‘Farms are failing’ as fertilizer prices drive up cost of food • Hacker News Board

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

#121

Post by cjbgkagh » Sat, Jan 22, 2022, 4:12 PM UTC

smallerfish wrote: post #101

flenserboy wrote: post #91

Pastures are the future. There's a reason the US Midwest had such great soil — it's not simply a confluence of rivers & luck. The buffalo did their thing, and the grasses they fed on were fed in turn by them. Replacing corn and soy with ruminants will replenish the soil, provide excellent protein for people, and get rid of the cheap, food-like things made from corn, soy, and their chemically-coaxed out byproducts. It…

"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 "So if this system is so ideal, why is it that my cow hasn’t tasted a blade of grass since October? Speed, in a word. Cows raised on grass simply take longer to reach slaughter weight than cows raised on a richer diet, and the modern me…

There is more to food than calories. I would love to replace livestock with bioreactors but I don’t think people understand the interaction with food and health well enough yet for me to ‘trust the science’. Plus costs have to come way way down. I eat a decent amount of yeast derivatives so it’s getting part of the way there. I also eat free range meat whenever possible because I hope that it is healthier for me; the fact that it is less cruel is definitely a bonus. I get that not everyone can afford it. So instead of pushing everyone into eating cheap to grow grains I would rather have the science improve so even the poor can eat healthier bioreactor food.

Edit: the poor and I. I also want healthier bioreactor food. Food fraud is a problem that’s getting worse with inflation and avoiding it is getting expensive.

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

#122

Post by makomk » Sat, Jan 22, 2022, 4:13 PM UTC

smallerfish wrote: post #101

flenserboy wrote: post #91

Pastures are the future. There's a reason the US Midwest had such great soil — it's not simply a confluence of rivers & luck. The buffalo did their thing, and the grasses they fed on were fed in turn by them. Replacing corn and soy with ruminants will replenish the soil, provide excellent protein for people, and get rid of the cheap, food-like things made from corn, soy, and their chemically-coaxed out byproducts. It…

"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 "So if this system is so ideal, why is it that my cow hasn’t tasted a blade of grass since October? Speed, in a word. Cows raised on grass simply take longer to reach slaughter weight than cows raised on a richer diet, and the modern me…

Humans cannot survive on calories alone, though, and certainly aren't going to be healthy living on them. Protein has always been one of the most expensive parts of a healthy diet.

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

#123

Post by Turing_Machine » Sat, Jan 22, 2022, 4:19 PM UTC

freeflight wrote: post #93

Scoundreller wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Growing by hand for calories is a negative return activity. Industrial is just more energy efficient and who cares about artisanal sugar or cooking oil. Hand-Grow some herbs and tomatoes on the other hand and now you’re making dough.

> Growing by hand for calories is a negative return activity. Industrial agriculture, with the help of chemical fertilizers, has only been a thing since the early 19th century. I find it hard to believe that agriculture, in all the centuries before that, was negative in return. How did sedentary humans feed themselves for these thousands of years before that if not with manual agriculture?

I don't think it's negative, but it's quite marginal. As noted above, in most traditional civilizations, upwards of 90% of the population was engaged just in growing food, generally as unfree labor. The remaining 10% were priests, nobles, and soldiers to keep the peasants in line and working hard.

Such societies typically also had famines every few years. We don't have famines in developed countries any more.

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

#124

Post by _0w8t » Sat, Jan 22, 2022, 4:20 PM UTC

dehrmann wrote: post #80

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.

Potato and sweet potato can be produced in a local garden and provide enough calories and nutrients. For example, if one eats enough potatoes to get 2500 kilocalories (about 6 pounds), one get more than enough protein.

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

#125

Post by _0w8t » Sat, Jan 22, 2022, 4:24 PM UTC

Turing_Machine wrote: post #34

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…

Edit: "wheat" -> "corn" "Square foot gardening" with hand labor isn't going to replace the 772 million metric tons of wheat and 1 billion metric tons of corn produced annually. Sorry, it just isn't. Given that it's January, why not try the experiment of producing all the food you personally consume this year using the techniques in this book? Growing a few tomatoes and a bit of lettuce is pretty easy, and is a fun an…

When historians looked into details, it turned out a serf worked less than 40 hours per week on average in the Middle Ages in France, less than modern workers. And he needed to feed both own family and his master.

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

#126

Post by Turing_Machine » Sat, Jan 22, 2022, 4:24 PM UTC

_0w8t wrote: post #124

dehrmann wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Potato and sweet potato can be produced in a local garden and provide enough calories and nutrients. For example, if one eats enough potatoes to get 2500 kilocalories (about 6 pounds), one get more than enough protein.

6 pounds? I'm skeptical that anyone can sit down and eat 6 pounds of potatoes. You should probably check your arithmetic here.

And no, you're not going to produce enough potatoes in a "local garden" to feed our cities, much less all of the people in the rest of the world who are fed by our croplands.

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

#127

Post by CuriouslyC » Sat, Jan 22, 2022, 4:27 PM UTC

gruez wrote: post #39

teslabox wrote: post #17

There are options besides chemical fertilizers. The nodules on legume root are a symbiotic home for nitrogen-fixing bacteria. Farmers traditionally rotate corn and soybeans to reduce their nitrogen costs. Other plants have deeper roots, which pull up nutrients... My comment about biological nitrogen fixation (15 days ago): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29829580 Saw this recently: Black eyed peas could help eli…

>There are options besides chemical fertilizers. But as it relates to this problem (ie. food getting more expensive), your suggestion doesn't make any sense. Considering that the methods you described aren't widely used, I think it's safe to say that they're more expensive than using synthetic fertilizers. Therefore if we implemented that suggestion we wouldn't have higher food prices... because the food prices would…

A no till rotational cover crop system with grazing is better in pretty much every way than monocropping with fertilizer, with the main downside being required knowledge of animal husbandry, along with some additional expenses in terms of fencing and some time investment in care of the animals.

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

#128

Post by 99_00 » Sat, Jan 22, 2022, 4:30 PM UTC

flenserboy wrote: post #91

Pastures are the future. There's a reason the US Midwest had such great soil — it's not simply a confluence of rivers & luck. The buffalo did their thing, and the grasses they fed on were fed in turn by them. Replacing corn and soy with ruminants will replenish the soil, provide excellent protein for people, and get rid of the cheap, food-like things made from corn, soy, and their chemically-coaxed out byproducts. It…

What % of global population will have to expire for a fertilizer free future possible?

Population of US in 1780 was 3 million. Today it’s 300 million.

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

#129

Post by Turing_Machine » Sat, Jan 22, 2022, 4:30 PM UTC

_0w8t wrote: post #125

Turing_Machine wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Edit: "wheat" -> "corn" "Square foot gardening" with hand labor isn't going to replace the 772 million metric tons of wheat and 1 billion metric tons of corn produced annually. Sorry, it just isn't. Given that it's January, why not try the experiment of producing all the food you personally consume this year using the techniques in this book? Growing a few tomatoes and a bit of lettuce is pretty easy, and is a fun an…

When historians looked into details, it turned out a serf worked less than 40 hours per week on average in the Middle Ages in France, less than modern workers. And he needed to feed both own family and his master.

Umm... hours worked isn't the only metric for quality of life. I'm pretty sure that 40 hours spent in agricultural stoop labor is not the same thing as 40 hours sitting in a comfy chair in front of a computer.

Also, you're just shining off the fact that they were serfs. I wouldn't want to be a serf even if I had to work only 10 hours per week. Would you? Not free to leave the land on which you were born, living in a hovel with no running water, toilet facilities, or central heating, maybe one change of clothes, fully subject to your master in all aspects of your life, including who (and even if) you were allowed to marry...

> And he needed to feed both own family and his master.

His master had to have 9 or 10 serfs doing that to produce enough surplus to support him. That was rather the point.

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

#130

Post by jtwebman » Sat, Jan 22, 2022, 4:31 PM UTC

I think no-dig would work way better but we need machines that can do that to take it to scale. So maybe the farms need to fail to get there. Also doesn't help that 80% goes to feed animals.