What’s Ahead: Food the new oil, clean water the new gold; Americans need to prepare for extreme weather patterns

(Oct 13) One of the world’s leading environmentalists issued a warning that the global food supply system could collapse at any point, leaving hundreds of millions more people hungry, sparking widespread riots and bringing down governments.

“We are beginning a new chapter. We will see food unrest in many more places. Armed aggression is no longer the principal threat to our future. The overriding threats to this century are climate change, population growth, spreading water shortages and rising food prices.”

Record heatwaves and droughts in the US and other major food-exporting countries had hit harvests badly and could trigger a major hunger crisis in 2013 because world grain reserves are so dangerously low – the lowest level since 1974.

In the last 10 years prices have doubled as demand for food has increased with a rapidly growing world population and millions have switched to animal-based diets, which require more grain and land. UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) say it’s unlikely the prices will normalize anytime soon. Even if things do not boil over this year, by next summer many more will be exposed to the effects of anything that hurts production.

“An unprecedented period of world food security has come to an end. The world has lost its safety cushions and is living from year to year. This is the new politics of food scarcity. We are moving into a new food era, one in which it is every country for itself.”

The ever greater number of weather-related crises suggests strongly that climate change is beginning to bite and that the heatwaves, droughts and excessive rainfall around the world in the last few years have not been a blip, but a new reality. Every 1C above the optimum in the growing season equates to roughly a 10% decline in grain yields. Simply put, rising earth’s temperature is devastating food supplies.

Sources: The Guardian_1, The Guardian_2

What about water scarcity? Water resources are being depleted at record rates and yet not a single country has mobilized to reduce water use.

Persistent Droughts Plaguing Much of the World; Water Shortages Could Cause Wars

Revelation 6:5-8 (HCSB) The Third Seal 5 When He opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, “Come!”And I looked, and there was a black horse. The horseman on it had a set of scales in his hand. 6 Then I heard something like a voice among the four living creatures say, “A quart of wheat for a denarius, and three quarts of barley for a denarius—but do not harm the olive oil and the wine.”

A whole day’s work for a little wheat or barley? It may be difficult for us to imagine food being so expensive in the near future but that’s also what the expert is predicting. We’ve warned about these things for a few years now.

“Food will become more valuable than oil. Climate change is about to become dramatic as the polar ice is being melted… the World Food Bank is almost depleted, and there will be no relief in re-building the needed staples. The worst is yet to come, and is non-preventable by man; the most this dying generation can do is to ration what little will be available.  Food and sanitary water will become more valuable than gold or silver and will be reserved for those of the elite evil class.”

Ezekiel 7:19 “They will throw their silver into the streets, and their gold will seem like something filthy. Their silver and gold will be unable to save them in the day of the LORD’s wrath. They will not satisfy their appetites or fill their stomachs, for these were the stumbling blocks that brought about their iniquity.” 

We’re used to thinking that the rich aren’t like the regular folks because they are recession-proof. Can you imagine there will come a time when the rich will find a pound of gold not worth an ounce of bread?

“Give me neither poverty nor wealth; feed me with the food I need.”

Isaiah 5:10 “For a ten-acre vineyard will yield only six gallons, and 10 bushels of seed will yield only [one] bushel.” 

We used to say “there will be the time when…” and that time has come – less produce is forthcoming from the earth; massive crop failures will soon lead to starvation and contaminated fresh water will cause diseases to become rampant.  In the nations that are already starving, millions will perish.Famine is a reality for millions, and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that 800 million people go hungry each day, and malnutrition in children contributes to over half of child deaths.

(Oct 11) As climate change continues to “load the dice” and increase the frequency of heat waves, drought and wildfires across our country, Americans need to prepare and plan for these extreme weather patterns. Yesterday, NRDC and National Wildfire Federation called on the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to mandate states to consider climate change when they create their natural disaster mitigation plans.

In 2011, America experienced 14 disastrous weather events that created over a billion dollars in damages each—an all-time record. Taken together, extreme events cost our country at least $55 billion in 2011. This year has delivered another round of extreme events, from record-breaking heat waves to freak storms and devastating wildfires. The cost of the drought alone could rise to $77 billion. (Source)

The climate is in a state of flux – it is no longer reliable and there is no normal anymore. And the situation is not temporary. Many who laugh and scoff at end times prophecies keep saying that the world will go on – one generation passing over and another taking its place. Well, what kind of world would that be? It will be one plagued by food and water crises along with worsening weather -climate change is increasing the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events like drought, heat waves, downpours, and intense storms. 

Members of the elite class know the future is bleak – they have come to realize Mother nature is going to continue to take an heavy toll upon mankind and this planet. Resources are limited and population growth is out of control – the world’s population is already 7 billion plus!  They know that a breakdown is inevitable and they have plans – population control is one of them. In other words, this world will continue its legacy of centuries of conflict and exploitation as it descends into chaos and become an environmental wasteland. That is why many will welcome the anti-Christ, hoping he will bring solutions to the world’s most intractable problems. He gives them hope that humanity will come together, save the planet and build a unified society of peace and harmony.

More @ http://endtimesrevelations.wordpress.com/2012/10/20/whats-ahead-food-the-new-oil-clean-water-the-new-gold-americans-need-to-prepare-for-extreme-weather-patterns/

The Video Monsanto Does NOT Want You to See!

What is a GMO, and how do GMOs effect you and your family? 

The same corporations that said DDT and Agent Orange were safe have now put millions of dollars into the campaign against our right to know what's in our food. In November, Californians will vote on the most important issue to ever effect our food supply. As Goes California, So Goes the Nation. 

Global Food Reserves Have Reached Their Lowest Level In Almost 40 Years

Michael Snyder, Contributor
Activist Post

For six of the last eleven years the world has consumed more food than it has produced.  This year, drought in the United States and elsewhere has put even more pressure on global food supplies than usual.

As a result, global food reserves have reached their lowest level in almost 40 years.

Experts are warning that if next summer is similar to this summer that it could be enough to trigger a major global food crisis.  At this point, the world is literally living from one year to the next.  There is simply not much of a buffer left.

In the Western world, the first place where we are going to notice the impact of this crisis is in the price of food.  It is being projected that overall food prices will rise between 5 and 20 percent by the end of this year.  It is becoming increasingly clear that the world has reached a tipping point.  We aren't producing enough food for everyone anymore, and food reserves will continue to get lower and lower.  Eventually they will be totally gone.

The United Nations has issued an unprecedented warning about the state of global food supplies.

According to the UN, global food reserves have not been this low since 1974...

World grain reserves are so dangerously low that severe weather in the United States or other food-exporting countries could trigger a major hunger crisis next year, the United Nations has warned.

Failing harvests in the US, Ukraine and other countries this year have eroded reserves to their lowest level since 1974. The US, which has experienced record heatwaves and droughts in 2012, now holds in reserve a historically low 6.5% of the maize that it expects to consume in the next year, says the UN.

'We've not been producing as much as we are consuming. That is why stocks are being run down. Supplies are now very tight across the world and reserves are at a very low level, leaving no room for unexpected events next year,' said Abdolreza Abbassian, a senior economist with the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).

But the population of the globe is much larger than it was back in 1974.  So needless to say, we have a major league problem on our hands.

The United States exports more food than anyone else in the world, and so the devastating drought that the U.S. experienced this summer is putting a lot of stress on the entire global food system.

According to Reuters, the drought hit U.S. ranchers particularly hard. Many of them had to kill off large portions of their herds because they couldn't afford to feed them any longer.

So there was a short-term surge in the supply of meat, but because herds are smaller now in the long-term the supply of meat is going to become much tighter.

So expect meat prices to start to go up significantly...

The worst drought to hit U.S. cropland in more than half a century could soon leave Americans reaching deeper into their pockets to fund a luxury that people in few other countries enjoy: affordable meat.

Drought-decimated fields have pushed grain prices sky high, and the rising feed costs have prompted some livestock producers to liquidate their herds. This is expected to shrink the long-term U.S. supply of meat and force up prices at the meat counter.

Some analysts are already projecting "a world shortage of pork and bacon" according to the Los Angeles Times...

The price of corn — a key component in livestock feed and an ingredient in powdered sugar, salad dressing, soda and more — catapulted 60% in early summer. A British trade group recently predicted "a world shortage of pork and bacon next year," which most analysts interpreted to mean that higher prices are ahead.

In the meantime, chickens and turkeys are getting more expensive just in time for the holidays. Already, chicken prices are up 5.3% from a year earlier, while the cost of turkey and other poultry is up 6.9%. Eggs cost 18% more in September than they did a year earlier.

Sadly, the truth is that food prices have already been steadily rising in the United States in recent years.  We have come to accept this as "normal", but these horrible price increases are really squeezing the budgets of middle class families and we certainly don't need food prices to start going up even faster.

One man recently came across a grocery receipt that was eight years old.  When he compared those prices to what he is paying now he was absolutely stunned...

1 can Campbells Vegetable soup was listed as $0.89
We now pay $2.19 for the same can.

Fresh Haddock Fillets were $3.99lb. Now $7.99lb.

4 litres of Skim Milk was $4.59...now $7.59.

1 loaf of whole wheat bread was $.99...now $2.99.

Fresh Green Pepper was $1.99lb...now $3.99lb.

Canned tomato juice was $0.99 a can...now $2.29 a can.

Many prices had doubled on him in just eight years.

Now that food prices are projected to start rising even more rapidly, how soon will it be until food prices double again?

Many Americans will be shocked by rising food prices, but at least for now we won't have to deal with actual food shortages like many on the other side of the globe will be soon.

At the end of August, the World Bank issued a global hunger warning...

'Food prices rose again sharply threatening the health and well-being of millions of people,' said World Bank group president, Jim Yong Kim. 'Africa and the Middle East are particularly vulnerable, but so are people in other countries where the prices of grains have gone up abruptly.'

The bank said food prices overall rose by 10% between June and July to leave them 6% up on a year earlier. 'We cannot allow these historic price hikes to turn into a lifetime of perils as families take their children out of school and eat less nutritious food to compensate for the high prices,' said Kim.

The price of food can mean the difference between life and death in some of the poorest areas of Africa.  What some African families face on a daily basis would be absolutely unimaginable to many of us in the Western world.  The following example is from a recent article in the Guardian...

On the other side of the world, Mary Banda, who lives in Mphaka village near Nambuma in Malawi, has had a year during which she has barely been able to feed her children, one of whom has just gone to hospital with malnutrition.

Government health worker Patrick Kamzitu says: 'We are seeing more hunger among children. The price of maize has doubled in the last year. Families used to have one or two meals a day; now they are finding it hard to have one.'

How would you feel if you only got one meal per day?

In many parts of India and in many parts of Africa more than 40 percent of all children have stunted growth due to malnutrition and a lack of clean water.

So if your family has enough to eat and drink every day you should be thankful for your blessings.
What makes things even worse is that the big banks have turned betting on the price of food into a giant casino game.

Many are making huge amounts of money through commodity speculation, but by driving up prices they are severely hurting millions of families on the other side of the planet.  The following is from a recent article by Heather Stewart...

The Institute of International Finance has estimated that by the middle of last year, $450bn of financial assets was invested in commodities – or derivatives, betting on future price movements.

In principle, there would be nothing wrong with financiers moving into the food market if it directed billions of dollars of investment towards expanding production, bringing new land into cultivation and developing new technologies to boost yields.

But – as the thoroughly mad market for mortgage-backed securities in the run-up to the credit crisis, and the resulting building boom across the US, illustrated very clearly – the price signals emerging from the stampeding herds of Wall street can be deeply misleading.

In a recent paper, provocatively titled 'Don't Blame the Physical Markets,' the UN's trade and development arm, Unctad, argued that the wall of money flooding into commodities has badly distorted the price signals a well-functioning market should send to producers and consumers.

The era of seemingly endless cheap food has come to an end.  In future years, there simply will not be enough food for everyone on the globe.  Some people are going to go hungry.  That is one reason why I am encouraging everyone to start preparing for the coming global food crisis.

Some experts are projecting the worst for the years ahead...

Evan Fraser, author of Empires of Food and a geography lecturer at Guelph University in Ontario, Canada, says: 'For six of the last 11 years the world has consumed more food than it has grown. We do not have any buffer and are running down reserves. Our stocks are very low and if we have a dry winter and a poor rice harvest we could see a major food crisis across the board.'

'Even if things do not boil over this year, by next summer we'll have used up this buffer and consumers in the poorer parts of the world will once again be exposed to the effects of anything that hurts production.'

Let us certainly hope for the best, but let us also prepare as if the absolute worst is headed our way.

I am busy preparing.

Are you?

This article first appeared here at The Truth.  Michael Snyder is a writer, speaker and activist who writes and edits his own blogs The American Dream and Economic Collapse Blog. Follow him onTwitter here.