Re, report from Institute of Mechanical Engineers, summary and download here.
1. I mean, it's a terrible shame that it is wasted (or that people waste all that time and energy growing food which is wasted, they could be relaxing instead), but that puts paid to the myth that there is not enough land left to grow food on to feed us all. The problem is storage, transport, the distorting effect of subsidies*, warfare, and to be fair, the fact that Western consumers are incredibly fussy about the shape of vegetables they buy (most of which are going to be chopped up small anyway).
2. If the IME's lower estimate of 30% being wasted is correct, and assuming that the starving millions (whose problems are mainly caused by warfare and land grabbing, separate issues) could easily be fed from the food that is bought but not eaten in the fussy West, then that means feeding a global population of ten billion won't be a big problem. With a bit of luck, by the time we've got that far, the "wealth effect" which reduces the birth rate will cancel out population growth in those areas where the population is still growing (where, exactly?) and that's the end of that.
3. I have a sneaking suspicion that the IME originally wanted to talk up their own game a bit by explaining that if only there was more engineering involved in agriculture (irrigation, storage, transport etc) that less food would be lost between field and table, but then the authors realised that there are loads of other types of waste as well.
4. A reader's letter in today's Metro reminded us that Indian agriculture is in the same mess as anywhere else, with just as much waste, see e.g. here. Compared to that, the Western farming-agriculture system (the biggest Socialist experiment outside the military-industrial bloc) is hyper-efficient.
Friday, 11 January 2013
Excellent news: Fifty per cent of food grown is wasted
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8 comments:
Yup!
Lots of lefties wringing their hands about people buying too much then throwing it away. They also moan when people buy too much then eat it.
If the Indians (and others) allowed Tesco and Walmart in their supply chains would be revolutionised and there might be fewer riots about the price of onions.
Why doesn't Europe put its funny-shaped veg into tins and every time there's a famine somewhere we could send them over. They'd soon decide to grow their own instead.
I think I missed the bit where the IMechE reminded us that poor harvests are mostly due to poor governance.
BE
BE: "I missed the bit where the IMechE reminded us that poor harvests are mostly due to poor governance."
They allude to it in their summary, I don't know what the full report says. I get the impression that they focus more on practical stuff and not political or economic stuff - but poor infrastrucure in the third world is political, that's down to the crappiness of their governments.
True, and if the going gets tough, prices goes up, more will go into not wasting. Plus all those grains going to feed animals is also a large buffer, and prove that there is the capacity.
The problem is as always those who can't afford the price on offer, not production.
I suspect that the funny-shaped vegetables are only dumped because we produce too many to satisfy the demand, thus the buyers can be picky. If the producers sold the surplus veg to the third world, they would be accused of "dumping" and ruining local agriculture by making it unprofitable to grow things there. Far from "we're all going to starve" western agriculture seems to be just too damn efficient and insulated by political considerations from the logical results of that efficiency.
Good point that if this much is being wasted we could support 20 billion. Indeed if we assumed the extra labour available could produce more it would be well above 20 billion.
In essence there is no limit to how rich we can be if we rely on human ingenuity and get rid of government parasitism.
I wouldn't call the weastern agricultural system socialist. I wouldn't even call the CAP socialist - it is simply subsidisng the politically connected.
Kj, true.
B: "western agriculture seems to be just too damn efficient"
Possibly, it certainly is in terms of food-per-unit-man-hour.
NC, 20 billion is at upper end of current estimates, but no doubt we could get there if we wanted to. And then we'd have to work out how to feed 21 billion, and so on.
It's not the consumers that are picky about misshapen veg. It's the EU (again). They scrapped some of their rules in 2009 but
"The rules will remain unchanged for 10 types of produce, which account for 75% of EU fruit and vegetable trade: apples, citrus fruit, kiwi fruit, lettuces, peaches and nectarines, pears, strawberries, sweet peppers, table grapes and tomatoes. But an apple which does not meet thestandard could still be sold, as long as it were labelled "product intended for processing" or equivalent wording, the commission says."
Half the world’s food wasted?
Oh no it isn't!
http://brianwernham.wordpress.com/2013/01/10/potato-logic-news-media-repeat-zombie-statistics-on-food-wastage-4
#APMFG
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