Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
Bill McKibben, the skeptics best friend, can always be depended on to provide interesting claims. Never one to let a good crisis go to waste, he opines on the tsunami and our “shrinking margins” over at the Guardian. A number of people have highlighted various of his ideas, not all of them favorably. One claim of his that I have not seen discussed is the following:
We’re seeing record temperatures that depress harvests – the amount of grain per capita on the planet has been falling for years.
Figure 1. Food and Protein per capita. The LDCs are the “Least Developed Countries”, the poorest of the world’s countries. Red and orange are total food supply (right scale). Dark and light blue are protein (left scale). DATA SOURCE
Let’s start by considering the real issue. People eat a host of things, not just grains. So the issue is not the number of kilogrammes of grain produced per person. That’s only part of the story. The real issue is, how well are we feeding the ~ 7 billion people of the world?
The first thing that Figure 1 shows is that after years of making little gain, since the early 1990s the food supply in the LDCs has been improving (orange line). There’s still a ways to go, but the trend is upwards.
The next thing is quite surprising. In the year 2007 (the last year for which we have data), the people in the poorest countries (orange line) were getting almost as many daily calories as the global average in 1961 (red line). To me, this is an amazing accomplishment. Remember that during this time, the population of the planet more than doubled. Despite that, both the poorest of the poor, and the global population as a whole, are better fed than at any time in history.
Finally, globally there is no sign of any recent decrease in nutrition levels. Nor do nutrition levels appear to be connected in any way to the temperature.
However, to be fair, that wasn’t McKibben’s claim. He said that grain production per capita on the planet has been “falling for years”, so let’s check that. Figure 2 shows those numbers, with the data again from FAOSTAT.
Figure 2. Production per capita for all cereal grains. Figures for the LDCs represent domestic cereal production divided by domestic population.
Has global grain production per capita been “falling for years” as McKibben claims? The observations say no. Globally, it peaked at just above 350 kg per person around 1980 and has dipped less than 10% and come back up since then.
For the LDCs, on the other hand, their domestic cereal grain production was unable to keep up with their domestic population growth until the early 1990s. Since then, due in part to decreasing population growth rates, LDC grain production per capita has been rising steadily. There’s no sign of any recent change in that rising trend. Anything is possible tomorrow, of course. But there’s no sign of falling grain production as McKibben claims, from temperature or any other cause.
So, what’s the current score in the battle of the farmers of the planet to feed the ever-increasing masses?
Farmers: 1 … Malthus: 0.
Oh, and McKibben’s score? … -1 for truth content, but high marks for entertainment value.
w.
PS – The continued ability of the world to feed itself, despite adding a total of four billion people to the planet in the last fifty years, is an unparalleled and largely unrecognized success for humanity. I am so tired of people like McKibben not only not acknowledging that, but going so far as to claim that the trend has reversed and that things are getting worse. That’s nonsense. In terms of world nutrition, things are better than they have ever been, even for the poorest countries. Not only that, but they continue to improve. That’s a huge success.
So rather than incessant whining about how terrible things are, how about we take some pride in that success, and think about what it is we’ve done right to achieve that, and how to do more of whatever that was that got us here?
[UPDATE TWO WEEKS LATER] Here’s the latest of Bill McKibben’s “depressed harvests”, from the WSJ … India has so much grain from several years of record harvests that it has run out of warehouse space to store it.
India Foodgrain Output to Hit Record High
By BANIKINKAR PATTANAYAK
NEW DELHI –India’s foodgrains output is set to rise to a record 235.88 million metric tons this crop year, according to government estimates, a figure which is likely to pave the way to lifting the export ban on wheat and common rice varieties.
Citing the government’s latest crop estimates, Farm Minister Sharad Pawar said wheat output during the year through June is likely to rise to 84.27 million tons from 80.8 million tons last year, while rice output will increase to 94.11 million tons from 89.09 million tons over the same period.
“The government should now give serious thought about storage, allocation to states and export of rice and wheat,” Mr. Pawar told a news conference.
India imposed a ban on the export of wheat and common grades of rice three years ago to curb prices, and since then the government’s grain stocks have swelled to more than double its requirement.
Consequently, state-run warehouses ran out of space last year and the government was forced to store some of the grain in the open. The storage crunch may worsen this year because of the record output. The government is expected to make a decision next month on lifting the export ban on wheat and common rice grades.
Willis, in one message you moan that “but the bad news is, we may be nearing the planet’s carrying capacity in terms of stupidity” yet in later one you write “And yes, I have absolute faith that human imagination has not reached its limit”
So what’s going to win stupidity or imagination? You can list technological successes in the part, unfortunately we only need to have one spectacular failure to make much of our current civilization come crashing down. For example the failure advocated on this blog: ignoring the risk of climate change.
Thomas: your
Willis, in one message you moan that “but the bad news is, we may be nearing the planet’s carrying capacity in terms of stupidity” yet in later one you write “And yes, I have absolute faith that human imagination has not reached its limit”
For a brilliant example of the former, see:
For example the failure advocated on this blog: ignoring the risk of climate change.
savethesharks:
Schmeiser was found guilty of patent infringement by a Saskatchewan court, the Appeals Court, and the Supreme Court of Canada.
Now, should I believe Percy, or the courts?
Tough choice.
Food vs. Fuel
USDA Biofuels Strategic Production Report. June 23, 2010
http://www.usda.gov/documents/USDA_Biofuels_Report_6232010.pdf
Chris, Becky has said some silly things initially, with no attempt to back them with referrences. I attempted, early in the thread, to point out one of Becky’s fallacies but she has not bothered to respond. That’s her perogative whether to respond or not, but I am a little disappointed by her silence. Your attempt at galloping to her rescue by flinging implications at some of us does not fit with your usual calm, witty and rational persona.
“Got me wondering: if it was dedicated entirely to growing grain, could the American Mid-west produce enough grain? Or the Russian prairies? How much area would it take, in the best grain country in the world, with the best methods? I wouldn’t know where to start looking.”
I thought I’d take a stab at answering my own question. Just for a first approximation, let’s go with the US avg wheat yields: 10 tonnes per hectare (150 bushels per acre) – Wikipedia. 2010 total world wheat crop around 650 million tonnes. 65 million hectares (150 million acres) needed. 373 million hectares of land under cultivation in the US at the moment (also Wiki). Puts things in perspective, really.
Ecclesiastical Uncle says:
March 27, 2011 at 11:18 pm
I’ll do you one better than that: It is currently impossible to get a patent through the US Patent Office for any device, contraption, mechanism, or machine that is based on “cold fusion”. Their response to such a submission? They waive it away as either being 1) not in the public interest, or 2) based on untenable theory. Basically what they’re doing is illegal, since other patented items aren’t required a thorough theoretical explanation of the forces involved. Take for instance airplane flight–do you have a firm, unequivocal theory of gravity? I thought not.
But here’s the kicker–Rossi’s E-Cat unit will start operation in Athens this October and production will expand from there, whether you are skeptical or not. That’s the plan. A consortium comprising all the energy companies in both Italy and Greece called Defkalion will make this energy source available to their power-generating facilities. Considering the cost, ease of use, and lack of any pollutants, it will be a shoe-in. Then when other countries start belly-aching about not being asked to the party, we can all point to the US as being the biggest obstacle in utilizing energy from the most amazing development since man started using fire.
Thomas says:
March 28, 2011 at 1:25 am
Heck, I don’t know who’s going to win, stupidity or imagination. It’s a race. I note that you are doing everything in your power to favor the former, but despite your valiant efforts the forces of imagination still have a fighting chance.
Will “one spectacular failure” bring our technological civilization “crashing down”? What is it with you guys and doomsday scenarios? Don’t you think if “current civilization” was so unstable we’d have seen it at least waver or totter or the like … the world is a very big place, Thomas. Even huge wars that involved the entire planet didn’t bring modern civilization down.
More to the point, will “ignoring climate change” bring down our civilization? Man, you are full of bizarre claims. I know that you’d love for us to believe that a couple degree change in average temperature would bring down the entire current civilization … but no, that just another strange fantasy that you folks have been repeating for so long that it appears you actually believe it yourself.
Sorry, Thomas, but you’ll have to find a less discerning crowd to sell that fantasy to. I assure you, you won’t get any traction around here for that kind of foolishness.
w.
Willis Eschenbach says:
March 26, 2011 at 8:36 pm
Bowel movement says:
March 26, 2011 at 6:46 pm
I always love to get to write this. Land area of Texas (less water) 261,797 sq. mi. or 7.29 X 10^12 sq. ft. World population 6,775,235,00 people. Divide the one by the other and you get 1,077 ft^2/person. In other words, laid out on a grid, you could put every single person on Earth at the middle of a square 32.8 feet per side, that is no person would be closer than 33 feet in any direction to another person in the land area of Texas. How overpopulated is the Earth? You know the world does not end at the Hudson river.
Willis Eschenbach says:
March 27, 2011 at 11:40 am
“Clearly, you don’t understand scientific web sites like this one. If you think there aren’t 7 billion people on the world, you need to do the math and show us why you think there aren’t that many. Otherwise, you’ll just get (deservedly) ignored.”
Really? that’s an unfair comment, my understanding of scientific web sites like this one, is that the one making the claim is the one for whom the burden of proof lies, you have asserted the claim of a population estimate of “7 billion” therefore the burden of proving this figure lies with you and not with someone whom you say should be “deservedly ignored”.
I should have elaborated more, I apologize for that, I agree with how Malthusian arguments don’t and have not matched real world observations over the past 50+ years.
I thought it strange of you to use such a touted Malthusian figure of 7 billion, especially when the population figure of 7 billion is not a real world count, but a natural logarithm influenced by Thomas Malthus’ Theory of Population and the misanthropic proponents/believers of this theory,
I would have thought that in good scientific practice; just as this “Malthusian Theory” has been dismissed for its pessimism and failure to take into account technological advances in agriculture and food production, so too must the population figures based on or around the theory.
It always surprises me of just how many people (and who) believe the figure/s on these population clocks, the natural logarithms used in the programs are updated from web-sites that have a disclaimer about the accuracy of the data, Where is the disclaimer of your asserted figure of “7 billion”?
A search can reveal a wide variation between estimates and these figures below are not the low estimated figures nor are they the high estimated figures that I can find, and they can be easily verified.
population of six continents:
Africa 1 billion – 1,000,010,000
Asia 3.8 billion – 3,879,000,000
Europe 731 million – 731,000,000
North America 514 million – 528,720,588
South America 371 million – 385,742,554
Australia 21 million – 21,874,900
Estimated to be between 4,982,600,000 – 5,546,338,042
Here’s the formula for the world clock and an example of the type of program/script used.
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, International Data Base.
Growth rates are calculated using the formula:
r(t) = ln [ P(t+1) / P(t) ]
where:
t = year
r(t) = growth rate from midyear t to midyear t+1
P(t) = population at midyear t
ln = natural log
function counter() {
popstat=5946422755;
poprate=2.4452;
today=new Date()
statsdate = new Date(“February 1, 1999″);
offset = today.getTimezoneOffset()*60*1000
diffpop = (( today.getTime() + offset ) – statsdate.getTime() ) / 1000
var newpop = Math.ceil(popstat + (diffpop * poprate));
newpop = “” + newpop;
p1 = newpop.substring(0,1)
p2 = newpop.substring(1,4)
p3 = newpop.substring(4,7)
p4 = newpop.substring(7,10)
var pops= p1 + “,” + p2 + “,” + p3 + “,” + p4;
var popul = document.getElementById(“poo”);
popul.innerHTML = pops;
setTimeout(‘counter()’,200);
TheTempestSpark says:
March 28, 2011 at 7:38 pm (Edit)
I’ve said several times that all figures in the post are from FAOSTAT. The figure of 7 billion is no exception. If you think that the FAOSTAT is wrong, my best to you. I’ve never found them to be so, but you might be the first. The FAOSTAT has the sources of the figures, go to town.
I await your report debunking FAOSTAT.
w.
les johnson says:
March 28, 2011 at 2:56 am
savethesharks:
Schmeiser was found guilty of patent infringement by a Saskatchewan court, the Appeals Court, and the Supreme Court of Canada.
Now, should I believe Percy, or the courts?
Tough choice.
================
“Tough choice” only for those who are inclined to groupthink and siding with the Establishment.
Easy choice for the rest of us.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Alexander K says:
March 28, 2011 at 5:28 am
Chris, Becky has said some silly things initially, with no attempt to back them with referrences. I attempted, early in the thread, to point out one of Becky’s fallacies but she has not bothered to respond. That’s her perogative whether to respond or not, but I am a little disappointed by her silence. Your attempt at galloping to her rescue by flinging implications at some of us does not fit with your usual calm, witty and rational persona.
=============
Point taken. I did not read all the details….there are simply too much to read….and I don’t have the time to read it.
If it can’t be said in a few sentences, it can’t be said….so I probably jumped to conclusions.
I am certainly not saying that all GMOs are bad.
I am simply saying that Monsanto is bad.
They are an evil, ruthless, soulless, black-hearted corporation from saccharine (1901) to agent orange in the 1960s to roundup in the 70s and controlling the world’s seeds in the 2000s with GMOs that they have developed.
Two separate arguments here and Willis is right I should have distinguished between the two.
However…its just that GMOs and Monsanto are both on the world stage at the same time…and indeed…they are inextricably linked.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
As a matter of routine, I hereby confess that I am an old retired bureaucrat in a field only remotely related to climate, with minimal qualifications and only half a mind.
Re RockyRoad, Mar 28 2011, 7.15am
Well, bully for Rossi and Deflakion. If they play it cleverly, it will be an interesting time watching economic power transfer to the classical world. (But remember the Chinese curse: May you live in interesting times!)
But I am sorry to have to confess that I not now re-investing my meager savings on the tip that Rossi’s E-Cat unit will start operation this October or that Deflakion will become involved.
Re Willis Eschenbach, Mar 27 2011, 10.14am and 12:47 pm and Mar 28, 2011 at 9:53 am, and Thomas March 28, 2011 at 1:25 am
The contributions by W that T picks out seem to be, on the one hand, an observation about human stupidity (maybe about food production only) and, on the other hand, a declaration of faith in human inventiveness. Comparing the two does not seem right since the former is, presumably, a starting point for the latter.
But while it is nice to see W’s faith in the future, I fear I have moments when I cannot share it. And I have to sow a seed of doubt into his argument. I cannot see what happens in the future as a race: the planet will always be vulnerable to human capacity to destroy (so much easier than creating – something to do with thermodynamics, I think). And there are people out there who get it into their heads that we are all evil and that they will go to their 70 virgins or whatever if they destroy us, and the GM crop alarmists might just be right and the world become submerged in roast- beef weed or something. And I do not think that a catastrophic event would necessarily be part of a determinate (?) system – it might just happen (and what about the law of unforeseen consequences?).
My own tag on this matter: Evolution’s experiment with intelligence seems to be a failure (or seems bound to be, etc).
Practically, however, I do not think this gets me very far. The consequences of responses to fears of global catastrophe are certainly an immediate and huge reduction in the capacity of the world to support the present human population. (Which might itself precipitate a catastrophe that would eliminate it.) And there is a chance that, if we just keep working to improve our lot as we have in the past, the catastrophe will not happen, at least for a very long time. So, my conclusion – let’s keep the improving going!
In the context of the matters we discuss her, my tag has a very long time frame!
So, W, that’s what’s with it with me! Must be a majority position, I would think. I don’t quite know why I waste effort putting it in writing.
Willis Eschenbach says:
March 28, 2011 at 8:08 pm
“I await your report debunking FAOSTAT.”
Waite? you’ll notice that FAOSTAT uses Population data from the UN Population Division and the data refers to the UN Revision 2008, which of course has the disclaimer I mentioned. I have no disagreement with FAOSTAT but I do question the population data that they are using that has a Disclaimer.
You could give me a real challenge next time.
“The FAOSTAT PopSTAT module contains timeseries on population and economically active population. The series consist of both estimates and projections for different periods as available from the original sources, namely:
1. Population data from the UN Population Division and the data refers to the UN Revision 2008. Long term series estimates and projects from 1961 to 2050.”
savethesharks: your
“Tough choice” only for those who are inclined to groupthink and siding with the Establishment.
You are making assumptions with absolutely no data. And ad hominem to boot. Totally false too.
Easy choice for the rest of us.
I highly doubt that. If you ask someone if they believed a single farmer, or the decisions of 3 courts, including the SCOC, the majority will believe the courts.
I also have Percy’s statement, that in 1997, he sprayed 3 acres with Round Up, and harvested the survivors, and used that seed to seed 1000 acres. As the SCOC said, he knew, or should have known, that the seed was Round Up Resistant, in violation of the patent, and the agreement he had signed the year before.
Lets forget the ludicrous belief that 3 acres of plants would supply seed for 1000 acres.
TheTempestSpark says:
March 28, 2011 at 9:42 pm
Not clear what your point is. The UN is basically using data for the period 1961-2008, and contains estimates beyond that to 2050.
And?
Any population numbers, except at the moment of the census, are always an estimate. However, this doesn’t mean that they just make it up. The census was in 2010. The estimated population of the US in 2011 is not going to be far from the actual population in 2011
w.
Willis Eschenbach says:
March 29, 2011 at 12:58 am
“Not clear what your point is. The UN is using data for the period 1961-2008, and contains estimates beyond that to 2050.
And?”
“7 billion” people on this planet, Where is your proof?
Just a query for Willis.
It doesn’t change your argument much but some people take poorly checked figures off and use them elsewhere.
In a response to Becky you used two thirds living in poverty (or 4 billion people).
In “the Skeptical Environmentalist” by Bjorn Lomborg, he refers to 1.2 billion living in poverty, with the number not changing much over the 1987 to 1998 period. This meant a drop from 28% to 24% of those in the Less Developed Countries.
Is your two thirds from FAOSTAT?
I hope not as the difference (from 1.2 to 4 billion people in 12 years) would be a disaster.
TheTempestSpark says:
March 29, 2011 at 2:11 am
If you want to be all coy and cutesy, go play someplace else.
Can I “prove” that global population is ~ 7 billion? No.
Is it really, really, really likely that the population of the world is ~ 7 billion? Every authority I know of says so, so I’ve been hoping that you’d point to someone saying something different.
Put up a citation to your claim or play elsewhere, there’s a good fellow.
w.
John Do says:
March 29, 2011 at 7:59 am
My bad, I was using old figures. It also depends on what you call “poverty”. The portion of the world living on less than $2 per day seems to be about half the planet these days, down from earlier estimates.
w.
What I saw recently in Cambodia and Nepal were many people too poor to overeat. The rich were the ones that look to be in poor health. They live longer because they are at less risk from infectious diseases and trauma.
I have worked as a consultant in developing countries for 40 years. What I see now is the growing incidence of obesity, mostly in countries that have enjoyed rapid economic growth during the last 20 years or so. Nepal and Cambodia are two countries where obesity is not yet common, except among the rich. Obesity is becoming a problem in countries that have climbed out of poverty, like Malaysia, and is common in middle-income countries, such as Syria and Indonesia.
The unfortunate thing is that humans are programmed to overeat and to ruin their health by doing so. We need to ask, “Is a low-calorie diet as bad as we have been led to believe?”
The OSS collected data in the Netherlands after World War II when people had so little to eat that they turned to rats. Those years coincided with a decline in heart disease. I put this oberservation to good use. At age 74, I was myself at risk from heart disease, but now as I approach my 80th birthday I have normal blood sugar, cholesterol and blood pressure levels and a BMI of 22. I weigh 18 kilos (40 pounds) less than I did at age 74.
How can this be? Very simple. I keep to a moderately low-calorie diet avoiding sugars, starches, meat, cereals and dairy products, except as tasty treat occasionally. If I could bear it, I would eat less than I do, but I like to eat just like everybody else.
So I am never impressed by data that say the world will run out of food. I just do not believe that poverty equals malnutrition.
The history of the Little Ice Age in Europe tells us that the big risk is climate cooling. The post-Roman Warm Period tells the same story. So I am sceptical about the impact of global warming.
Frank, first, many thanks for your interesting observations. As someone who has also worked extensively in developing countries, and lived for 9 years in a “Least Developed Country”, I can only agree with what you said.
However, given the choice between kids overeating or going hungry …
As you know, the fact that we are winning in the fight to (minimally) feed and clothe and educate the 7 billion people of the planet doesn’t mean that the battle is won. Far from it.
My issue is the false claim that we are losing the battle. We are winning, and we need to approach the battle with that in mind.
w.
I have added an update at the end of the head post.
w.