Friday, March 07, 2008

The pending food crisis.....

..... is much more of an immediate problem than climate change, according to the government's new chief scientist, Professor John Beddington, as reported in The Guardian.

"price rises in staples such as rice, maize and wheat would continue because of increased demand caused by population growth and increasing wealth in developing nations. He also said that climate change would lead to pressure on food supplies because of decreased rainfall in many areas and crop failures related to climate."

"Some of the biofuels are hopeless. The idea that you cut down rainforest to actually grow biofuels seems profoundly stupid." Quite!

"Global grain stores are currently at the lowest levels ever, just 40 days from running out."

Rapidly rising prices, all those extra mouths to feed and insufficient land and water. Things aren't looking too promising. Maybe it really is time to start tackling the issue that dare not speak its name?

2 comments:

Emma said...

You do, of course, refer to the critical issue of making aviation fuel out of bio-crops, I presume?

Dave said...

No, don't be silly. Plastic bags of course!