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Historic fertilizer crunch threatens food security

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Re: Historic fertilizer crunch threatens food security

#21

Post by 2000UltraDeluxe »

citizenkeen wrote: post #12
DiabloD3 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please stop repeating the falsehood that animal pastures can somehow be transmuted into high yield crops for the human food supply: about 1/3rd of farmland in the US can never be transformed into suitable farmland for that task, and this accounts for most of the land used for pasture. If we're having problems maintain soil fertility levels now, imagine if we needed 2-3x the fertilizer to transform unsuitable land int…

I don't believe the argument is that the acreage for animal pastures would be converted, but rather the acreage for the crops they eat would be converted. Or is that in error as well?

Not at all. Those fields are now fertilized with cow manure, though. Without the cattle, you'd need more artificial fertilizer for the crops you intend to feed humans with.

Would it be good for the environment? Quite possibly. Would it result in more fertilizer available on the market? Not really.

Re: Historic fertilizer crunch threatens food security

#22

Post by smcl »

Asooka wrote: post #7
citizenkeen wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(1) [Thing] is bad for the world (2) But I want it. This is the recipe for the road we are on.

If eating meat were bad for the environment, all predators who eat exclusively large prey would be extinct. We can have a discussion about how much meat per year production is sustainable, but I'm not going to start eating bugs.

And where in the comment thread was anyone saying

a) all instances of meat-eating is bad for the environment

b) you will need to start eating insects

Re: Historic fertilizer crunch threatens food security

#23

Post by engineer_22 »

citizenkeen wrote: post #6
ianhawes wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It will be hard to give up my fertilizer-fed beef.

(1) [Thing] is bad for the world (2) But I want it. This is the recipe for the road we are on.

If an impact-free human being is the goal, the only solution is genocide.

Re: Historic fertilizer crunch threatens food security

#24

Post by Saanti »

thriftwy wrote: post #15
ryanmercer wrote: post #2

Well, we can feed ourselves a lot better rapidly by: - Drastically reducing food waste. In the United States, food waste is estimated at 30-40% https://www.usda.gov/foodwaste/faqs - Shift away from animal based protein rapidly. Livestock takes up nearly 80% of global agricultural land, yet produces less than 20% of the world's supply of calories https://ourworldindata.org/agricultural-land-by-global-diets... . (don't…

Animal based protein does not need fertilizer to be grown and it may not be carbon-intensive. Plant based protein is basically putting oil in the ground and getting crops back. It's intellectually disgusting how you try to put a round peg in a square hole.

What about fertilizer needed to produce food for livestock?

Re: Historic fertilizer crunch threatens food security

#25

Post by IntrepidWorm »

deltille wrote: post #17
Asooka wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If eating meat were bad for the environment, all predators who eat exclusively large prey would be extinct. We can have a discussion about how much meat per year production is sustainable, but I'm not going to start eating bugs.

Most predators that eat exclusively large prey don't number in the billions. Any reason you are averse to eating bugs specifically?

I second this - cow based protein and cricket based protein both supply adequate value in an average human diet - why is there such a stigma against one versus the other?

Re: Historic fertilizer crunch threatens food security

#27

Post by Aromasin »

jhgb wrote: post #8
DiabloD3 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please stop repeating the falsehood that animal pastures can somehow be transmuted into high yield crops for the human food supply: about 1/3rd of farmland in the US can never be transformed into suitable farmland for that task, and this accounts for most of the land used for pasture. If we're having problems maintain soil fertility levels now, imagine if we needed 2-3x the fertilizer to transform unsuitable land int…

I was under the impression that a significant percentage of cattle was not fed purely from pastures. Perhaps this what GP's comment was about?

Correct. The vast majority of US cattle are grain fed/finished.

"If all the grain currently fed to livestock in the United States were consumed directly by people, the number of people who could be fed would be nearly 800 million," David Pimentel, professor of ecology in Cornell University's College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, reported at the July 24-26 meeting of the Canadian Society of Animal Science in Montreal. Or, if those grains were exported, it would boost the U.S. trade balance by $80 billion a year, Pimentel estimated.

With only grass-fed livestock, individual Americans would still get more than the recommended daily allowance (RDA) of meat and dairy protein, according to Pimentel's report, "Livestock Production: Energy Inputs and the Environment."

"If all the grain currently fed to livestock in the United States were consumed directly by people, the number of people who could be fed would be nearly 800 million," David Pimentel, professor of ecology in Cornell University's College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, reported at the July 24-26 meeting of the Canadian Society of Animal Science in Montreal. Or, if those grains were exported, it would boost the U.S. trade balance by $80 billion a year, Pimentel estimated.

With only grass-fed livestock, individual Americans would still get more than the recommended daily allowance (RDA) of meat and dairy protein, according to Pimentel's report, "Livestock Production: Energy Inputs and the Environment."

https://news.cornell.edu/stories/1997/08/us-could-feed-800-m...

To add to that, the argument that animal pastures cannot be used for anything else has been proven demonstrably false time and time again. They are not usable for modern day agricultural monoculture cropland, which is the metric that the studies use and I'm sure the commenter is referring to. That does not mean by any stretch of the imagination that they cannot be rewilded or even transformed into usable farm land again through long term soil regeneration methods such as permaculture farming or effective through growing climate appropriate polycultures.

Re: Historic fertilizer crunch threatens food security

#28

Post by formerkrogemp »

ryanmercer wrote: post #2

Well, we can feed ourselves a lot better rapidly by: - Drastically reducing food waste. In the United States, food waste is estimated at 30-40% https://www.usda.gov/foodwaste/faqs - Shift away from animal based protein rapidly. Livestock takes up nearly 80% of global agricultural land, yet produces less than 20% of the world's supply of calories https://ourworldindata.org/agricultural-land-by-global-diets... . (don't…

I don't know if the US is going suffer food insecurity in the short term anywhere near as soon as other countries. I fear that with heat waves/drought in India, the Ukraine invasion, drought in the American west, and climate change broadly leading to crop failures food prices will remain elevated for years to come. I don't think people want to hear "give up meat" speaking as someone who has mostly given up meat (pork, poultry, and beef) for fish and mushrooms. I guess slow conversion is best. I've been feeding relatives mushrooms where they've never had them before in effort to reduce meat consumption to some, admittedly, limited success. I do worry for the future.

Re: Historic fertilizer crunch threatens food security

#29

Post by verve_rat »

dbatten wrote: post #14
DiabloD3 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please stop repeating the falsehood that animal pastures can somehow be transmuted into high yield crops for the human food supply: about 1/3rd of farmland in the US can never be transformed into suitable farmland for that task, and this accounts for most of the land used for pasture. If we're having problems maintain soil fertility levels now, imagine if we needed 2-3x the fertilizer to transform unsuitable land int…

The objection I've usually heard is less about farm land being used for pasture instead of growing crops, and more about the amount of crops that have to be grown to feed the cattle... Growing corn to feed cows to feed humans is massively less efficient than growing corn to feed humans, or at least that's how the story goes. Is there not an efficiency problem there that we could improve on? (Not an expert in this are…

Sure, but go back to pasture based systems. Cows are a fantastic way to turn grass into human edible nutrients. That will probably reduce the amount of meat on the market, but no where near the drastic levels some people talk about.

All land is not fungible, we need to use the best tools for the job, and that will be a mix of a bit of everything, including animal meat.

Re: Historic fertilizer crunch threatens food security

#30

Post by myshpa »

DiabloD3 wrote: post #5
ryanmercer wrote: post #2

Well, we can feed ourselves a lot better rapidly by: - Drastically reducing food waste. In the United States, food waste is estimated at 30-40% https://www.usda.gov/foodwaste/faqs - Shift away from animal based protein rapidly. Livestock takes up nearly 80% of global agricultural land, yet produces less than 20% of the world's supply of calories https://ourworldindata.org/agricultural-land-by-global-diets... . (don't…

Please stop repeating the falsehood that animal pastures can somehow be transmuted into high yield crops for the human food supply: about 1/3rd of farmland in the US can never be transformed into suitable farmland for that task, and this accounts for most of the land used for pasture. If we're having problems maintain soil fertility levels now, imagine if we needed 2-3x the fertilizer to transform unsuitable land int…

Not every piece of land existing should be used to feed us.

We could reforest the pastures (start reducing CO2 in the atmosphere) and return the land to the wildlife (put a stop to an anthropomorphic extinction).

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