20 Signs That A Horrific Global Food Crisis Is Coming. The Great Food Crisis of 2011 - By Lester Brown. As the new year begins, the price of wheat is setting an all-time high in the United Kingdom. Food riots are spreading across Algeria. Russia is importing grain to sustain its cattle herds until spring grazing begins. India is wrestling with an 18-percent annual food inflation rate, sparking protests. China is looking abroad for potentially massive quantities of wheat and corn. The Mexican government is buying corn futures to avoid unmanageable tortilla price rises. And on January 5, the U.N. Food and Agricultural organization announced that its food price index for December hit an all-time high. But whereas in years past, it's been weather that has caused a spike in commodities prices, now it's trends on both sides of the food supply/demand equation that are driving up prices.
There's at least a glimmer of good news on the demand side: World population growth, which peaked at 2 percent per year around 1970, dropped below 1.2 percent per year in 2010. 5 Dangers To Global Crops That Could Dramatically Reduce The World Food Supply. The world food situation is starting to get very, very tight. Unprecedented heat and wildfires this summer in Russia and horrific flooding in Pakistan and China have been some of the primary reasons for the rapidly rising food prices we are now seeing around the globe. In places such as Australia and the African nation of Guinea-Bissau, the big problem for crops has been locusts. In a world that already does not grow enough food for everyone (thanks to the greed of the elite), any disruption in food production can cause a major, major problem. Tonight, thousands of people around the world will starve to death. Already, there are huge warning signs on the horizon.
A recent article on the Forbes website noted a few of the agricultural commodities that have skyrocketed during this year.... Here’s what’s happened to some key farm commodities so far in 2010…•Corn: Up 63% •Wheat: Up 84% •Soybeans: Up 24% •Sugar: Up 55% Are you ready to pay 84 percent more for a loaf of bread? UG99 Wheat Rust. US farmers fear the return of the Dust Bowl. Honey Bees Are Dying; Scientists Suspect Pesticides, Disease, and Worry About Food Supply. No matter where you live -- in a brick Philadelphia row house, the sprawling suburbs of Dallas or an apartment in Seattle -- you depend, more than most of us know, on honeybees raised in California or Florida.
The bees have been dying in unusually large numbers, and scientists are trying to figure out why. "One in every three bites of food you eat comes from a plant, or depends on a plant, that was pollinated by an insect, most likely a bee," said Dennis vanEngelsdorp of Penn State University's College of Agricultural Sciences. "We're still managing to pollinate all the orchards," he said.
"But we're really cutting it close out there. " It has been going on for four years. "Something is wrong out there," said David Mendes, a commercial beekeeper near Fort Myers, Fla., who is also president of the American Beekeeping Federation. "It didn't used to be like this," he said. Trouble in the Fields; Prices at the Checkout Counter "And it's not without cost," he said. null What's going on? EPA risks kiling bees to fight invasive stink bugs. White-Nose Syndrome Bat Disease: An Unprecedented Epidemic.
From the Center for Biological Diversity's Mollie Matteson: You might not know it, but a quiet killer is stalking America's bats. A fast-spreading disease called white-nose syndrome has already wiped out more than a million bats in the eastern United States. And just recently, it made more startling moves: showing up in Indiana and North Carolina for the first time ever, renewing scientists' worries that it could easily march into the western United States and jeopardize millions more bats.
The disease -- which leaves a telltale white fungus around the muzzles of the bats it kills -- was first detected in this country five years ago in upstate New York. Unfortunately, federal agencies have not done enough to slow this unprecedented epidemic, and this winter -- the time of year when the disease exacts its deadliest toll -- threatens to be the worst yet. One of the most important steps that federal land managers in the West can take is to shut down caves to all-but-essential human access.
Scientist warns of dire consequences with widespread use of glyphosate. Scientist warns of dire consequences with widespread use of glyphosate The December/January 2010 issue of The Organic & Non-GMO Report featured an interview with Robert Kremer, an adjunct professor in the Division of Plant Sciences at the University of Missouri, whose research showed negative environmental impacts caused by glyphosate, the main ingredient in Monsanto's Roundup herbicide, which is used extensively with Roundup Ready genetically modified crops. The following interview is with another scientist, Don Huber, who recently retired from Purdue University, who has also documented negative environmental impacts from glyphosate.
The widespread use of glyphosate is causing negative impacts on soil and plants as well as possibly animal and human health. These are key findings of Don Huber, emeritus professor of plant pathology, Purdue University. Compromise agricultural sustainability, animal and human health Please tell me about your research with glyphosate. DH: Absolutely not. Roundup—the American Weed-Killer—Is Likely Killing American People, Too.