it’s just not going to be very much of their calories.

[0]: https://www.ers.usda.gov/amber-waves/2012/march/data-feature...

[1]: https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-us-land-use/

[2]: https://www.nrdc.org/resources/grazing-operations-journey-be... unfortunately an ad for grass fed beef, but I think it says something that beef producers see the writing on the wall for the current methods affecting the environment

Re: ‘Farms are failing’ as fertilizer prices drive up cost of food

#80

Post by dehrmann »

SEJeff wrote: post #21

There is also a slightly different way to grow food using a less intense fertilizer called "square foot gardening". https://squarefootgardening.org/ There is a best selling book about it and it works surprisingly well. The secret fertilizer for this, affectionately known as "Mel's Mix" recipe is available for anyone to make their own. It's not even terribly hard if you're willing to do a bit of composting outside on…

Most things grown in home gardens don't have a significant number of calories. Here's a planting schedule from that site:

https://squarefootgardening.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/S...

None of those are significant sources of fat or protein, and a few are at best moderate sources of carbs.

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