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Author Topic: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD  (Read 884410 times)

Tom_Mazanec

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1850 on: December 10, 2019, 12:52:54 PM »
Quote
That sprayer system shown in the beginning of the video is draining the ogallala aquifer complex dry to grow corn/soy in the desert. Draining the ogallala is not a good idea even to build carbon in the soil. Lets hope he finds a better way, one that might even regenerate aquifer.
I've been hearing the ogallala is about to run out of water any day now as long as I can remember. I know the level has been dropping, but can anyone get a firm answer on how much lower it can go?

sidd

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1851 on: December 10, 2019, 10:50:14 PM »
Re: ogallala

In my trips out west i spoke to many farmers reliant on pumped irrigation from the aquifer. Their major concern at present is not running out of aquifer, rather running out of money to pump from deeper and deeper wells ...

sidd

gerontocrat

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1852 on: December 10, 2019, 11:49:15 PM »
Re: ogallala

In my trips out west i spoke to many farmers reliant on pumped irrigation from the aquifer. Their major concern at present is not running out of aquifer, rather running out of money to pump from deeper and deeper wells ...

sidd
sidd,

to my surprise some farmers have got the message and are trying to do something about it.

https://civileats.com/2019/11/18/high-plains-farmers-race-to-save-the-ogallala-aquifer/
Quote
BY GRETA MORAN
Climate, ENVIRONMENT, FARMING, Regenerative Agriculture, Water
Posted on: November 18, 2019  |  Leave a Comment 
About a decade ago, Chris Grotegut realized that he had to start pumping much less groundwater out of his wells. It dawned on the cattle rancher and grain farmer that if he didn’t act soon, there may not be enough water to sustain his 11,000-acre farm in Hereford, Texas—much less to support the next generation on his land.

It’s well-documented that the Ogallala Aquifer, which supplies water to Grotegut’s land, is rapidly depleting. Nearby farms in the High Plains of the Texas Panhandle have experienced worse—many of their wells are going dry. As the aquifer draws lower, the future of agriculture in the region becomes an open question—and the answer depends, in part, on whether enough farmers can shift their practices to sustain on less groundwater.

“We must live within our ecological means in order to give those same ecological opportunities to the next generation,” said Grotegut, who is as much a self-taught ecologist as he is a farmer. “The ethical problem is, what are we leaving our kids?”

read on, worth it

But I lost a farmer's blog on how no-till farming + other stuff (especially mulch) meant water levels in his wells are rising.

"Para a Causa do Povo a Luta Continua!"
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sidd

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1853 on: December 11, 2019, 05:55:33 AM »
Thanks for the link. In that article there is a link to a wapo article (among many others)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/09/12/how-long-before-the-midwest-runs-out-of-water/

that might partly answer Mr. Manzanec's question.

sidd

kassy

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1854 on: December 11, 2019, 10:50:24 AM »
Large atmospheric waves in the jet stream present risk to global food production

In a new study published today in Nature Climate Change, scientists show how specific wave patterns in the jet stream strongly increase the chance of co-occurring heatwaves in major food producing regions of Northern America, Western Europe and Asia. Their research finds that these simultaneous heatwaves significantly reduce crop production across those regions, creating the risk of multiple harvest failures and other far-reaching societal consequences, including social unrest.

...

"We found a 20-fold increase in the risk of simultaneous heatwaves in major crop producing regions when these global scale wind patterns are in place. Until now this was an underexplored vulnerability in the food system. We have found that during these events there actually is a global structure in the otherwise quite chaotic circulation. The bell can ring in multiple regions at once and the impacts of those specific interconnections were not quantified previously."

Western North America, Western Europe and the Caspian Sea region are particularly susceptible to these atmospheric patterns that get heat and drought locked into one place simultaneously where they then affect crops production yields.

for details see:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/12/191209112147.htm
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Tom_Mazanec

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1855 on: December 11, 2019, 12:41:55 PM »
Thanks for the link. In that article there is a link to a wapo article (among many others)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/09/12/how-long-before-the-midwest-runs-out-of-water/

that might partly answer Mr. Manzanec's question.

sidd

I can't afford to subscribe...can you tell me the answer?

kassy

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1856 on: December 11, 2019, 02:38:36 PM »
There is not one simple answer.

The depth of the Ogallala varies with the shape of then-prevailing surface, being deepest where it fills ancient valleys and channels. The Ogallala Formation consists mostly of coarse sedimentary rocks in its deeper sections, which transition upward into finer-grained material.

The water-saturated thickness of the Ogallala Formation ranges from a few feet to more than 1,000 feet. Its deepest part is 1200 ft. (300 m) and is generally greater in the Northern Plains.[10] The depth of the water below the surface of the land ranges from almost 400 feet (120 m) in parts of the north to between 100 and 200 feet (30 and 61 m) throughout much of the south.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ogallala_Aquifer

Similar but free articles:
http://duwaterlawreview.com/crisis-on-the-high-plains-the-loss-of-americas-largest-aquifer-the-ogallala/

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-ogallala-aquifer/

As sidd points out above for some small farmers they might not be able to pump from depths.

In general a lot can be done with choice of crop or drought resistant varieties and this could add decades because even small measures add up because of the scale.

As time goes on more surface streams will disappear , 268 km to 2060 or so which will not improve the area. And there is PFAS and related pollution seeping in.

So there is not a fixed year. Depends on where you are in the area and what you can spend.
And it depends on the measures taken for the area.

It is a balancing act over time. You have city populations that need water the rest can be used for farming but when it runs out it is gone (although it freely replenishes we just have to wait for 6000 years) . So the key policy question is how long do you want to farm?

Þetta minnismerki er til vitnis um að við vitum hvað er að gerast og hvað þarf að gera. Aðeins þú veist hvort við gerðum eitthvað.

Tom_Mazanec

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1857 on: December 11, 2019, 03:51:59 PM »
If the whole ogalalla were drained, how much of a millimeter would that raise sea level?

sidd

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1858 on: December 11, 2019, 09:36:56 PM »
wikipedia:

"The USGS estimated that total water storage was about 2,925,000,000 acre feet (3,608 km3) in 2005. This is a decline of about 253,000,000 acre feet (312 km3), or 9%, since substantial groundwater irrigation development began in the 1950s."

3600 km^3 is about 10 mm global SLR

sidd

Tom_Mazanec

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1859 on: December 12, 2019, 12:28:47 AM »
Wow.
That is ten or twenty times more than I expected!

vox_mundi

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1860 on: December 13, 2019, 03:46:54 PM »
One of Europe's Worst Famines Likely Caused by Devastating Floods
https://blogs.agu.org/geospace/2019/12/12/one-of-europes-worst-famines-likely-caused-by-devastating-floods/

Europe's Great Famine of 1315–1317 is considered one of the worst population collapses in the continent's history. Historical records tell of unrelenting rain accompanied by mass crop failure, skyrocketing food prices, and even instances of cannibalism.

These written records strongly suggest Europe's Great Famine was caused by several years of devastating floods that began in 1314, but they can't tell us how this flooding compares to historic averages, or its full geographical extent

Now, new research using tree ring records confirms the historical data, showing the years of the Great Famine were some of Europe's wettest. A team of researchers from the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and Columbia University quantified the extent of Great Famine flooding and found the years 1314, 1315, and 1316 were the fifth-wettest sequence of summers on record over a 700-year period.

... "When we think about extreme hydroclimate events, we talk a lot about drought," said Jason Smerdon, a paleoclimatologist with Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and lead author of the study. "But this was a deluge. And both of those things are going to be more frequent as a consequence of climate change."

... During the Great Famine, the OWDA clearly shows that heavy rainfall affected Northern Europe only, leaving southern Spain and Italy completely dry. Today’s climate models assume that the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) will continue to be the dominant climate pattern, but if the dominant pattern has switched before, it could potentially switch again.
“There are three classes of people: those who see. Those who see when they are shown. Those who do not see.” ― anonymous

Insensible before the wave so soon released by callous fate. Affected most, they understand the least, and understanding, when it comes, invariably arrives too late


vox_mundi

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1862 on: December 16, 2019, 06:18:09 PM »
Arctic Threats, Water Shortages and Rising Conflicts: Climate Change Will Require Military Responses
https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2019/12/12/arctic-threats-water-shortages-and-rising-conflicts-climate-change-will-require-military-responses/

As impacts from climate change grow in the coming years, troops might see beefed up Arctic capabilities, such as icebreaking ships, better infrastructure and mobile nuclear reactors in the region.

At the same time, forces face increased conflict in northern African and the Middle East over dwindling water resources and more demand for responses to damage from ever-increasing natural disasters.

That’s the diagnosis from a panel of military intelligence and planning experts who testified this week before members of the House Armed Services Committee.

https://armedservices.house.gov/2019/12/subcommittee-on-intelligence-and-emerging-threats-and-capabilities-hearing-climate-change-in-the-era-of-strategic-competition

... Concerns besides the Arctic at Wednesday’s hearing includes a combination of political instability, economic crises and water shortages that have and will likely continue to plague nations in both North Africa and the Middle East.

Those factors stand to exacerbate already hostile conditions.

Langan-Riekhof stressed that while there hasn’t been a major conflict over water shortages yet, situations such as those in Syria and Libya had other factors, water shortages compounded problems.

“One area is water disputes,” she said. “That has not yet to date led as a single cause to conflict between two nations. But moving forward, future constraints, particularly in the Middle East, North Africa and South Asia – areas with extreme drought – water supplies will be challenged going forward.”
“There are three classes of people: those who see. Those who see when they are shown. Those who do not see.” ― anonymous

Insensible before the wave so soon released by callous fate. Affected most, they understand the least, and understanding, when it comes, invariably arrives too late

TerryM

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1863 on: December 17, 2019, 12:27:52 PM »
When your only tool is a hammer, every problem looks very much like a nail.


Could we expect anything else from the House Armed Services Committee?


Faced with problems of how to feed the poor, improve education, or build highways, the Armed Services Committee will undoubtedly find a solution that requires additional military funding.  :P
Terry

nanning

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1864 on: December 17, 2019, 04:37:42 PM »
Well said.
The last nail of the coffin?
"It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly" - Bertrand Russell
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Why do you keep accumulating stuff?

TerryM

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1865 on: December 17, 2019, 05:35:10 PM »
^^
Ramen!
Terry

Sigmetnow

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1866 on: December 18, 2019, 07:37:19 PM »
Ocean waters off West Coast acidifying at twice the rate of global average, NOAA researcher finds
Quote
The Pacific Ocean off the West Coast is acidifying at twice the rate of the rest of the world’s oceans, according to researchers, with potentially catastrophic effects on shellfisheries.

The findings, published Monday in the journal Nature Geoscience, were the product of a seven-year study led by Emily Osborne, a researcher with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s ocean acidification program.

Osborne began collecting samples of sediment from the Santa Barbara Basin off the coast of Southern California in 2013. Because the basin has little oxygen and a dearth of plants and animals, the ocean floor has remained relatively undisturbed. The sediment cores she pulled from the basin contained the shells of foraminifera, a single-celled plankton, dating back to 1895. After weighing and photographing each specimen, Osborne was able to use the thickness of the shells to establish a 100-year record of pH levels in the waters of the California Current, which runs along the West Coast.

She found that, since 1895, shell thickness had decreased by 20 percent due to increased ocean acidification.

“I started looking at the lowest, oldest parts of core and worked my way to top,” she said. “It was crazy to see visually how the shell changed throughout the core.”

The ocean absorbs carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, which reduces pH levels and concentrations of calcium carbonate, a mineral used by shellfish to calcify their shells. As more carbon is released into the atmosphere, concentrations of calcium carbonate decrease and the shells of organisms like foraminifera get thinner, a trend Osborne saw clearly in the sediment cores she examined.

“The shell thickness record instantly showed a long-term declining trend,” she said. “It was really obvious across entire record.”


That trend could spell trouble for shellfish farmers on the West Coast, who depend on calcium carbonate-rich waters for their oysters, clams and mussels to grow. In 2007, the Whiskey Creek Shellfish Hatchery in Netarts Bay on the Oregon coast saw a catastrophic larval failure because of acidic conditions.

Looking at the chemical composition of the shells, Osborne found that the type of carbon in the shells was indicative of carbon dioxide absorbed from the atmosphere, the same greenhouse gas that is driving changes to the climate across Oregon and around the globe. ...
https://www.oregonlive.com/environment/2019/12/ocean-waters-off-west-coast-acidifying-at-twice-the-rate-of-global-average-noaa-researcher-finds.html
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vox_mundi

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1867 on: December 19, 2019, 05:56:09 PM »
US Corn Belt Expecting Climate Change Double Whammy
https://blogs.ei.columbia.edu/2019/12/18/climate-change-corn-belt/

Warming temperatures create two major drying trends, jeopardizing corn and soybean crops.

The United States Corn Belt includes western Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, eastern Nebraska, and eastern Kansas. The region has dominated corn production in the U.S. since the 1850s, accounting for more than a third of the global supply of corn. It is also the world's largest source of soybeans.

New research led by atmospheric scientist Mingfang Ting from Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory reveals that climate change has triggered two changes that threaten the region's crop production; warming temperatures are both increasing the evaporation of soil moisture and causing summer storms to carry more moisture away from the Midwest.

Traditionally the Corn Belt receives most of its rainfall during the summer, which is also the growing season for corn. However, Ting identified a net loss of surface water here, indicating evaporation from the soil and plants is exceeding the net rainfall during those months.

Ting and colleagues found the storms in the Corn Belt during the summer are becoming weaker and dropping less precipitation. This weakening is a product of global warming as well. Temperature differences between the polar and midlatitude regions trigger storm intensity. With the polar regions warming faster, there is less of a temperature contrast, thus weakening the storms.

The storms are getting weaker, but they will actually move more moisture out of the region, causing further drying. This was an unexpected finding, said Ting.



Typically when storms are weaker, they are less efficient at moving moisture out of the region. But future modeling shows this is not the case. Due to global warming, the atmosphere holds more moisture. This triggers a greater moisture difference to build up between the Central Plains and the polar regions, "so the storms are trying harder to remove the moisture from the region," explained Ting, "to smooth out the gradient." The models show more moisture being transported to northern high latitudes, including into northern reaches of the currently drier Great Plains.

Ting's models indicate the trend only intensifies in the future under climate change.

"Our results suggest that in the future, the US Midwest corn belt will experience more hydrological stress," said Ting.

---------------------------------

African Swine Fever Kills Nearly 30,000 Pigs in Indonesia
https://phys.org/news/2019-12-african-swine-fever-pigs-indonesia.html



-----------------------------------

Deadly Pig Virus Reaches Poland’s Top Pork Area
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-12-05/deadly-virus-roiling-meat-market-reaches-poland-s-top-pork-area

------------------------------------

Denmark Completes Controversial Fence to Keep Wild Boars Out
https://www.porkbusiness.com/article/denmark-completes-controversial-fence-keep-wild-boars-out

A fence intended to prevent wild boars from bringing African swine fever (ASF) into Denmark is getting pushback from critics who say the fence is a waste of money against a problem that doesn’t exist.

On Monday, Denmark completed the fence along the border with Germany to protect its nearly 5,000 pig farms that export 28 million pigs annually, according to the Danish Agriculture and Food Council in a DW.com article.

https://www.dw.com/en/denmark-completes-contentious-fence-along-german-border/a-51496704
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Insensible before the wave so soon released by callous fate. Affected most, they understand the least, and understanding, when it comes, invariably arrives too late

sidd

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1868 on: December 19, 2019, 10:00:15 PM »
Saul interviews Senanayake at counterpunch: Analog forestry

"Every country on this planet has a tradition of agriculture spanning thousands of years. Those that did wrong, failed horribly."

"both the creatures of the ecosystem and the humans learned to create and manage a system that was beneficial for the manager. This was the traditional system of agriculture, anywhere. If you look at it, that system of agriculture gives you probably not the highest, but probably the optimal yield you could get from a system without external input. Then, as we increase our level of external inputs – whether you bring in oxen, or whether you bring in a group of other people, or later on, a tractor, or fertilizer – as you bring in external imputs, the apparent productivity goes up, but the cost of that productivity is tremendous."

"And the wallow disappears, though the tractor is not graceful on the land, and the buffalo will yield to that tractor, although the buffalo finally is more efficient in its dialog with the land, more lucid. Clearly, there is something about technology that does not like that which is not itself."

"You are alive. You breathe. The air you breathe was made breathable by plants. The way that you integrate this truth into how you lead your life, will determine the course of our world."

https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/12/18/the-threat-to-life-as-we-know-it-the-view-from-sri-lanka/

sidd

gerontocrat

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1869 on: December 20, 2019, 01:35:12 PM »
I am tempted to call it COP25 Syndrome - not doing something, or doing something, while knowing it is so, so wrong.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/dec/18/eu-ministers-opt-to-continue-overfishing-despite-2020-deadline
EU ministers opt to continue overfishing, despite 2020 deadline
Governments accused of ‘betrayal’ for setting quotas to miss sustainability targets
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kassy

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1870 on: December 20, 2019, 02:14:18 PM »
Since they cite a breach of law some organisation(s) will take them to court.

Þetta minnismerki er til vitnis um að við vitum hvað er að gerast og hvað þarf að gera. Aðeins þú veist hvort við gerðum eitthvað.

sidd

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1871 on: December 24, 2019, 11:32:02 PM »
Nice article on attempts to recreate lost crops:

doi: 10.2993/0278-0771-39.4.549

sidd

nanning

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1872 on: December 25, 2019, 06:47:26 AM »
Quote from: Senanayake
"Every country on this planet has a tradition of agriculture spanning thousands of years.

Eeeehhhmm *cough* aboriginals *cough* inuit *cough* civilisation bubble *cough*..


edit: changed author of quote, thanks sidd and, sorry. (Every but not all?)
« Last Edit: December 25, 2019, 10:22:55 AM by nanning »
"It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly" - Bertrand Russell
"It is preoccupation with what other people from your groups think of you, that prevents you from living freely and nobly" - Nanning
Why do you keep accumulating stuff?

sidd

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1873 on: December 25, 2019, 07:17:38 AM »
1) Quote is not from sidd. Is from Senanayake
2) The quote is true. Agriculture arose about 10KYr ago and spread very very quickly to every part of the world
3) That there always were, and still are non agriculture, hunter gatherer and pastoral communities is not disputed.

sidd
 

kassy

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1874 on: December 25, 2019, 08:25:49 PM »
2b) also developed independently in south-middle america. (and in regional variations possibly the north?).

Cool project on regrowing those old crops.
Sadly the article itself is paywalled. Did they also look at historical pollen records to check what grew along it? I think it is interesting that a polyculture of them growing together yields more but possibly they had other booster plants around them too. 
Þetta minnismerki er til vitnis um að við vitum hvað er að gerast og hvað þarf að gera. Aðeins þú veist hvort við gerðum eitthvað.

Sigmetnow

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1875 on: January 01, 2020, 04:38:49 PM »
"Starting January 1, any reef-toxic sunscreen imported or sold in Palau will be confiscated and the owner will be fined US$1,000.”
https://mobile.twitter.com/rapplerdotcom/status/1212204865482625024
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Sigmetnow

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1876 on: January 01, 2020, 04:41:45 PM »
This company grows crickets, locusts and other insects to sell as pet food. Now, they're expanding, becoming the first in the UK to produce insects for human consumption at an industrial scale.
Video:
https://www.cnn.com/videos/world/2019/12/29/eating-insects-good-of-planet-cotovio-vpx.cnn
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TerryM

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1877 on: January 01, 2020, 10:18:35 PM »
2b) also developed independently in south-middle america. (and in regional variations possibly the north?).

Cool project on regrowing those old crops.
Sadly the article itself is paywalled. Did they also look at historical pollen records to check what grew along it? I think it is interesting that a polyculture of them growing together yields more but possibly they had other booster plants around them too.


Locally they take deep mud samples in ponds and small endorheic lakes, then identify the pollen. An acquaintance located a large pre-contact Iroquois village after identifying corn pollen from ages past. They excavated the village & it's become a tourist magnet as well as a source of information about the First Nations.


His technique was to drive a capped pipe deep into the mud. Fill the pipe with dry ice, then study the core much as if it were an ice core sample. Simple and low tech, but apparently very effective.


Terry

Tom_Mazanec

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1878 on: January 06, 2020, 06:27:05 PM »
West’s ‘dust bowl’ future now ‘locked in’, as world risks imminent food crisis
https://medium.com/insurge-intelligence/wests-dust-bowl-future-now-locked-in-as-world-risks-imminent-food-crisis-947f50eca712
Quote
Past climate emissions mean the US and Europe will experience devastating drought in 80 years, and a global food crisis could be triggered in the 2020s — yet it’s not too late to build resilience and avert the worst

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1879 on: January 08, 2020, 01:43:24 PM »
Food 'made from air' could compete with soya

Finnish scientists producing a protein "from thin air" say it will compete with soya on price within the decade.

The protein is produced from soil bacteria fed on hydrogen split from water by electricity.

The researchers say if the electricity comes from solar and wind power, the food can be grown with near-zero greenhouse gas emissions.

If their dreams are realised, it could help the world tackle many of the problems associated with farming.

...

I ate a few grains of the precious protein flour - called Solein - and tasted nothing, which is what the scientists have planned.

They want it to be a neutral additive to all sorts of foods.

It could mimic palm oil by reinforcing pies, ice cream, biscuits, pasta, noodles, sauces or bread. The inventors say it can be used as a medium for growing cultured meat or fish.

It could also nourish cattle to save them eating soya raised on rainforest land.

For details see:
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-51019798

I really like this idea. Sadly it is a couple of years late (and current startdate is in 2025).
This is the sort of stuff you could invest big time in as the EU...
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dnem

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1880 on: January 08, 2020, 01:56:25 PM »
Monbiot has column about this in the Guardian today and also a movie about it coming out tonight:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/08/lab-grown-food-destroy-farming-save-planet

Lab-grown food will soon destroy farming – and save the planet
Scientists are replacing crops and livestock with food made from microbes and water. It may save humanity’s bacon

kassy

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1881 on: January 08, 2020, 08:32:30 PM »
Destroying farming would not be a good idea.

We just have to turn it back to where the farmers can make a living from living with the land. So none of the big scale factory farming but well i guess it is the same idea phrased a little differently.
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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1882 on: January 09, 2020, 07:13:06 AM »
Lab-grown food needs a lab. A lab needs high technology. After social collapse the labs will fail. No lab-grown food. Then what?

This is just another techno-fix. To force and control living nature to do your bidding without returning anything. More supremacy. Supremacy is always destructive.


When you are born a very strong man, you are more careful than others because you might hurt or damage others. You have higher potential so you have also higher responsibility and have to exercise restraint.

In this metaphor: High technology is what makes civilisation 'strong'. That comes with a very high responsibility.
Only through supremacy (= a fantasy) can you ignore that responsibility because you are now insane. And utterly destructive with wielding the extreme strength/power from high technology.

When will civilisation humans learn responsibility and restraint?


The indiginous (non- civilisation humans) don't have supremacy over living nature.
Living in balance with nature: Don't take more than you need and stay functionally in ecosystems.

Civilisation humans think they are supreme over these other humans and have conquered (killed) them -> Insanity.
Rich civilisation humans think they are supreme over poor civilisation humans -> Insanity.
Low intelligence rich people think they are supreme over high intelligence poor people -> Insanity.
"It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly" - Bertrand Russell
"It is preoccupation with what other people from your groups think of you, that prevents you from living freely and nobly" - Nanning
Why do you keep accumulating stuff?

Paddy

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1883 on: January 09, 2020, 11:36:01 AM »
The FAO food price index December figures are out, and it's climbed to a 5 year high: http://www.fao.org/worldfoodsituation/foodpricesindex/en/

I doubt the January situation (Australian wildfires, oil price scares, Chinese New Year etc) will be helping food prices to stop rising. On the bright side, it's still significantly below 2011-2014 figures.
« Last Edit: January 09, 2020, 11:49:24 AM by Paddy »

dnem

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1884 on: January 09, 2020, 04:35:03 PM »
Lab-grown food needs a lab. A lab needs high technology. After social collapse the labs will fail. No lab-grown food. Then what?

This is just another techno-fix. To force and control living nature to do your bidding without returning anything. More supremacy. Supremacy is always destructive.

I agree nanning. I was surprised and disappointed to see Monbiot so bought in on what strikes me as a bizarre techno-fantasy.  Not only do we need to completely re-jigger the entire global energy economy and infrastructure to move from fossil fuels to "renewables" but now we need to add on completely replacing the entire global agricultural economy and infrastructure? It is absurd on its face. Perhaps the technology he describes can help on the margins to replace some intensive ag w relatively low impact calories from microbial fermentation, but I cannot imagine how we can displace a meaningful amount of humanity's caloric needs in this way.

TerryM

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1885 on: January 09, 2020, 08:32:40 PM »
^^
Ramen!
When robots are growing our food in petri dishes, what happens when the grid goes down?


On the other hand think of all of the factories that will arise on formerly cultivated land. GF n won't be restricted to deserts, swamps and forests. We can paint them with neon green glow in the dark coatings and have our EV'S take us past them on Sunday outings, deferentially dimming their headlamps while passing each gigantic structure.


Our children will applaud our prescience in adapting these amazing technological miracles.


Or not
Terry

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1886 on: January 09, 2020, 09:58:42 PM »

TerryM

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1887 on: January 10, 2020, 12:11:23 AM »
Solar foods “factory” is producing one kilogram of flour per day. Way to start a revolution.

https://www.foodnavigator.com/Article/2019/07/15/Solar-Foods-makes-protein-out-of-thin-air-This-is-the-most-environmentally-friendly-food-there-is#


If they ramp up production before getting the flavor thing figured out, perhaps they could sell it as Green Pig Supplement/Slop & I could become a Vegan, once removed. :D
Terry

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1888 on: January 10, 2020, 02:37:52 AM »
For some of us our culture and our food preferences are intertwined. I cook from the same cookbook my grandmother used. I still make the same cookies for the holiday season that we have made in our family for generations. I just can’t imagine a takeover by fake food but I can see where it may compete at the lower end of the protein market. It will put pressure on farmers, mostly small farmers already operating on small to nonexistent margins. The trend to industrialized agriculture will continue apace with peas where wheat used to be planted. Big equipment and diesel tractors turning fossil fuel into protein.

 
 
 

dnem

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1889 on: January 10, 2020, 12:55:40 PM »
For almost ALL of us, food is deeply entwined with our culture! Very disappointed in Monbiot. I get the general point that intensive ag is chewing up way too much land across the globe and that all else equal UNintensive ag has the potential to take even more land out of wild lands, but factory food paste as humanity's salvation. Yeah, no.

greylib

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1890 on: January 10, 2020, 01:28:34 PM »
If the process scales up successfully, it could make a great difference to the world - probably not quickly, but long-term.

If it can then be scaled DOWN, so that a family-sized unit can be produced, it could reduce malnutrition problems everywhere. As well as being pretty useful for a lunar colony!
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Tor Bejnar

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1891 on: January 10, 2020, 02:44:23 PM »
From the Solar Foods article, they say they are
Quote
using a proprietary organism, carbon dioxide (CO2), water, and renewable electricity, to manufacture a high-protein ingredient.
[emphasis added]
Where I come from, using an "organism" means they are farming - factory farming, perhaps, but farming nonetheless.

I'm fond of Quorn products which use a mycoprotein and a factory to generate useful food. [From Wikipedia:  "Mycoprotein is a form of single-cell protein, also known as fungal protein, that is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as "Protein derived from fungi, especially as produced for human consumption." "Myco" is from the Greek word for "fungus"."]
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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1892 on: January 11, 2020, 01:10:20 PM »
Yeah Quorn rocks.  :)

Plant physiology: One size may not suit all

Summary:
A new study demonstrates that there are no simple or universal solutions to the problem of engineering plants to enable them to cope with the challenges posed by climate change

...

plants have developed sophisticated cellular mechanisms that protect them against the deleterious effects of high light intensities on photosynthesis. In one such photoprotective process, the excess light energy is dissipated as heat before it can damage the photosynthetic apparatus. This depresses yields but it is very much in the plant's interest.

Three enzymes play a key role in this adaptation process, which are referred to as V, P and Z for short. In a paper published in 2016, which drew a great deal of attention, an American research group overexpressed the genes for these three proteins in tobacco plants, thus increasing the amounts of the enzymes produced in the leaves. They subsequently observed, under field conditions, that these 'VPZ' lines grew faster rates than did control plants with normal levels of the enzymes. LMU biologists Antoni Garcia-Molina and Dario Leister have now performed essentially the same experiment in the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana (thale cress). Their findings appear in the journal Nature Plants.

Their results confirm that, as in the case of tobacco, higher levels of V, P and Z reduce rates of photosynthesis while enabling the plants to adapt more rapidly (in fact, even faster than tobacco) to fluctuating light levels. Crucially however, the Arabidopsis VPZ lines did not grow faster than control plants. On the contrary, overexpression of the three enzymes resulted in retarded growth. "This clearly shows that it's not quite as easy to produce plants that are better adapted as some research groups have confidently suggested," Leister remarks. "In fact, higher levels of photoprotection may actually interfere with the operation of other mechanisms that are important for plant growth."

...

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/01/200110104431.htm
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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1893 on: January 11, 2020, 04:25:29 PM »
For almost ALL of us, food is deeply entwined with our culture! Very disappointed in Monbiot. I get the general point that intensive ag is chewing up way too much land across the globe and that all else equal UNintensive ag has the potential to take even more land out of wild lands, but factory food paste as humanity's salvation. Yeah, no.

Soylent Green is people!!!!

jai mitchell

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1894 on: January 15, 2020, 04:40:57 AM »
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/eye-of-the-storm/newly-identified-jet-stream-pattern-could-imperil-global-food-supplies/

Newly Identified Jet-Stream Pattern Could Imperil Global Food Supplies

A new study finds a 20-fold increase in the risk of simultaneous heat waves in major crop-producing regions when the pattern is in place

By Jeff Masters on December 9, 2019

Quote
A just-published December 9 follow-up study, Amplified Rossby waves enhance risk of concurrent heatwaves in major breadbasket regions--also led by Dr. Kornhuber--found that stuck jet stream patterns like seen in 2018 are prone to bringing simultaneous heat waves and associated drought conditions to multiple important grain-producing regions of the world. The authors wrote that these stuck jet stream patterns can cause “reductions of 4% in crop production in the affected regions, with regional decreases up to 11%. Given the importance of these regions for global food production, the identified teleconnections have the potential to fuel multiple harvest failures posing risks to global food security.” (A teleconnection is a causal connection or correlation between meteorological phenomena which occur a long distance apart).

In a press release that accompanied the most recent paper, Dr. Kornhuber said, “We found a 20-fold increase in the risk of simultaneous heat waves in major crop-producing regions when these global-scale wind patterns are in place. Until now, this was an underexplored vulnerability in the food system. During these events there actually is a global structure in the otherwise quite chaotic circulation. The bell can ring in multiple regions at once.”




Figure 1. Average crop production from 2003-2007 (in colors) for the major commodity crops maize (corn), wheat, soybean, and rice in units of kcal (based on data from Ray et al., 2012). Areas affected by heat waves and their associated droughts during stuck jet stream patterns of wave-5 (shown in brown-bordered regions) and during wave-7 (red-bordered regions) are also shown. Affected areas include the major breadbaskets in central North America, plus Western and Eastern Europe. The regions affected by wave-5 and 7 account for about a quarter of global food production. The U.S., France and Russia produce 42% of the world’s wheat; for maize, the U.S. and France alone produce 57% of the total. Credit: Kornhuber et al., 2019, Amplified Rossby waves enhance risk of concurrent heatwaves in major breadbasket regions, Nature Climate Change
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jai mitchell

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1895 on: January 15, 2020, 07:35:46 AM »
This thread has many references and is very good.  https://twitter.com/ClimateBen/status/1205577540531838977
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vox_mundi

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1896 on: January 17, 2020, 06:44:17 PM »
UN Warns Hunger Crisis in Southern Africa 'On Scale We've Not Seen Before'
https://www.dw.com/en/un-warns-hunger-crisis-in-southern-africa-on-scale-weve-not-seen-before/a-52029274

An unprecedented number of people in 16 countries across southern Africa are gravely food insecure as climate change wreaks havoc on the region, the UN's World Food Program (WFP) warned on Thursday.

"This hunger crisis is on a scale we've not seen before and the evidence shows it's going to get worse," the WFP's Regional Director for Southern Africa, Lola Castro, said in a statement.

The crisis is impacting 45 million people — many of whom are women and children. The region has been hit hard by repeated droughts, widespread flooding and economic hardship.

Eswatini, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe are among the hardest-hit.

Many families across the region are already skipping meals, taking children out of school and falling into debt to stave off agricultural losses, the WFP said.

... "The annual cyclone season has begun and we simply cannot afford a repeat of the devastation caused by last year's unprecedented storms," Castro said.

Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi are still reeling from the widespread devastation caused by Cyclone Idai in 2019.

According to the UN, nearly half of Zimbabwe's 15 million inhabitants are living in a state of chronic food security.

An estimated 20% of the population are facing a food crisis in drought-hit Lesotho and Zambia, long considered the region's breadbasket.

--------------------------------------------

Locusts Swarm Into Kenya as UN Warns of 'Extreme Danger' to Food Supply
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2020/jan/17/locusts-swarm-into-kenya-as-un-warns-of-extreme-danger-to-food-supply

The UN has warned of a “significant and extremely dangerous” escalation in the number of desert locusts descending on Kenya, as the government strives to contain the threat before it reaches the country’s food-producing regions.

The tropical grasshoppers have been wreaking havoc on Kenya’s neighbours to the north and east, devouring tens of thousands of hectares of crops in Ethiopia and Somalia since last June.

Swarms crossed over into north-east Kenya on 28 December. In a statement released on Monday, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) predicted that their “potential spread” could include the breadbasket counties of central Kenya.

If it does, the insects could destroy crucial parts of the country’s food supply, at a time when food insecurity is already on the rise owing to droughts and floods last year.

Each square kilometre of locusts in a swarm can eat as much in a day as 35,000 people, according to the FAO. One locust swarm seen in Kenya measured 2,400 sq km.



Locust plagues occur intermittently in the Horn of Africa, but this invasion is the worst in 25 years, according to the FAO. Originating at the India-Pakistan border, the insects migrated into Somalia and Ethiopia and destroyed nearly 71,000 hectares of farmland in the two countries.
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vox_mundi

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1897 on: January 17, 2020, 07:24:43 PM »
Soybean Oil Implicated in Metabolic Disease and Genetic Changes in the Brain
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2020-01-america-widely-consumed-oil-genetic.html

New UC Riverside research shows soybean oil not only leads to obesity and diabetes, but could also affect neurological conditions like autism, Alzheimer's disease, anxiety, and depression.

Used for fast food frying, added to packaged foods, and fed to livestock, soybean oil is by far the most widely produced and consumed edible oil in the U.S., according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. In all likelihood, it is not healthy for humans.

It certainly is not good for mice. The new study, published this month in the journal Endocrinology, compared mice fed three different diets high in fat: soybean oil, soybean oil modified to be low in linoleic acid, and coconut oil.

The same UCR research team found in 2015 that soybean oil induces obesity, diabetes, insulin resistance, and fatty liver in mice. In the study released this month, the scientists found pronounced effects of the oil on the hypothalamus, where a number of critical processes take place.

"The hypothalamus regulates body weight via your metabolism, maintains body temperature, is critical for reproduction and physical growth as well as your response to stress," said Margarita Curras-Collazo, a UCR associate professor of neuroscience and lead author on the study.

The research team discovered roughly 100 other genes also affected by the soybean oil diet. They believe this discovery could have ramifications not just for energy metabolism, but also for proper brain function and diseases such as autism or Parkinson's disease. However, it is important to note there is no proof the oil causes these diseases.

Additionally, the team notes the findings only apply to soybean oil—not to other soy products or to other vegetable oils.

Poonamjot Deol et al, Dysregulation of Hypothalamic Gene Expression and the Oxytocinergic System by Soybean Oil Diets in Male Mice, Endocrinology (2020)
https://academic.oup.com/endo/advance-article/doi/10.1210/endocr/bqz044/5698148
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Sigmetnow

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1898 on: January 17, 2020, 08:56:28 PM »
UN Warns Hunger Crisis in Southern Africa 'On Scale We've Not Seen Before'

Locusts Swarm Into Kenya as UN Warns of 'Extreme Danger' to Food Supply

Locust plagues occur intermittently in the Horn of Africa, but this invasion is the worst in 25 years, according to the FAO. Originating at the India-Pakistan border, the insects migrated into Somalia and Ethiopia and destroyed nearly 71,000 hectares of farmland in the two countries.

Clearly, one answer is: learn to cook and eat locusts.
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Sigmetnow

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Re: Climate change, the ocean, agriculture, and FOOD
« Reply #1899 on: January 17, 2020, 08:57:37 PM »
"The less technical term is: It's a s***-ton of energy," he said - and it's already having a huge impacting the environment.

The Ocean Is Warming at a Rate of 5 Atom Bombs Per Second, Scientists Warn
https://www.physics-astronomy.org/2020/01/the-ocean-is-warming-at-rate-of-5-atom.html


Ocean temperatures hit record high as rate of heating accelerates
Oceans are clearest measure of climate crisis as they absorb 90% of heat trapped by greenhouse gases
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jan/13/ocean-temperatures-hit-record-high-as-rate-of-heating-accelerates
People who say it cannot be done should not interrupt those who are doing it.