Category: World Affairs

In the Washington Post OpEd, “End of the Open Road -The Land of the Perpetual Frontier Meets $4-a-Gallon Gas,” dated 23 June, 2008, by Bill McKibben, Mr. McKibben discusses a few of the impacts of the high price of oil: automobile use is down, airlines are cutting routes, food costs are higher, and more people are gardening, presumably, growing vegetables. He notes that “local farmers markets are the fastest growing part of the food economy” and “in many areas the number of small farms is on the rise for the first time in a century.”

I have been thinking for years that I would like to get out of the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area. Ideally, I’d like to relocate to Upstate New York or Vermont. I would like to live in a smaller community where we provide more for ourselves rather than relying on huge chains of grocery and department stores to which goods have to be shipped from the four corners of the globe. We, as humans and communities, have to become more self-reliant and less dependent on “world-trade.”

I don’t have the sources immediately at hand to prove what I am about to say but, though it may not happen in my generation or the next, fossil fuels will soon become so scarce and so expensive that the mobile life we now know, be it in our own cars or in planes, trains, and ships for vacation or transportation of goods, will not exist. We may be able to maintain some semblance of the life we currently know through nuclear, solar, wind, tidal, and geothermal power but that is likely to provide power only for homes, businesses, and telecommunication systems…not transportation. Accordingly, we will have to be able to provide sustenance for ourselves and each other locally and regionally.

The bottom line for me is that beginning next year…should have started this year…I will try to grow some of my own vegetables wherever I might find myself. And if I have more than I can use, I’d be glad to trade them for some local product or service that someone else can provide for me.

As I am sure everyone is aware, the price of most food items is rising. This is due to few issues, none of which I believe, are easily remedied.

U.S. and EU countries unreasonably subsidize agriculture operations including those that make $150,000 per year. Asian countries countries with recently booming economies such as India and China are increasingly consuming more meat, rice, and soy products. Poor harvests in Europe and Australia compounded by Russian satellite states such as Kazakhstan banning exports have made wheat that much more scarce.

U.S. farmers are producing less wheat due to “climate change” and the fact that wheat is more susceptible to disease than corn. More corn is being produced due to “climate change” and the fact that the price has risen dramatically due to the demand for fuels such as ethanol that emit less carbon dioxide when burned for energy. The growing of corn for bio-fuels is also largely subsidized by the U.S. government, again artificially increasing the desirability of growing corn and, unfortunately also, increasing the price of products based on the consumption of corn such as many meats and milk.

Due largely to government mismanagement of agricultural research to increase crop yields and of continual agricultural subsidies, many countries haven’t increased there crop yields per acre in years. The Philippines reportedly can’t even grow enough rice to feed their own people let alone export it. Top that off with an official policy against birth control and you have a dramatically increasing population and not enough rice to feed it.

My last note for the day will touch on the fact that contenders from both parties for the presidency have suggested that the government suspend the gasoline and diesel fuel taxes for the summer, “Truckers Rally to Protest High Costs for Fuel.” Now there’s a fucking brilliant idea. We are in enough trouble as it is with our national debt…let’s cut taxes some more. Where is the benefit? The price is likely to rise enough to cover any reduction incurred by eliminating the tax. And finally, why should we reward people for driving more at less cost all the while producing more pollutants?