Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
Daily we are deluged with gloom about how we are overwhelming the Earth’s ability to sustain and support our growing numbers. Increasing population is again being hailed as the catastrophe of the century. In addition, floods and droughts are said to be leading to widespread crop loss. The erosion of topsoil is claimed to be affecting production. It is said that we are overdrawing our resources, with more people going hungry. Paul Ehrlich and the late Stephen Schneider assure us that we are way past the tipping point, that widespread starvation is unavoidable.
Is this true? Is increasing hunger inevitable for our future? Are we really going downhill? Are climate changes (natural or anthropogenic) making things worse for the poorest of the poor? Are we running out of food? Is this what we have to face?
Figure 1. The apocalyptic future envisioned by climate alarmists. Image Source
Fortunately, we have real data regarding this question. The marvelous online resource, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) statistics database called FAOSTAT, has data on the amount of food that people have to eat.
Per capita (average per person) food consumption is a good measure of the welfare of a group of people because it is a broad-based indicator. Some kinds of measurements can be greatly skewed by a few outliers. Per capita wealth is an example. Since one person can be a million times wealthier than another person, per capita wealth can be distorted by a few wealthy individuals.
But no one can eat a million breakfasts per day. If the per capita food consumption goes up, it must perforce represent a broad-based change in the food consumption of a majority of the population. This makes it a good measure for our purposes.
The FAOSTAT database gives values for total food consumption in calories per day, as well as for protein and fat consumption in grams per day. (Fat in excess is justly maligned in the Western diet, but it is a vital component of a balanced diet, and an important dietary indicator.) Here is the change over the last fifty years:
Figure 2. Consumption of calories, protein, and fat as a global average (thin lines), and for the “LDCs”, the Least Developed Countries (thick lines) . See Appendix 1 for a list of LDCs.
To me, that simple chart represents an amazing accomplishment. What makes it amazing is that from 1960 to 2000, the world population doubled. It went from three billion to six billion. Simply to stay even, we needed to double production of all foodstuffs. We did that, we doubled global production, and more. The population in the LDCs grew even faster, it has more than tripled since 1961. But their food consumption stayed at least even until the early 1990s. And since then, food consumption has improved across the board for the LDCs.
Here’s the bad news for the doomsayers. At this moment in history, humans are better fed than at any time in the past. Ever. The rich are better fed. The middle class is better fed. The poor, and even the poorest of the poor are better fed than ever in history.
Yes, there’s still a heap of work left to do. Yes, there remain lots of real issues out there.
But while we are fighting the good fight, let’s remember that we are better fed than we have ever been, and take credit for an amazing feat. We have doubled the population and more, and yet we are better fed than ever. And in the process, we have proven, once and for all, that Malthus, Ehrlich, and their ilk were and are wrong. A larger population doesn’t necessarily mean less to eat.
Of course despite being proven wrong for the nth time, it won’t be the last we hear of the ineluctable Señor Malthus. He’s like your basic horror film villain, incapable of being killed even with a stake through the heart at a crossroads at midnight … or the last we hear of Paul Ehrlich, for that matter. He’s never been right yet, so why should he snap his unbeaten string?
APPENDIX 1: Least Developed Countries
Africa (33 countries)
Angola
Benin
Burkina Faso
Burundi
Central African Republic
Chad
Comoros
Democratic Republic of the Congo
Djibouti
Equatorial Guinea
Eritrea
Ethiopia
Gambia
Guinea
Guinea-Bissau
Lesotho
Liberia
Madagascar
Malawi
Mali
Mauritania
Mozambique
Niger
Rwanda
São Tomé and Príncipe
Senegal
Sierra Leone
Somalia
Sudan
Togo
Tanzania
Uganda
Zambia
Eurasia (10 countries)
Afghanistan
Bangladesh
Bhutan
Cambodia
East Timor
Laos
Maldives
Myanmar
Nepal
Yemen
Americas (1 country)
Haiti
Oceania (5 countries)
Kiribati
Samoa
Solomon Islands
Tuvalu
Vanuatu
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Willis Eschenbach says:
September 9, 2010 at 4:51 pm
In this age of statistics, we can demonstrate the first two (as I have done). In this age of mathematics, we can demonstrate the third (expand e^x as a Taylor series and demonstrate that it is greater than C*x as x -> infinity).
I would never, however, put a time limit on when that would occur.
LMAO. We have a person that, on one side, is firmly brainwashed with totally unsupported by evidence conspiracy theories, and on other, uses Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, which is about rich countries that have no resources or have exhausted theirs stealing resources from poor countries in order to sustain themselves, to support his claim that those same countries have plenty of resources….
A truly amazing feat of illogical thinking…
Andrew W says:
September 9, 2010 at 5:26 pm
So you say that using oil puts us in “overshoot” … again I have to ask for your definition of overshoot, everyone seems to have a different definition. Iron, like oil, is a non-renewable resource. Does using iron (along with using fertilizer, irrigation and oil as GM says above) put us into overshoot?
When the natives in Trinidad used the local lakes of tar to patch their canoes thousands of years ago, were they in overshoot?
Definition of overshoot. Please.
Yes, if those are non-renewable resources and you can not sustain the population without them. It’s really very simple.
“Definition of overshoot. Please.”
Yeah, for clarity we probably should stick to the ecology definition of overshoot which is that overshoot said to have occurred when a population’s consumption exceeds the carrying capacity of its environment.
So even using the term in the context of human civilisation is dubious unless we can be certain that future innovation to enhance this planets ability to carry humans isn’t possible.
Willis Eschenbach says:
September 9, 2010 at 5:49 pm
So you say that using oil puts us in “overshoot” … again I have to ask for your definition of overshoot, everyone seems to have a different definition. Iron, like oil, is a non-renewable resource. Does using iron (along with using fertilizer, irrigation and oil as GM says above) put us into overshoot?
When the natives in Trinidad used the local lakes of tar to patch their canoes thousands of years ago, were they in overshoot?
Definition of overshoot. Please.
Overshoot is the use of a resource faster than it is being produced. How bad that is depends on its utility and your time-horizon. If you run out of something in 100 years time are you bothered? Some people are – they’re thinking of their children/grandchildren.
For example: If you have a stock of incandescent bulbs and you’re using them once they’re stop being manufactured, then you are in overshoot with them. If you’re going to run out of your stock of bulbs in 20 years time – then you probably won’t be bothered. Out of stock in two months time, you might be looking around to get a new supply. Either way, it’s not going to kill you – so are you bothered really?
However, without oil, you don’t make fertilizer, without fertilizer you don’t make (so many) plants, and without plants you don’t make food. Suddenly, that becomes important. Perhaps it will only bite in 60 years time – in which case are you bothered? You might be, you might not be – it’s a personal preference. Hitting in 2 years time – yes you are bothered.
At the far end of the scale, the sun is in overshoot in terms of the use of its hydrogen stocks – 20 billion years from now it won’t even be a glowing cinder. That’s important, but are you bothered?
I can’t really see how hard it is to grasp the concept of overshoot. It’s just a drawing down of savings really.
The future isn’t certain, if a decline in oil production is recognised well in advance, and if the decline is slow, there’s every likelihood that civilisation can adapt, develop other energy sources like nuclear (dispensing with the paranoia that exists around that energy source), if the decline in oil production is rapid and it’s total effects not recognised or anticipated, there’s the risk of hikes in the cost of fuel causing economic recession, which itself would cripple our ability to finance the development the necessary energy alternatives.
@ur momisugly Z says:
September 9, 2010 at 5:08 pm
“Coal is a fossil fuel – it is produced in the mantle.”
Doesn’t form in the mantle.
Well, you could have deleted just the offensive words, not the whole post. But that would not have provided enough protection to the person I was replying I guess…
Still, I will be persistent and will repeat that if to the objection that you can not assume that yields will keep growing indefinitely due to the very real limits of conversion of sunlight to chemical energy stored in carbohydrates by photosynthesis you reply by giving a number for the sun energy falling on a unit of area, then use the whole surface area of the planet (the way things are going we may be able to grow plant on the South Pole, but we won’t be able to pretty much everywhere else I guess), including the oceans (ecosystems, who needs them), 24 hours a day (for photosynthesis, make no mistake) and 100% conversion efficiency (when around 1% in reality and it will never go higher than theoretical maximum of 11%), then you get to be called something not very pleasant
anna v says:
September 9, 2010 at 1:16 am
Once fusion is harnessed for production, there will no longer be an energy problem, but an occupation problem.
I don’t think that will ever happen. To the powers that be, a cheap, clean and plentiful energy source is an abomination. They want to depopulate, and making people’s lives more comfortable isn’t going to achieve that quickly enough for them – remember they are ALL malthusians. That is what they believe anyway. For all we know, they could have the technology already.
“Nor have proved reserves fallen. In fact, despite all the oil we pump and use, proved reserves have increased steadily since 1980.”
Willis, please read these reports. All your questions and assumptions are answered in these:
http://www.tsl.uu.se/uhdsg/Publications/GOF_decline_Article.pdf
http://www.jfcom.mil/newslink/storyarchive/2010/JOE_2010_o.pdf
http://www.tsl.uu.se/uhdsg/Publications/PeakOilAge.pdf
http://www.ukerc.ac.uk/support/tiki-index.php?page=Global+Oil+Depletion
https://www.msu.edu/~ralsto11/PeakOil.pdf
anna v says:
September 9, 2010 at 1:16 am
Once fusion is harnessed for production, there will no longer be an energy problem, but an occupation problem.
————
Fusion will never happen: http://europe.theoildrum.com/node/5929
“Coal is a fossil fuel – it is produced in the mantle.”
No, it is produced from once dence swamp land that has been burried, mostly vegitative in origin.
“If you heat coal you can get oil from it, as the Germans proved during WWII.”
It’s not that simple. One of the major additives to coal to make oil is hydrogen, to add to the ends of the carbon chains. Coal to oil is a net negative ERoEI.
“Oil is not a fossil fuel, because there is something in the mantle preventing the heat from converting the coal there to oil.”
Oil is not from coal. It’s from marine organisms, completely different origin than coal. The mantle is as much as 75km down. The deepest oil field, Tupi, is only 7km.
“Have I got that right?”
You would have if you had done some searching on the net.
Z says:
September 9, 2010 at 5:33 pm
You’ll have to explain that to me. How can we possibly use more fertilizer (or as you point out, iron, or oil, or anything else) than we are producing????
There are two kinds of resources, renewable and non-renewable. Mined fertilizer (e.g. guano) is a renewable resource. Produced fertilizer (usually made from natural gas) is a non-renewable resource.
From your description of guano, it sounds like you are defining “overshoot” as using a renewable resource faster than it is being produced. Which makes sense, and is definitely possible.
But if that is the case, it does not apply to oil, or iron, or the like. You say that using oil puts us into “overshoot”, but like iron, oil is (over any reasonable timespan) a non-renewable resource. So are you defining “overshoot” as using any non-renewable resource?
Definition of overshoot. Please.
Nah, doesn’t work like that. The world is a big place. The resource won’t suddenly “run out”. It will become more and more expensive. As it does, alternatives will become more and more cost effective. In addition, advances in technology often allow replacements that were undreamed of prior to the advance. Anyone in 1950 estimating copper usage to wire up the world-wide web would have gotten an answer in megatonnes … who would have guessed that we would be able to replace much of that copper with, of all things, glass? And now much of it is carried by microwave …
GM says:
September 9, 2010 at 5:43 pm
So here we have a person that, on one side, is firmly brainwashed with totally unsupported by evidence conspiracy theories, and on other, uses Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, which is about rich countries that have no resources or have exhausted theirs stealing resources from poor countries in order to sustain themselves, to support his claim that those same rich countries have plenty of resources….
_____________________________
And here we have a person who missed the point entirely due to his political blinders. Todays politics is nothing more than people and the money that buys them.
It is NOT rich countries stealing the resources of poor countries, it is extremely wealthy, influential people exerting lots of control over many countries.
For example:
Stan Greenberg’s company, Greenberg Carville Shrum directed Campaigns in 60 countries:
“As a hired gun strategist, Greenberg—a seasoned pollster and political consultant—has seen it all. In his memoir, he recounts his work with President Bill Clinton, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, Bolivian president Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, and South African president Nelson Mandela. Through his experiences aiding the leaders in pushing their visions for better and clearer domestic and international policies, Greenberg offers an insightful examination of leadership, democracy, and the bridge between candidate and constituency… http://macmillanspeakers.com/stanleybgreenberg%3Cbr%20/%3E
Or how about the influence VP of Cargill Dan Amstutz has had? He wrote the WTO Agreement on Agriculture and the “freedom to fail” Act. Most informed farmers around the world hate the mans guts, especially after the food riots in 2008.
Unsupported by evidence conspiracy theories??? How about several years unraveling the politics behind idiotic food legislation???
GM says:
September 9, 2010 at 5:52 pm
Yes, it is simple … for example, since we can’t sustain the population without iron (non-renewable), according to you we have been in “overshoot” since the beginning of the Iron Age. And of course, the iron age was preceded by populations sustained using knives and scythes and tools of non-renewable bronze, so according to you, we’ve been in “overshoot” since the beginning of the Bronze Age. And don’t get me started on the Stone Age, I mean, stones are a non-renewable resource too, obsidian doesn’t grow on trees, you know …
Remind me again why “overshoot” (which by your definition is any use of non-renewable resources) is a bad thing? Because according to you we’ve been in overshoot since the start of the Stone Age, without visible effects, but by gosh the reckoning is going to come very soon, in the year 2030 according to you …
You know, you have beaten even the Xtians. I mean they’ve only been waiting for two millennia for the second coming of the Big Guy. But you have been waiting for the impending crash due to to “overshoot” since the beginning of the Stone Age …
In any case, not much longer to wait, for someone like you who has been waiting since the Stone Age, 2030 is just around the corner.
GM says:
September 9, 2010 at 6:36 pm
You make a claim without showing a single number. I do a back of the envelope calculation to get a sense of it, and you want to call me names for doing so … not polite.
You sure you understand how this newfangled “science” thingy works? Because so far you’ve put words in people’s mouths, made unsubstantiated claims, pissed off the moderators, and insulted people. That won’t get you any traction here. Even when you are right, when you act like that people won’t believe you. You sure that’s your goal?
If you think that there is a hard limit to how much food we can raise on the earth, based on the amount of energy coming from the sun, great. Show us your numbers, do your calculations, tell us how much we can ever possibly grow. Don’t forget to include the effect of increased CO2, and the use of greenhouses, and multiple cropping, and reduction of post-harvest losses, improvements in distribution, genetic engineering, and the like … I await your numbers. I don’t think the limiting variable is solar power, but I’ve been wrong before.
But don’t bother calling me names, that just shows the weakness of your claims.
Z says:
September 9, 2010 at 6:04 pm
Since everyone has always used non-renewable resources, by your definition we have all been in overshoot since the beginning of the Stone Age. Of what possible use is such a concept? It is so broad as to be useless, but it sure sounds impressive.
Why not just say something like “at present usage, mining, and recovery rates we’ll run out of unobtanium in 2050”? That actually has meaning.
Saying we are in overshoot has no meaning. Since it applies to everyone all the time you might as well say “we are alive”. It is true, but meaningless.
The fact that (by your definition) we are all in overshoot adds nothing to our knowledge, since according to you we have been in overshoot since the start of recorded time. It just sounds educated to say “overshoot”, and it has the added advantage of being kinda scary.
Color me unimpressed. In the 1930s the claim was that we were going to run out of magnesium. People like some in this thread were all on about how little magnesium there was in the mines and the proved reserves back then, and how fast we were using it. (Of course back then they didn’t realize how much smarter they’d sound if they called it “overshoot”.)
Heard much lately about our “magnesium overshoot”? Ever wonder why not?
Richard Wakefield says:
September 9, 2010 at 7:00 pm
No thanks, I’ll pass. If you disagree with one of my points, address the point. Waving your hands at a large stack of literature and saying “the answer to all of your questions is in there somewhere” is a useless time-consuming exercise. The fundamentalists do the same thing, come up to my door, wave their hands at the Bible, and say “the answer to all of your questions is in there somewhere”. I tell them “No thanks” in exactly the same manner …
overshoot is using up resources you rely upon to support your population or ecological load if you prefer than what the environment can provide indefinitely
like any other animal man tends to do the same as any other animal, he grows and out consumes the ability of his environment to support his numbers, overshoot
It has happened many many times on local scales thru history, now its getting to be global. Should the current supply of needed resources that support our population decline in ways we can’t compensate for then the overshoot is realized. Energy is the number one resource that has allowed man to swell to such numbers. Collectively like other animals man typically does not plan long term or consider the future consequences of actions taken now. We’ve known for almost 40 years now energy was going to be a problem, also known that it would take decades to deal with it. Unfortunately geology and physics don’t bargain or care. Most people refuse to even consider things like this for whatever reason. Maybe its hard to realize we are just a bunch of stupid animals not quite as smart as we think we are. Others fall into the cornucopians that think technology will save the day when it isn’t a technological problem, it is a social problem and behavioral problem. Our own base instincts and behavior are at odds with our own long term future. The oil age has indeed been something special, pity we squandered the way we did.
Depending on renewals is the only way you get a Malthusian crash. When the British started using coal at the start of the Industrial Revolution, Malthus’s theory was reduced to rubbish cause the per land unit food productivity went up…a lot. Now we are seeing population correct itself for some reason. There are several theories why but regardless even high birth rate demographic groups are reducing their birth rate. I think the current estimates are that population will peak in about 20 years.
Willis is right. Declining resources will first show up as an economic problem. Scarcity will be reflected in price pressures that will cause the scarce resources with alternative uses to be used effectively. If the last 100,000 years is any indication, these pressures will result in new technologies that will keep the train moving. That is how we have survived until now. It is what we are good at. Why suddenly stop a winning strategy and go back to miserable poverty stricken self sustaining life styles? Either we will invent our way out of any coming energy crisis or some few of use will live like hunter gathers…but rather poorly at first since we have forgotten how to do it.
Uranium Reserves
Willis Eschenbach
Thanks for an excellent article.
Willis, the problem is the foundation of the ideology of environmentalism is fear and scare mongering, despite contrary facts. What do we have to do to fight this inimical ideology?
Jaye says:
Outstanding link, Jaye, thanks. There is a particularly fascinating discussion of mineral resources at the end of the paper, a small portion of which I excerpt below (emphasis mine):
To a large extent I think we’re talking at cross purposes Willis, you’re saying that technology turns existing material into new valuable resources; I’m saying that any resource is finite – though some more so than others.
If people assume that ever improving technology will always find solutions to the problem resource depletion they’re relying on a form of faith.