Africa alone could feed the world

Source: New Scientist

DOOM-MONGERS have got it wrong - there is enough space in the world to produce the extra food needed to feed a growing population. And contrary to expectation, most of it can be grown in Africa, say two international reports published this week.

The first, projecting 10 years into the future from last year's food crisis, which saw the price of food soar, says that there is plenty of unused, fertile land available to grow more crops.

"Some 1.6 billion hectares could be added to the current 1.4 billion hectares of crop land , and over half of the additionally available land is found in Africa and Latin America," concludes the report, compiled by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

If further evidence were needed, it comes in a second report, launched jointly by the FAO and the World Bank. It concludes that 400 million hectares, straddling 25 African countries, are suitable for farming.

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Read more: http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20227143.100-africa-alone-could-feed-the-world.html

and I suppose donkey carts and sailing ships will speed it to world markets?

Or 'outsourced corporate labor resources'.

I wonder.... ???

Multi-national corporations can't make money on rain forests.

Try Google-earth before you pull my heart -strings..

.....Boswana produces most of the beef eaten in Europe today...on and on...

We must think of solutions,,,and not whine "oh Corp will ruin me anyway ,, so count me out...."where's the remote and my BUD...?"

it ain't pretty. Like it or not, we need them for oxygen and weather control. We're flirting with disaster...in ways we can't even imagine.

Either way, the native species lose. Predators will be exterminated, and anything that competes for grass with the cattle would be killed, just as we did on the US Great Plains.

and people usually come down on the side of people.

Yet we keep breeding and breeding, and the planet keeps getting cut up, burned down, and torn apart.

Just rocketing closer and closer to Soylent Green.....

probably some type of virulent disease or plague that will wipe out a fair chunk of humanity...and then the process will resume.
people enjoy reproducing.

supposedly arable land where they are experiencing drought now or is it in the jungle or savannahs? Are they proposing to farm more Rwandan gorilla habitat or Kenyan game parks?

They hint that much current farmland is marginally used, and that's certainly the case in Zimbabwe and a some other areas, but it looks like they might be talking just as much about expanding monoculture and turning Africa into Nebraska.

Monsanto's goons will have to be kept in check though.

Zimbabwe used to produce a lot of food for its neighbors...look at it now.

All that productive farmland has been liberated from the colonial oppressors and their treacherous indigenous collaborators and has been redistributed to those who have earned it though their faithful service to glorious leader Robert Mugabe.

As any doomer will willingly concede: SPACE IS NOT AN ISSUE. Nobody ever claimed that we are heading down the drain because there isn't enough SPACE.

This reminds me of the RW arguments I read on other websites concerning population. I always draw answers like: But the total population of the world would fit in the state of new jersey if they all stood next to each other. So clearly, there is enough SPACE for 700 billion human beings.

I think this article, promising as it is, really doesn't get the gist of the arguments of the people who are concerned with the sustainability of our food production.

This could be a future Republican talking point.

infrastructure to distribute the food, according to the world aid agencies.

Of course, the fighting in various areas does not help any.

dictators for life ruling much of the continent.

The price of which can fluctuate on the global market dramatically, depending on how many producers there are or how successful the harvest is in any given year. This can leave them with not enough money to buy enough food which they were previously able to grow on their own, and reliant on foreign aid.

This goes for the ones not suffering from things like war, or from natural disasters.

vein as the Mafia "convinces" people that it's in their best interest to fork over the cash for "protection".

Convinced by our clandestine military actions. Convinced by World Bank manipulations. Convinced by AID intervention.

I have a friend whose friend's son is a U.S. Army Ranger who is stationed in Africa. He told his dad that he would never tell him what he DOES over there because it would freak him totally out. So I doubt he's doing medical assistance projects with the indigenous peeps.

Natives are driven off the forests and fertil lands. This land is given to rich farmers who send the food to europe while the locals starve. Why do you think the UK is pissed with mugabe. Because of human rights? No, because zimbabwe used to be the granary of the UK.

Mugabe has taken the land from farmers, black and white and has given it to ZANU-PF morons who thought they could cash-in by renting it back to the farmers they evicted. And today Zimbabwe isn't even its own granary.

The real land travesty in Africa is huge parcels of excellent land that are wasted as game reserves where wealthy tourists chase drugged animals with assault rifles in land rovers.

why do we need Savo etc. Lets kill off all of those pesky animals and turn their environment into wheat fields. OBTW. those animals are not hunted with "assault rifles". Those gun calibers are to enemic for large game. Bolt action high power rifles are what is used to hunt those animals.

and yeah, they hunt them with assault rifles - if the animal is lucky the game warden will finish the job once the "hunters" are bored.

are hunting elephants with .223 or 7.63x39 ammunition.

to hire workers.

Most are still clearing fields with a machete and hand axe and planting fields with a hoe.

Extremely exhausting work with very small yeilds. Enough to feed the family and make a few bucks to buy other necessities.

monopolies are bad, wait until you deal with food monopolies.

Wonder how further global warming will affect the ability to sustain agriculture in Africa, though.

The ignorance of our arrogance is destroying this planet.

The question needed to be ask is, "Why do we think we are so special at the expense of every thing else?"

That's where the entirety of the spiritual and pop self help gurus all need to turn.

It's all about humans. Dominionist mentality.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominionism

.
.
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But we are doing pretty good on the multiplying and subduing part

thanks for your words

is life worth living on a soilent green planet? I don't think so. ZPG is the only way, imho.

because so many people feel that their god created us in his image, and gave us dominion over the planet.

and for others, it's just part of life at the top of the food chain.

Its being worked on...

...we need less population, not more.


Sorry to seem callous, but anytime you introduce more food to a population, it grows. Less food, the population shrinks. This is true for any species. Some people will always be starving, no matter how much food there is. Less food = less fucking = fewer people. I guess it also = less profit. Too bad!

problem is, the numbers of those that are fed breed the cycle of hunger in less then a generation tripling the number of starving the next time the food aid drives start up. Feed those in the most need increases their dependence.

feed a man a fish, he eats for a day and eventually, the hand that feeds him will be biten off and wonder why it happened.


callous is the reality of the situation.

Give a man a corporation and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to make a corporation and you'll have partner to exploit his brother and sisters

Oh wait, no they don't despite the fact most of them are well fed.
If people know that their children will probably live to adulthood, they are less likely to have many of them if they have a choice by having access to reliable birth control.

Population growth is highest where people are hungry.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_territories_by_fertility_rate



Population growth rate is declining. Global population will level off around 10 billion.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_population

will be at the rate we are expanding our population and DEVELOPING the world.

My friends ask me why I don't wash my car (except maybe twice a year), or flush the toilet when I only urinate, or drink bottled water. They tell me that the drought is over.

When I tell them that the water table is not even half recharged and that our underground water is not only being depleted but polluted with industrial chemicals, all I get is a blank stare. Like I'm the one who's crazy.

But you are right, bhikkhu. In the near future, water will be THE issue in a lot of places.

and try to help them with their illnesses like AIDS. There is plenty of wealth and farmland and business opportunity in Africa... if the governments would allow those things to benefit the average citizen.

We should be able to locally sustain our populations.

I weep for the people and animals of Africa. If big agriculture has their land and resources in its sites, they will suffer even more then they do now...

The planet is one large living organism. Biodiversity loss affects us all, like it or not. And, as unpopular as the idea is, we should be aiming for zero population growth. Families like the Duggars shouldn't be celebrated when so many still go hungry.

ZPG means zero population growth, not murder. Replace yourself, don't breed like a rabbit. Greed, thoughtlessness and selfish actions hurt all.

I read it on DU in the last couple of weeks that large agricultural companies are buying farmland in Africa and elsewhere. If I find the link I'll post it.

http://www.globalchange.umich.edu/globalchange2/current/lectures/freshwater_supply/freshwater.html

Note aways in there where it's explained that humans currently appropriate 54% of the planet's available fresh water. The whole thrust and purpose of the brain-dead OP is that we don't need to worry about population because we can grow so much more food; even the thrust of the article I linked to is that we don't need to worry about population, there are ways to increase efficiency...

even with modern farming tech, people still go without.

What is the first thing that has to be fixed before even thinking about Africa being the bread basket of the world? WATER. Something that Africa lacks and that people need desperately.

So, before we even consider the possibility we need to solve their lack of fresh water issue. How can we do that? Well, I for on think that the African coast should be populated with water desalinization facilities. Not only would it create work for several million people, but it would practically end the water crisis in Africa.

Once the water crisis is fixed, we then can begin to expand the farming possibilities with conservation of forest in mind. Instead of chopping down millions of hectors of rain forest and decimating the animal habitat in the process, the coast and a few mile inland would be able enough for the farm expansion in Africa.

The farming would also create jobs and with fresh water made available to millions, the entire African landscape would change; environmentally, socially and economically.

And Peak Oil prices diesel fuel and fertilizer out of the pocket of the average African farmer.

Dust Bowl: Part Two on the African continent, only with AK's and warlords thrown in.

buckminster fuller said similar things years ago

it is not too many people or too little space or food

it is poor resource management

fascist want Malthus to be right

it justifies the slaughter and war they profit from

but Malthus was a moron

If Africa could revert back to farming sweet potatoes and native tubers, they could certainly feed themselves. All it takes is peace, and allowing women to go about their traditional farming. But mankind somehow manages to screw up what Mother Earth provides for us.

They are sending specialists and investment capital to improve African crops.

http://www.ocnus.net/artman2/publish/Africa_8/Food_Security_in_Africa_China_s_New_Rice_Bowl.shtml

China seems to be investing extremely heavily in Africa. I can't blame them. Africa has cheap labor, tons of natural resources and fertile ground for crops. Hopefully poverty levels will go down there because of all the investments. But there is a risk that shortcuts will be taken and health and environment will suffer because of it.

We have obliterated the planet, yet they want more of us to fuck the Earth even worse.

Sure, the whole fucking planet will be one great big crop. I'm fucking sure that the fertilizer, crop dusting, insecticides, herbicides, and other shit neeeded is going to be great, too.

Just come out of the denial. There are too many of us. Come to terms with it as a good thing.

:toast:

That doesn't change the fact that there are too many people already!

Overpopulation - it's the starving elephant in the room.