Food supplies getting low

[Atash Hagmahani]

This topic has shown up at a number of sites. Interestingly, the MSM has covered it as well, although low-keyed it.

http://www.marketskeptics.com/2009/12/2010-food-crisis-for-dummies.html

The 2010 Food Crisis is different. It is THE CRISIS. The one that makes all doomsday scenarios come true. The government bailouts and central bank interventions, which have held the financial world together during the last two years, will be powerless to prevent the 2010 Food Crisis from bringing the global financial system to its knees.

Financial crisis will kick into high gear

So far the crisis has been driven by the slow and steady increase in defaults on mortgages and other loans. This is about to change. What will drive the financial crisis in 2010 will be panic about food supplies and the dollar’s plunging value. Things will start moving fast.

Dynamics Behind 2010 Food Crisis

Early in 2009, the supply and demand in agricultural markets went badly out of balance. The world experienced a catastrophic fall in food production as a result of the financial crisis (low commodity prices and lack of credit) and adverse weather on a global scale. Meanwhile, China and other Asian exporters, in an effort to preserve their economic growth, were unleashing domestic consumption long constrained by inflation fears, and demand for raw materials, especially food staples, exploded as Chinese consumers worked their way towards American-style overconsumption, prodded on by a flood of cheap credit and easy loans from the government.

Normally food prices should have already shot higher months ago, leading to lower food consumption and bringing the global food supply/demand situation back into balance. This never happened because the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), instead of adjusting production estimates down to reflect decreased production, adjusted estimates upwards to match increasing demand from china. In this way, the USDA has brought supply and demand back into balance (on paper) and temporarily delayed a rise in food prices by ensuring a catastrophe in 2010.

Overconsumption is leading to disaster

It is absolutely key to understand that the production of agricultural goods is a fixed, once a year cycle (or twice a year in the case of double crops). The wheat, corn, soybeans and other food staples are harvested in the fall/spring and then that is it for production. It doesn’t matter how high prices go or how desperate people get, no new supply can be brought online until the next harvest at the earliest. The supply must last until the next harvest, which is why it is critical that food is correctly priced to avoid overconsumption, otherwise food shortages occur.

The USDA—by manufacturing the data needed to keep supply and demand in balance—has ensured that agricultural commodities are incorrectly priced, which has lead to overconsumption and has guaranteed disaster next year when supplies run out.

An astounding lack of awareness

The world is blissful unaware that the greatest economic/financial/political crisis ever is a few months away. While it is understandable that general public has no knowledge of what is headed their way, that same ignorance on the part of professional analysts, economists, and other highly paid financial "experts” is mind boggling, as it takes only the tiniest bit of research to realize something is going critically wrong in agricultural market.

USDA estimates for 2009/10 make no sense

All someone needs to do to know the world is headed is for food crisis is to stop reading USDA’s crop reports predicting a record soybean and corn harvests and listen to what else the USDA saying.

Specifically, the USDA has declared half the counties in the Midwest to be primary disaster areas, including 274 counties in the last 30 days alone. These designations are based on the criteria of a minimum of 30 percent loss in the value of at least one crop in the county. The chart below shows counties declared primary disaster areas by the secretary of Agriculture and the president of the United States.

The same USDA that is predicting record harvests is also declaring disaster areas across half the Midwest because of catastrophic crop losses! To eliminate any doubt that this might be an innocent mistake, the USDA is even predicting record soybean harvests in the same states (Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Alabama) where it has declared virtually all counties to have experienced 30 percent production losses. It isn’t rocket scientist to realize something is horribly wrong.

USDA motivated by fear of higher food prices

The USDA is terrorized by the implications of higher food prices for the US economy, most likely because it knows the immediate consequence of sharply higher food will be the collapse of the US Treasury market and the dollar, as desperate governments and central banks dump their foreign reserves to appreciate their currencies and lower the cost of food imports. Fictitious USDA estimates should be seen as proof of the dire threat posed by higher food prices, as the USDA would not have turned its production estimates into a grotesque mockery of reality if it didn't believe the alternative to be apocalyptic.

While the USDA may be the worst offender, the United States isn’t the only government trying to downplay the food situation out of fear. As one Indian reporter writes, governments are lying about the looming food crisis.

… some experts and governments, in full cognizance of the facts, want us not to create panic and paint a picture of parched crops and a looming food crisis. This, they say, would push up food prices unnaturally, lead to hoarding and ultimately result in a situation where many more millions across the world would go hungry. And whether it is the developing world or the developed, it is those at the bottom of the pyramid who are the most affected in such scenarios.

This leads to a confusing divide between reality and government pronouncements, or even between the perspectives of government departments

Confusing divide between reality and government estimates

For months now, the media has been reporting two distinctly, contradicting realities. One of these realities is filled with record crops and plentiful supply, and the other is filled agricultural devastation and ruin. It has been a mad, frustrating experience to read about agricultural disasters and horrendous crop losses in virtually every state combined with predictions of a US record harvest, sometimes in the same article.

Commodity prices seem to also be out of whack, something I noticed a few years ago. I am not a farmer, but I am guessing that farmers have not been getting paid enough for their crops. Between unrealistic prices, and increasing inability to get farming loans, I believe that production is in fact falling. Increasingly unstable weather is not helping!

I don't think that these authors are in cahoots. Here is Ned Schmidt's take on the same phenomenon:

http://www.financialsense.com/editorials/schmidt/2009/1215.html

The Global Warming Scam may finally be on its way to well-deserved oblivion. Take your pick of discrediting events, the snow storms that hit the Midwestern U.S., snow at the start of the Australian Summer, -40 degree temps in Western Canada, or Climategate. The Global Warming Scam appears now to have been nothing more than a giant research dollar Ponzi-like scheme. Researchers would take research dollars, cook some numbers, discard other data, and exchange dubious research for more funding from other sources. Rather than useful research that might help us understand what effect tomorrow’s climate might have on global Agri-Food production, we got subterfuge and intimidation of nonbelievers.

Across the Midwestern U.S. snow storms have wreaked havoc with the corn harvest. Iowa was hit with the worst snow storm since the 1950s. Estimates of that corn remaining in the U.S. fields, now awaiting Spring to be harvested, varies from 6% to 25% to 40%, depending on location. Estimated losses of that corn remaining in the field till Spring range from 25% to 40%. Thus far this situation has not caused stress on Agri-Food prices as the new U.S. corn crop was indeed large, and had just arrived.

However, as Spring unfolds, we will know more fully how much of the U.S. corn crop has been damaged. A fair bet would be that the real economic U.S. corn crop, including the light weight of the harvested crop and that not already damaged by wet conditions or lost due to still being in the field, will be a lot less than the forecast numbers suggest. The real economic value of corn is not the volume in bushels, but the usable food content of the corn. And do remember, corn is not produced in a factory. A new crop of corn will not arrive in North America till Fall of 2010.

One of the many uses of grains like corn is portrayed in the chart above. Plotted in that chart is months of vegetable oil consumption, or usage, represented by stocks at the end of the relevant crop year. Vegetable oil is a critical component of Agri-Food consumption. As is readily apparent in that graph the world’s inventory of vegetable oil, in terms of months of consumption, has been declining for years. The USDA forecasts that the world is moving toward having less than one month of vegetable oil in inventory. As that is somewhat of an average, some parts of the world have less than one month of vegetable oil available. Largest components of global vegetable oil production are palm oil at 33%, and soybean of about 27%.

While not suggesting that we start hoarding vegetable oil, not much would be required to push the world toward such a situation. Vegetable oil is produced by crushing grain, or palm fruit in the case of palm oil. Since some basic working inventory is required to “oil” the supply system, the current low level of inventories would suggest that inventory building may be necessary. In order to build more inventories, producers would have to crush more grain or palm fruits. Oil producers would have to bid against others for grain in an already tight Agri-Food supply world.

We usually talk about dry goods. However, vegetable oil is a big deal too I suppose. It usually comes in sealed jugs. I dunno what the ultimate shelf-life is, but it is probably flushed with nitrogen and sealed, which should keep it from going rancid indefinitely. I suggest looking for pull-dates.

I buy oil in big gallon jugs. Doesn't last all that long, though, with my big family.

[opsec]

Oil goes rancid relatively quickly. Just did some digging around, consensus seems to be that cooking oils have a shelf life of about 1 year, olive oil a bit longer. Two options for those wanting to store for long term are canned butter and Crisco, the shelf life of which is measured in decades.

Here's a source for the butter: http://www.mredepot.com/servlet/the-Canned-Meats%2C-Cheese-%26-Butter/Categories

[The Future]

You might want to be aware than "canned butter and Crisco" will also eat away at you arteries for decades!  It cannot objectively be even classified as food.

Re the corn harvest, I wasn't aware that corn was left in the field for so long.  How will all those cows get fed if the corn crop fails I wonder.  (88% of it is not grown for people - 94% if you count HFCS!)

[Atash Hagmahani]

Opsec, Future is right. The reason saturated fats keep so long, is that all possible hydrogen bonds are filled, so they are resistant to oxidization. Unfortunately, this means that they are solid fats, and do not "flow" readily in our bloodstream. If they are not trans-fats (un-naturally-shaped hydrogenated fats), we can handle some, but actually living on them would be bad. For one thing, by definition they don't contain the short-chain essential fatty acids that we require to build hormones.

Future, they left the maize ("Indian corn") in the fields so late, because they had planted it late, because of cold, rainy spring weather that flooded the fields during normal planting season. So, we knew that this was a crop at-risk going into it, but the USDA has apparently been spreading press releases of highly optimistic bumper-crop forecasts.

[opsec]

That leaves us with a one year window for edible cooking oil.

[Atash Hagmahani]

Well, in that case you just don't fry food. You can still get enough essential fatty acids to keep you alive from foods that are naturally oily. I have been thinking about growing a few Sunflowers, or maybe "Lady Godiva" pumpkins, which produce hulless pumpkin seeds. Pumpkin-seed oil is surprisingly good for you, for a tropical oil. It's mostly monounsaturated, like olive oil, with some polyunsaturates. In Austria they use it like olive oil, and it is pricey and valued.

I also have the variety "Styrian Hull-less" (the variety grown in Austria and neighboring countries), but I was worried that it takes a longer growing season. They both happen to be pepos, which is a problem for seed-isolation. Maybe I should go ahead and grow Lady Godiva, and hand-pollinate other pepos to keep their pollen out.

One surprisingly good oil is hempseed oil. It does not keep; it is too highly unsaturated. But it has a nice ratio of all the omega fatty acids. Ideally you would have the seeds whole, and grind them as needed. Too bad it's not legal to grow in the USA. Too bad a few people abused it and got it banned.  It's probably the most valuable fiber you can grow in a temperate climate. The weird thing is they won't even let us grow the varieties that are too low in TCH to abuse.

Whole-wheat flour contains the oil-rich germ. Hard to keep from going rancid though. Ideally, you grind the wheat as needed.

I seem to recall that your seedmill came with stainless-steel grinders for extracting oil, is that right?

[The Future]

I agree the oil-less cooking may be the best option.  I also have the lady godiva and a styrian pumpkin.  As an aside, I wonder of the lady godiva leaves are any good to eat - I imagine they are but haven't grown it yet - given the flesh is not of eating quality.  I imagine there are people growing this and not taking advantage of the leaf.  This spring, the hulless pumpkins are going in the ground.  In terms of the tropical oils, my research indicates they have an unfair stigma attached to them ("suprisngly good, for a tropical oil").  Many tropical places have no issue with cholesterol (beyond what is generated by the body it self, it ONLY comes from animal flesh), heart disease etc except for the rich who eat and live like other rich people).  Palm oil and coconut oil for example are quite healthy despite the claims by marketers of the real unhealthy trashy oils.  For those really interested, check out Udo Erasmus' Fats that Heal, Fats the Kill.

For ease of use and storage, I've found nothing better than chia.  Keeps for 5 years of more without refridgeration and does not require grinding like flax does.  Has the omega 3 & 6 (cannot be synthesized by the body hence "essential) and omega 9 and others.  Flax spoils at room temperature within 15 minutes but the catch is you can't smell it has gone rancid.  NEVER buy anything with ground flax in it.  I could go on....

Hemp is an interesting one.  Udo says it has the perfect omega 3:6 ratio and doesn't require blending.  I used to mix sesame, sunflower, pumpkin and flax to approximate the balance.  I have sampled the non-THC hemp products you can buy in health food stores (hemp milk etc.) and they taste good.  But the with the whole abuse thing, can't get my head around folks trying to get back to legalizing and growing it.  I say just leave it alone.  Allowing the low/no THC stuff might open the risk of folks opening growing high THC stuff secretly.  I dunno.  Oddly enough, i visited a guru plant propagator this weekend who was trying to get me to see this dvd on the wonders of medicinal hemp (resin ingested not smoked) for all sorts of ailments.  The conspiracy theory is that big pharma don't want THC used for internal use cause it would put them out of business.  Again, that's not my fight and I think people best just move on and find something else that helps....

Sesame, flax seem fiddly to harvest.  Chia is also but less so.  Pumpkin is easier and serves multiple roles.  Extracting pure oil is something I haven't looked into.  Does anyone grow olives of any kind?  I need a good semi-tropical one.

[opsec]

The grinding burrs are carbon steel, not stainless steel. The stainless steel part is the auger that drives the food into the burrs. It's not for extracting oil per se, my grinder is only designed to grind up oily seeds and beans effectively.

[offdalip]

If they are not trans-fats (un-naturally-shaped hydrogenated fats),

Actually , Fats or any long organic molecule can be either "trans" or "cis".

BOTH are natural

Cis have both ends pointing towards the same plane

Trans have both molecule ends pointing towards opposite ends

the take home message is that one type of molecule has a high melting point, it will clog your arteries, and the other has a low melting point, it will not clog your arteries

[offdalip]

in brief, trans molecules have high melting points


and, cis molecules have low melting points.


things that don't melt will clog things up

corrected

[Atash Hagmahani]

I thought that trans had "kinks" in them, and that their irregular shape was why our lipo-protein transport systems don't handle them well.

[Wellspring]

You might want to be aware than "canned butter and Crisco" will also eat away at you arteries for decades!  It cannot objectively be even classified as food.

I'm REALLY glad this topic has been raised as there's so much misinformation on this subject.  First, the longest shelf life for the BEST OIL YOU CAN CONSUME IS TWO OR MORE YEARS.  And what might that oil be???  Due to its exceptional stability, coconut oil has a long shelf life of two or more years (the longest of any oil), and does not have to be refrigerated. Coconut oil should be stored out of direct sunlight, however.

Also, here's an important question:  what did our ancestors/indigenous people's eat to fulfill their fatty acid requirements before the advent of "refined oil" or "cold-pressed" oil????  If those folks lived in the tropics, it was coconut oil.  If in Norther climes, animal fats.

Look into making your own pemmican; we are getting ready to make some.  The best online info I've found on making your own pemmican is here:   http://www.breadandmoney.com/docs/pemmican2006.html

Please go to the following page and spend some time reading and listening to Dr. Mercola talking about trans fats and the benefits of virgin coconut oil.  We even use coconut oil as a skin moisture:  it's Awesome!   http://products.mercola.com/coconut-oil/

From the Mercola site:

"Coconut oil is nature's richest source of these healthy MCFAs.

By contrast, most common vegetable or seed oils are comprised of long chain fatty acids (LCFAs), also known as long-chain triglycerides or LCTs.

There are several reasons to explain why these long-chain fatty acids are not as healthy for you as the MCFAs in coconut oil:

LCFAs are difficult for the body to break down -- they must be packaged with lipoproteins or carrier proteins and require special enzymes for digestion.
LCFAs put more strain on the pancreas, the liver and the entire digestive system.
LCFAs are predominantly stored in the body as fat. (That's why most people buy into the myth that fats are automatically "fattening".)
LCFAs can be deposited within arteries in lipid forms such as cholesterol.
On the other hand, however, the MCFAs in coconut oil are more health-promoting, because:

MCFAs are smaller. They permeate cell membranes easily, and do not require lipoproteins or special enzymes to be utilized effectively by your body.
MCFAs are easily digested, thus putting less strain on your digestive system. This is especially important for those of you with digestive or metabolic concerns.
MCFAs are sent directly to your liver, where they are immediately converted into energy rather than being stored as fat.
MCFAs in coconut oil can actually help stimulate your body's metabolism, leading to weight loss."

[opsec]

The -cis form of fats have a curved shape that the body can use. The -trans fats are straight making things difficult for the body.

Pumpkin seeds contain both essential fatty acids. That's one solution for those gowing curcubits. One oil to avoid is rapeseed oil. It has the EFA's but it also has a toxic fatty acid called erucic acid which has been identified as a cause of heart disease.

[offdalip]

here is the visual

cis                 _____________
                    /                     \


trans             _____________/
                   /

the trans form molecules link onto each other like velcro thus lowering the m.p.
the cis form doesn't form links with each other as easily

[The Future]

Wellspring, I would go a step further and question whether these fats are "digested" at all.  I think they are "assimilated" and the fact they they are not broken down is half the problem.  Carbohydrates are converted by the body into simple sugars.  Proteins are converted into amino acids.  Fats are not converted to anything other than fats (I.e. omega 3 and omega 6 can be synthesized to higher omega fats).  (As an aside,  a lot of people aren't aware that, for example, chicken, pig or cow fat are all stored in the body as chicken, pig or cow fat.)

Also, everyone another reason you may want to do your best to avoid hydrogenated fats: they are entirely unpredictable.  Udo reveals that partial hydrogenation - aprocess used to stiffen the fatty acid chains so they will not melt at room temperature and thus clog your artieries and also cause oxidation - results in a different outcome for every single batch a manufacturer runs.  The partial filling of hydrogen bonds - stopped in mid stream - means the exact chemical structure of the product is unknown aka experimental!  Partial hydrogenation is even more dangerous that full hydrogenation.