The Global Food Economy: Peak Food, Social Unrest, And Bailed-Out Credit-Junkies

Beginning with Malthus' warning to the world and the Great Irish famine, David McWilliams (of Punk Economics) provides his typically succinct, profoundly fascinating, and graphically pleasing insights on the state of the global food economy. "What happens when hungry people panic?" is the question McWilliams poses; "they move to other parts of the world," he rhetorically answers, adding that this could well be the story of the next 50 years on Earth as the rock of the insatiable demand of seven billion (soon-to-be-ten-billion) people smashes into the hard place of the planet's limited resources to produce that one thing that keeps us all alive - food. The food dilemma is more complex though as it is really an energy dilemma - one that is not going away (on the downside). On the bright side, Malthus' nightmare has yet to occur thanks to the ingenuity of humans. However, if all the world's seven billion people consumer as much as the average American, it would require the resources of over five planet Earths to sustainably support all of us. So either the rest-of-the-world eats less to allow Americans to eat more or we are stuck! But it's not just how much we eat, but what we eat...

In fact the change in diet of the Chinese and Indian and Brazilian populations is one of the biggest undocumented stories of globalization - driving up food prices dramatically and punishing the poorer nations (not to mention the inexorable currency devaluations that Central Bankers are slooshing unintendedly to these nations capital markets)

Furthermore, McWilliams rightly ties social unrest to these dramatic food price rises... must watch!

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