By Joel K. Bourne Jr
It is the simplest, most natural of acts, akin to breathing and walking upright. We sit down at the dinner table, pick up a fork, and take a juicy bite, oblivious to the double helping of global ramifications on our plate. Our beef comes from Iowa, fed by Nebraska corn. Our grapes come from Chile, our bananas from Honduras, our olive oil from Sicily, our apple juice—not from Washington State but all the way from China. Modern society has relieved us of the burden of growing, harvesting, even preparing our daily bread, in exchange for the burden of simply paying for it. Only when prices rise do we take notice. And the consequences of our inattention are profound.
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2009/06/cheap-food/bourne-textThis was forwarded in one of my overpopulation groups, with this message, I don't know who wrote:
Begin forwarded message:
> We don't want to think about limits. But as we approach nine
> billion people on the planet, all clamoring for the same
> opportunities, the same lifestyles, the same hamburgers, we ignore
> them at our risk.
>
> None of the great classical economists saw the industrial
> revolution coming, or the transformation of economies and
> agriculture that it would bring about. The cheap, readily available
> energy contained in coal—and later in other fossil fuels—unleashed
> the greatest increase in food, personal wealth, and people the
> world has ever seen, enabling Earth's population to increase
> sevenfold since Malthus's day. And yet hunger, famine, and
> malnutrition are with us still, just as Malthus said they would be.
>
> "Years ago I was working with a Chinese demographer, " Dyson says.
> "One day he pointed out to me the two Chinese characters above his
> office door that spelled the word 'population. ' You had the
> character for a person and the character for an open mouth. It
> really struck me. Ultimately there has to be a balance between
> population and resources. And this notion that we can continue to
> grow forever, well it's ridiculous."
>
> Perhaps somewhere deep in his crypt in Bath Abbey, Malthus is
> quietly wagging a bony finger and saying, "Told you so."
>
> The full article can be found at:
>
>
http://ngm.national geographic. com/2009/ 06/cheap- food/bourne- text
>
> Please consider writing a letter to the National Geographic
> commending them on this special report and their recognition that
> an expanded “green revolution” and the introduction of new hybrid
> grains may not be enough to head off a catastrophic food crisis.
>
> Letters can be sent to:
>
> ngsforum@nationalge ographic. com
>
I'd write and thank them.. maybe. But the story won't get forwarded to anyone who doesn't already know.