Guest essay by Eric Worrall
h/t Dr. Willie Soon; Apparently we face an urgent need to reform land use and human diets, even though satellite measurements prove the world is greening.
IPCC climate change report calls for urgent overhaul of food production, land management
By environment reporter Nick Kilvert
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And changing the way we farm could improve things for ourselves, as well as for the planet: “Balanced diets featuring plant-based foods such as those based on coarse grains, legumes, fruits and vegetable, nuts and seeds and animal-sourced food produced in resilient, sustainable and low-greenhouse-gas-emission systems present major opportunities for adaptation and mitigation while generating significant co-benefits in terms of human health.“
In Australia, where our meat consumption is particularly high on a global average, that means things like switching to low-emissions meat sources, ditching non-essential foods, and sourcing locally grown produce.
Reducing food waste is also identified as a key area to gain efficiency and reduce the environmental impact of agriculture.
Between 25 and 30 per cent of food is wasted worldwide, including crop waste, transport and store loss and personal waste.
“By 2050, reduced food loss and waste can free several million square kilometres of land,” the authors write.
The report confirms the world has a double-edged sword hanging over its head, according to IPCC vice-chair Mark Howden.
“We ignore the interactions between climate change and the land at our peril.”
Read more: https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2019-08-08/ipcc-report-climate-change-land-use/11391180
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George Monbiot’s response is even more entertaining, he gave one of his signature wide eyed video interviews: “Beef is like a loaded gun pointed at the living world“.
What the IPCC said of course is a little less apocalyptic, in fact in his video interview Monbiot describes the report as “pathetic and mealy mouthed”, because the scientists didn’t say what he wanted them to say.
Some interesting highlights from the Summary for Policymakers;
Climate Change and Land
An IPCC Special Report on climate change, desertification, land degradation, sustainable land management, food security, and greenhouse gas fluxes in terrestrial ecosystems
Summary for Policymakers
…
A2.3. Satellite observations15 have shown vegetation greening16 over the last three decades in parts of Asia, Europe, South America, central North America, and southeast Australia. Causes of greening include combinations of an extended growing season, nitrogen deposition, CO2fertilisation17, and land management (high confidence). Vegetation browning18 has been observed in some regions including northern Eurasia, parts of North America, Central Asia and the Congo Basin, largely as a result of water stress (medium confidence). Globally, vegetation greening has occurred over a larger area than vegetation browning (high confidence). {2.2.3, Box 2.3, 2.2.4, 3.2.1, 3.2.2, 4.3.1, 4.3.2, 4.6.2, 5.2.2}
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B6.2. Diversification in the food system (e.g., implementation of integrated production systems, broad-based genetic resources, and diets) can reduce risks from climate change (medium confidence). Balanced diets, featuring plant-based foods, such as those based on coarse grains, legumes, fruits and vegetables, nuts and seeds, and animal-sourced food produced in resilient, sustainable and low-GHG emission systems, present major opportunities for adaptation and mitigation while generating significant co-benefits in terms of human health (high confidence). By 2050, dietary changes could free several Mkm2 (medium confidence) of land and provide a technical mitigation potential of 0.7 to 8.0 GtCO2e yr-1, relative to business as usual projections (high confidence). Transitions towards low-GHG emission diets may be influenced by local production practices, technical and financial barriers and associated livelihoods and cultural habits (high confidence). {5.3, 5.5.2, 5.5, 5.6}
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C1.2. Insecure land tenure affects the ability of people, communities and organisations to make changes to land that can advance adaptation and mitigation (medium confidence). Limited recognition of customary access to land and ownership of land can result in increased vulnerability and decreased adaptive capacity (medium confidence). Land policies (including recognition of customary tenure, community mapping, redistribution, decentralisation, co-management, regulation of rental markets) can provide both security and flexibility response to climate change (medium confidence). {3.6.1, 3.6.2, 5.3, 7.2.4, 7.6.4, Cross-Chapter Box 6 in Chapter 5}
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D 3. Rapid reductions in anthropogenic GHG emissions across all sectors following ambitious mitigation pathways reduce negative impacts of climate change on land ecosystems and food systems (medium confidence). Delaying climate mitigation and adaptation responses across sectors would lead to increasingly negative impacts on land and reduce the prospect of sustainable development (medium confidence). {Box SPM.1, Figure SPM.2, 2.5, 2.7, 5.2, 6.2, 6.4, 7.2, 7.3.1, 7.4.7, 7.4.8, 7.5.6; Cross-Chapter Box 9 in Chapter 6, Cross-Chapter Box 10 in Chapter 7}
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Read more: https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2019/08/4.-SPM_Approved_Microsite_FINAL.pdf
It seems a little premature to declare a global land use and climate emergency, when satellite measurements suggest the world is greening.
What I find more interesting though , the IPCC admits they only have “medium confidence” that reducing greenhouse gas emissions would mitigate the problems they identified as affecting food supply.
The vague and in my opinion misleading term “medium confidence” may be a gift from the late Stephen Schneider. There is a hilarious climate gate email which suggests the term “medium confidence” arose because climate scientists didn’t want to say “inconclusive” in their reports;
Hello all. I appreciate the improvement in the table from WG 1, particularly the inclusion of symmetrical confidence levels–but please get rid of the ridiculous “inconclusive” for the .34 to .66 subjective probability range. It will convey a completely differnt meaning to lay persons–read decisionmakers–since that probability range represents medium levels of confidence, not rare events. A phrase like “quite possible” is closer to popular lexicon, but inconclusive applies as well to very likely or very unlikely events and is undoubtedly going to be misinterpreted on the outside. I also appreciate the addition of increasing huricane intensities with warming moving out of the catch all less than .66 category it was in the SOD.
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Great Tom, I think we are converging to much clearer meanings across various cultures here. Please get the inconclusive out! By the way, “possible” still has some logical issues as it is true for very large or very small probabilities in principle, but if you define it clearly it is probably OK–but “quite possible” conveys medium confidence better–but then why not use medium confidence, as the 3 rounds of review over the guidance paper concluded after going through exactly the kinds of disucssions were having now. Thanks, Steve
…
Climategate email 0967041809.txt (the paragraphs are reversed from the original reference to show correct chronological order)
Obviously some regions like Australia and Africa could do with a little more water infrastructure, and deforestation can have a substantial impact on rainfall, so planting a few trees, especially in marginal areas, is not always a bad idea.
The “balanced diet” demand stinks of one size fits all-ism. There are substantial regions of the world where herding cattle over low grade pastures is a tradition, because the land quality simply isn’t good enough for a more settled way of life. The land might be improved with a vast investment in infrastructure, but who is going to supply the cash?
Frankly I don’t see a case for radical global land use change and massive government intervention, as the IPCC seems to be advocating. Some of their ideas like security of tenure, better property rights are sensible, but investments in water infrastructure and tree planting are local issues. Determination to address these issues has and will emerge where necessary through normal local and national political processes; no great global political intervention required.
While the world continues to green, suggestions that the world faces a serious ecosystem degradation problem seem a bit of a stretch.
Most pasture is either too dry, or too hilly, to farm, so discussing trying to convert it to grain farming is silly. But the vegans apparently have some supporter in the IPCC, so they routinely “suggest” lower meat diets as a routine default claim.
Tom Halla – August 9, 2019 at 6:16 pm
Too dry fer shur, …… but not too hilly for some grain farmers, ….. to wit:
That looks like cold cuts on a deli platter!
If enough water is available.
If enough cheap labor, unaffected by vertigo, is available.
If enough good quality fill dirt is available to fill those hillside window boxes.
Hard to build, hard to maintain, manually hard to work, hard to harvest, susceptible to landslides, susceptible to earthquakes; and in winter climes, susceptible to avalanches.
Not for most people.
ATheoK – August 10, 2019 at 1:54 pm
Uh, .. uh, …. ATheoK, ….. me thinks the construction of those Chinese rice paddies is equivalent to US mountaintop removal coal mining, …… the mountain itself is used for the “fill” dirt.
Don’t sweat the “small stuff”, …… ATheoK, ….. cause iffen those dummies implement the GND the poor of the American populace will surely luv working hard to feed themselves.
Work or starve …. is not much of a choice one hesitates at making.
Cultists always try to drag new people into their money fleecing schemes. Basic pyramid svhemes.
Soon they’ll be suggesting soylent green
Soylent green, +overpopulation = perfect solution.
The idea that lower meat diets would do anything to prevent climate change is a red herring. The UK switched some power plants from burning coal to burning wood chips because wood, unlike coal, is renewable. It doesn’t add additional CO2 to the atmosphere if the trees are replanted. But grass, alfalfa, and other animal foods are also renewable. They are part of the yearly carbon cycle. The carbon gets released to the atmosphere when the vegetation is eaten, burned, or decays. Then it is absorbed again by plants the following year when the vegetation grows again. So if wood is considered renewable, why aren’t animal food stocks considered renewable as well?
I can see a really pressing need for really, really smart people to begin immediate control of global food production, supply and consumption. Maybe we can do it in 5 year plans.
The rule by experts has always been the goal….of experts.
An expert is someone speaking more than 150 miles from home.
The USSR had “5 year plans” for everything. Every 2 or 3 years they would come out with a new 5 year plan.
There are no “real smart people” who know the future! Give someone unlimited powers and check what will happen…. corruption to the highest level! IPCC has been screaming “wolf” for the last 30 years and we are still doing great with an increasingly green world! Now let’s go and eat some ribs!
According to the WHO, tobacco use accounts for about 2.6 million tons of CO2 emissions and 5.2 million tons of methane. How about you worry about non-productive means of reducing CO2 emissions before you worry about other things. So, bugger off!!
Do not blame the crops nor the meat.
In the old days, befor humans began to use the stored fossile energy, the only energy ressource was basically the Sun and the number of carbon atoms circulating in the Earth eco system was a constant (largely). What humans did and animals did, did not change this constant, so crops or agricultural product did not produce CO2, that changed that constant. Carbon was either in the air, in the ocean, in the plants or in the animals/humans circulating all the time. That is why agriculture and agrculture products have no effect on the CO2 level PERIOD. Only if new carbon atoms are introduced to the system there is a possebility for a higher CO2-level, and that is where fertilizers made by use of fossile energy, and oil used for machines, comes in, in modern time. The use of fossils is what to blame agriculture products for – if there is something to blame them for. The higher Carbon atom constant will fertilize the Eart – both more CO2 in the air and later more humus in the soil. Plant more trees to push that process.
Re: Carbon was either in the air, in the ocean, in the plants or in the animals/humans circulating all the time.
Hmm…..you missed fully 50% of where dynamic carbon resides
Today:
Plants/animals ~ 600 GT carbon
Atmosphere ~ 800 GT carbon
Ocean surface waters ~1,000 GT carbon
Top 1 meter of soil ~ 2,300 GT carbon
Soil’s carbon levels are directly impacted by agriculture. Plowing, leaving land bare, over-grazing, and under-grazing all trigger carbon levels in soil to fall. 40% of the world’s land is agricultural, so it impacts that 2,300 GT significantly.
The reason agriculture is so important is a 10% increase of 2,300 GT equates to all the “legacy” CO2 currently in the atmosphere.
A 10% decrease equates to doubling all the “legacy” CO2 in the atmosphere.
So yes: if you want to study carbon movement through the dynamic repositories, you have to study agriculture.
That in the soil I regarded as plant and animal stuff, at least it comes from that, but OK!
Thanks for posting the 2,300GT carbon in top soil. I was always curious about that after someone mentioned land use change and rising CO2 might be correlated. The start year for the CO2 “crisis” is usually around 1850 and California was founded that year which I found odd. A lot of western states obtained statehood shortly thereafter which means they had a stable population that was probably opening up virgin soil to the atmosphere. Laying conditions for the faster aerobic to break down soil. Add to that some plants like one carbon isotope more than others and you have an interesting mix of conditions that might change the atmosphere noticeably.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsidence
https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-1-4615-1785-6_6
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isotopic_signature
The fundamental date of interest is World War 2.
The world created massive munitions factories that absolutely nothing to do after WW2 ended.
They were converted to nitrogen fertilizer plants.
We’ve all been taught that was the greatest thing to hit the 20th century, but it also triggered the movement from traditional agriculture that depended on healthy soil to modern agriculture that can grow food in hydrophonic farms.
A 21st century farmer can grow a crop in just plain dirt. And many do.
The lack of attention to soil health has triggered a massive reduction in soil organic matter (SOM) over the last 75 years. SOM is ~50 carbon by weight, so we have witnessed a massive movement of carbon from agricultural land to the atmosphere/ocean. Maybe more than from fossil fuels over the same 75 years.
Bjarne
I think you are overlooking something. In order to promote “a crisis intervention” you should focus on one side of an equation. You will never gain power and influence if you insist on such a balanced perspective.
Fertilizers are key to improving agricultural productivity. There is plenty of carbon to go around. Effective agriculture allows the biome to recycle the carbon atoms at a higher rate for even more efficiency.
Fertilizer works on another third of the equation- nitrogen. Fertilizers are so effective because there is a dearth of nitrogen compounds in the soil. The natural sources seem to be pretty much limited to recycling manure and lightning. There are very effective but energy intense chemical processes to make NH3, ammonia fertilizer. The process is pretty efficient because plants don’t need large amounts. 2-3lb/acre is a typical usage rate.
There are ways to improve the soil. I’ve seen several articles on how native peoples used charcoal and smashed pottery as a major soil amendment in the Amazon jungle. The Amazon is pretty much a desert where the vegetation recycles everything to keep the jungle going. The soil conditioning turn the poor jungle soil into deep beds of highly fertile soil.
Of course the final third is water. Not much can easily be grown in a desert.
Doesn’t eating more legumes create more, not less, greenhouse gas. Beanz meanz fartz.
Agreed, David. I’d rather have the methane produced out in a farmer’s field than indoors at home or in a restaurant.
Regards,
Bob
Is it that hard to conceptualize how carbon dioxide could increase and in turn fertilize a greening (that doesn’t keep pace with the CO2)?
Two seconds of googling suggest your article is just disingenuous trolling. https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2016/carbon-dioxide-fertilization-greening-earth
Beans, beans, the musical fruit
The more you eat, the more you toot
The more you toot, the better you feel
So we have beans at every meal!
Eric Worrall wrote:
“Frankly I don’t see a case for radical global land use change and massive government intervention, as the IPCC seems to be advocating.”
That is correct Eric – thank you.
But this “climate emergency” fraud has ever been about the climate.
Jul 04, 2019
THE COST TO SOCIETY OF RADICAL ENVIRONMENTALISM
By Allan M.R. MacRae, B.A.Sc., M.Eng.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/07/04/the-cost-to-society-of-radical-environmentalism/
1. Introduction.
Ever wonder why extremists attack honest scientists who oppose global warming and climate change hysteria? Ever wonder why climate extremists refuse to debate the science?
It is because global warming and climate change alarmism was never about the science – it was always a false narrative, a smokescreen for the totalitarian objectives of the extreme left.
The novel “Nineteen Eighty-Four”, written by George Orwell in 1949, foresaw a time “when much of the world has fallen victim to perpetual war, omnipresent government surveillance, historical negationism and propaganda”. It now appears that Orwell had remarkable foresight.
Here is the real “Nineteen Eighty-Four”, an interview that year with ex-KGB officer and Soviet defector Yuri Bezmenov, who described their long-term program to ideologically undermine the western democracies. Jump to 1:07:30 for Bezmenov’s discussion of “ideological subversion”. It is all about manipulating the “useful idiots” – the pro-Soviet leftists within the democracies.
One commenter on the video wrote: “this is crazy, almost everything predicted by this guy is already happening.” Bernie Sanders, AOC and other socialist-Democrats are openly saying what Bezmenov predicted decades ago. The last democracies are under attack by leftist extremists.
All over the world, countries that once had a future have fallen into dictatorship, poverty and misery. It is notable that of the ~167 large countries in the world, most are totalitarian states, and all but “the chosen few” citizens of these countries suffer under brutal leftist dictatorships.
Radical greens have used wildly exaggerated stories of runaway global warming and climate change to stampede the gullible, in order to achieve their political objectives. The greens claim to be pro-environment, but their policies have done enormous environmental damage. Radical greens have also been destructive to humanity, causing millions of deaths.
Eric Worrall wrote:
“Frankly I don’t see a case for radical global land use change and massive government intervention, as the IPCC seems to be advocating.”
No of course you wouldn’t, the blinkered can’t, let alone those who exclusively inhabit their own personal echo-chamber.
Amazon deforestation back up to 3000sq km pa mainly caused by cattle ranching expansion.
http://deforestationapes.weebly.com/uploads/2/0/2/3/20236969/1313426_orig.png
so?
You don’t think there will be any repercussions if we mine the Amazon for hamburger?
“Deforestation of the Amazon is about to reach a threshold beyond which the region’s tropical rainforest may undergo irreversible changes that transform the landscape into degraded savanna with sparse, shrubby plant cover and low biodiversity.”
https://phys.org/news/2018-03-amazon-deforestation.html
(So) we trash the Amazon.
“We are ABOUT to reach a THRESHOLD that MAY result in IRREVERSIBLE…”
Translations:
“We don’t know anything, but we are terribly insecure and deathly afraid of change! If you don’t immediately restore the universe to the exact way it was when I last fell asleep in the safety of my mommy’s arms, I will throw a tantrum!”
Will there be any repercussions? Probably, but no worse then the repercussions for de-foresting Europe or N. America.
Far more “Damage”to the Amazon is from Palm Oil Plantations for Biofuel production to appease the Big Green Machine. Cattle elimination would only serve to remove a vital food source from the local populace.
Loydo,
do you realize the Amazon was nearly wiped out by the last Glaciation phase, the world rolled on and no tsunami wave of deaths showed up.
A belief, and it is belief, not reality; that ignores the original uses and populations that lived and farmed the Amazon before Conquistadors brought European disease.
So, grow up and read some Amazon history.
Ignoring for the moment that a third of anthropenic CO2 emission come from forest clearing…
Bryan A
Far more “Damage”to the Amazon is from Palm Oil Plantations for Biofuel production to appease the Big Green Machine.
No Bryan, have a look at the link above.
Sunsettommy
“nearly wiped out”
The jury is still out on that. For example this study suggests otherwise.
“the Amazon lowlands remained under forest throughout a glacial cycle”
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0277379199000591?via%3Dihub
Are you suggesting it doesn’t matter?
ATheoK, I hope this helps.
Rainforest-initiated wet season onset over the southern Amazon
From the abstract:
“Although it is well established that transpiration contributes much of the water for rainfall over Amazonia” Up to 75%.
“rainforest transpiration enables an increase of shallow convection that moistens and destabilizes the atmosphere during the initial stages of the dry-to-wet season transition. This shallow convection moisture pump (SCMP) preconditions the atmosphere at the regional scale for a rapid increase in rain-bearing deep convection, which in turn drives moisture convergence and wet season onset 2–3 mo before the arrival of the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ).”
https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2017/07/19/1621516114/tab-figures-data
Raze how much beofre there is not enough left?
Loydo is one of those people who belives that once a piece of the Amazon is deforested, it remains deforested for eternity.
In his world, nature is incapable of recovering by itself.
Local land use. Global solutions. Local heating. Global [average] warming.
A pattern of abuse is becoming quite evident.
Loydo
Humankind has not cut down two continents the size of mainland USA worth of trees in 35 years. That’s the land area increased atmospheric CO2 has generated, all of it virgin, according to NASA.
And in terms of human induced greening:
“China and India—the world’s most populous countries—are leading the increase in greening on land. The effect comes mostly from ambitious tree-planting programs in China and intensive agriculture in both countries.” https://tinyurl.com/y6jtuhyr
Impressive, innit.
“Humankind has not cut down two continents the size of mainland USA worth of trees in 35 years.”
I never said it did.
“Impressive, innit.” Amazing what a trace gas can do.
Are you as impressed at CO2 induced warming as CO2 induced greening?
CO2 induced greening has been observed.
CO2 induced warming is still theoretical.
Lol. Dude it was a trick question.
Loydo
There is no such thing as atmospheric CO2 induced warming as no one in the history of mankind has ever demonstrated it by empirical means. Many have tried and all have failed.
Global greening is the ONLY, observable, direct effect of increased atmospheric CO2. Nothing else, even in your convoluted distortions of proxies.
So I am supposed to give up my Made in the USA hamburgers because Brazil is doing something stupid?
That is generally how it translates, some country is doing something so it’s your fault and send more money.
Typo correction
But this “climate emergency” fraud has NEVER been about the climate.
You just saved my day, thanks!
They’re just a short hop, skip, and a jump away from Soylent Green.
If they want to reduce food waste, they might want to start with changing some government regulations.
We/West need to take the gloves off with the UN/IPCC. They are promoting ideology and that is clearly out of their mission. We need someone with balls to call them out. Hmmmm….
Free up land for … marijuana?
In any good scheme of food production, ruminants will have a role to play. Simply put, they convert green stuff you cannot eat into high quality stuff you can. The notion that cattle produce methane is absurd. If the animals did not eat the grass and metabolize to methane, then bacteria, ants, and termites (and who knows what else) would. It is simply part of the grassland cycle. The carbon must come from somewhere and must go somewhere. Most grazing lands are not suitable for agriculture anyway. Forcing the end of cattle production decreases a vital part of food production to no good purpose.
Then we have this gem”
Let’s break it down.
“recognition of customary tenure” – Land Ownership, interesting they could not come out and say it.
“redistribution, decentralisation, co-management” – All ways of taking the land from the current owners and “redistributing” it.
This redistribution transformed Rhodesia from the Breadbasket of Africa into Zimbabwe and it’s famines.
The same thing is currently going on in South Africa and having the same results. Wait a few more years.
Interesting that the people who could not bring themselves to say “Land Ownership” found three ways to say this.
Tony,
Your comments about ruminants might be correct but you are missing the point that at present
we do not have a “good scheme of food production”. Globally fully a third of crop land is used to produce
feed for livestock (mainly cows). In countries like the US cows are eating food that could be directly
used to feed humans (mainly soy and corn). Producing beef if incredibly wasteful in terms of water
and food required which is one of the reasons it has always been high status food and hence desirable
(plus it tastes great).
The IPCC report is commonsense — there is no way the earth can sustain a system where everybody eats the same as the average citizen of the USA.
“The IPCC report is commonsense — there is no way the earth can sustain a system where everybody eats the same as the average citizen of the USA.”
Then each country/region adapts to what it can produce and trade ensures that everyone gets what they want. A region that can produce something because it has a lot of water is not hurting a region that doesn’t have sufficient water. What you’re suggesting – something can’t be done anywhere because it can’t be done everywhere – is the opposite of common sense.
Farms/Ranches run like White Oak Pastures in Georgia (Google it, it is much studied) are seeing a cattle density of just over one head of cattle per acre of land. That ranch is self-sufficient for food. No corn/soy/hay/etc. is brought in from off the farm.
Their farm is 3,000 acres. That includes the pasture and the farm land to raise supplemental food. They maintain 3,000 head of cattle in the farm.
There is ~7.5 billion acres of range land globally. That’s plenty of room for cattle once best practice cattle management is brought to bear.
The Savory Institute is a global effort to educate farmers/ranchers on how to genetically increase cattle stocking rates. White Oak Pastures is a Savory Hub site and their activities are well documented. In fact a team of researchers monitored their 2017 activities in great detail.
The findings were impressive from all sides.
Iaak: “In countries like the US cows are eating food that could be directly
used to feed humans (mainly soy and corn). Producing beef if incredibly wasteful in terms of water
and food required which is one of the reasons it has always been high status food and hence desirable
(plus it tastes great).”
Where do you live? How involved in agriculture are you?
Here in the US most cattle are raised on grass. Grain is only used to “finish” off cattle before they are butchered. That is also true in South America and China. As near as I can determine the same feed cycle is used in Africa. It is only in Europe that cattle are fed otherwise because of the lack of large pastures.
I continually marvel at what myths exist in society about agriculture.
Re: Here in the US most cattle are raised on grass. Grain is only used to “finish” off cattle before they are butchered.
That is the last 1/3rd of their life.
And calves don’t eat all that much in the first third of their life, agreed.
As an educated guess, beef cattle typically get less than 1/2 their lifetime calories from grass, and my best guess would be about 1/3rd from grass.
Made that one up all by yourself, huh?
Utter nonsense.
The last few weeks, cattle may have their silage augmented with grain to ‘fatten’ them and improve meat marbling.
Ungulates with complicated stomach systems do not remain healthy long on grain diets. Far too much fermentation in their upper stomachs.
Nor is your “educated guess, beef cattle typically get less than 1/2 their lifetime calories from grass” educated at all! Sheer inanity is a better description.
Cattle around here are raised entirely on grass until they are sold to the stockyard or sent to the butcher.
Stock yards are not farms! They do not make money by feeding cattle long!
Winter silage is typically dried meadow grass, timothy and perhaps some alfalfa. Farmers who do not plow their corn stalks under might us corn stalks and dried corn leaves in their silage. Otherwise plowing the corn stalks under improves the soil.
Milk cows are never fed corn, wheat or oats. The dairy farme already has enough trouble keeping them healthy and producing milk! Their feed, when they are not grazing outside the barn, is dried meadow grass and timothy and perhaps a bit of alfalfa
Their feed may also include leaves from root crops, e.g. turnips and beets.
ATeoK,
In the US the typical beef cow or steer goes to a feedlot as a yearling (10-14 months old).
They stay there until they are 16-20 months old at which point they are slaughtered.
The whole point of a US feedlot is to convert a healthy fit yearling into an obese monster animal that will produce more pounds of steak.
The yearling will almost double its weight in the feedlot. That doesn’t happen in 2 weeks.
The entire time they are in the feedlot is called the finishing stage.
AtheoK:
+1.
Do the urban elites even know what a hay bale looks like?
How on Earth do you know that??
Paul R. Ehrlich wrote in “The Population Bomb” that we would all be dead of starvation and famine by 1990. It made him rich and famous.
Meanwhile Norman Borlaug, the “Father of the Green Revolution”, was changing the world. What he did was largely to bring modern agricultural practices to the third world. He changed everything.
Looks like Ehrlich did not notice what Borlaug was up to. How about that.
(After a long, slow start the Green Revolution was Roaring ahead, just as Ehrlich published his book. Ehrlich did not see because he did not want to see.)
Nonetheless, Ehrlich’s Doomsday Prophesy is what still informs the UN and IPCC reports.
It is often said that one third of world food production goes to waste. This is true. But the implication is that the cause is wasteful American consumers. This is false. The true cause is that one third of world crops is lost to vermin, which is to say insects and rodents. This is due to a lack of proper storage facilities and capacity. You fix this and you fix another big chunk of the problem.
TonyL wrote:
“It is often said that one third of world food production goes to waste. This is true. But the implication is that the cause is wasteful American consumers. This is false. The true cause is that one third of world crops is lost to vermin, which is to say insects and rodents. This is due to a lack of proper storage facilities and capacity. You fix this and you fix another big chunk of the problem.”
I believe you are correct Tony. If we were take a fraction of the money squandered on green energy fiascos, invest those funds in millions of vermin-proof food storage systems, and distribute them around the world, I believe we could go a long away to solving world hunger.
Take a few more squandered green energy dollars and invest in clean water and sanitation systems and install them in every village in the world, and save millions of children’s lives – who die every year from contaminated drinking water.
Take a few more wasted green energy dollars and stamp out malaria, as was done at relatively low cost in Europe and North America using DDT.
As I have said before, the greens and their political allies cannot have been this stupid for this long – they have a covert agenda, and it’s not about the environment – it is about politics – totalitarian control of our energy and our freedoms by the extreme left.
ALLAN MACRAE
I’m not sure I buy this concept of rodents eating a third of food.
I reckon much of this idea emerged from the EU where consumers supposedly demanded that carrots look like the ones Bugs Bunny eats, banana’s are bent like the ones the monkeys eat and potatoes are round like…..well, I don’t have a reason for that one. However, the upshot was, tons of perfectly good produce was either dumped, or sent for animal feed because it didn’t conform to what the EU thought the public wanted.
Similarly, EU fisheries regulations, designed by bureaucrats, not fishermen, saw decades when fish caught that exceeded a quota were simply dumped overboard, dead; so the fishermen weren’t fined when they reached port. Nor was it a secret, everyone knew it was going on.
And I wonder if the cattle slaughtered en mass in the UK, thanks to TB spread by Badgers that the greens battle to protect from culling, again, for decades, count in that 30% of food wasted?
I believe the concept of wasted food is largely a myth concocted to cover for bureaucratic incompetence.
Hi HotScot – not my area of study, but I believe there is huge loss of food related to:
– vermin – rats etc eating food stores. My home province Alberta is deemed rat-free – although this requires constant defensive action at our borders – we recently defeated a socialist government that did significant harm to our economy.
– simple waste of food in the “manufacturing process” such as you have described above, often driven by excessive regulation, appearance, etc., although much of this goes to feed livestock.
– stale-dating of food in supermarkets, although much of this goes to homeless shelters.
– simple food waste in homes and institutions, where it is now deemed a virtue to leave food uneaten on your plate.
laak is anti-biodiversity…wants only corn, soy beans and homo sapiens…no more cows and the pasture land full of the diverse flora and fauna that comes with…ferget the bales…save the cows!
Actually, it would be trivially easy for the earth to produce enough food to feed all of us.
All we have to do is get the greenies out of the way and allow all farmers to use the best technology.
Last I checked we are all being fed.
NEWSFLASH!
The Earth is already feeding everyone alive, as it always has.
Duh!
And the number one good related is due is too many people are too fat!
The idea that there is not enough land to feed is all adequately is patent nonsense promulgated by alarmist nincompoops.
Good production continues to increase far faster than population.
Nicholas McGinley
Not many fat people in Africa.
Utter nonsense.
Unless, you personally like eating coarse grass and bitter weeds for food.
Farmers raise what their land and climate is good enough to raise, and that they can raise sustainably for generations.
Only urbanites insulated away from working the land for a living believe all land is equally arable and that nutritious to humans’ food can be raised there. They’re collectively idiots when it comes to farming.
Capitalism drives what farmers raise beyond their needs. A far better scheme, by far, than the silliness you are spouting.
Which is a major reason why the world’s populations, that silly desk farmers have been predicting for decades will outgrow our ability to feed them, are getting fed better than ever before!
AtheoK:
Another +1!
From memory Medium Confidence is defined by the IPCC as 50/50 – or in plain English “We don’t know, it might or it might not”
Yep – “medium confidence” is so they don’t have to say “uncertain”.
or “inconclusive”
If medium confidence is – 50:50 chance it’s right then “high confidence” must be it’s more likely (in our biased judgement) to be right than wrong.
So am I write in these translations
IPCC “Medium confidence” = Sceptic “BS”
IPCC “High confidence” = Sceptic “probably deluded”
IPCC “Very high confidence” = Sceptic “cannot be totally ruled out”
IPCC “Very Very Very Very high confidence” = Sceptic probably true but still up for debate
Remember, Mike Haseler (Scottish Sceptic):
Those confidences were written by the diplomats.
Accuracy, truth, facts all had zero influence over the final determinations of confidence levels. The diplomats insisted on the confidence levels that would best aid them with their desired audiences and funders.
Leaving the best definition for “IPCC “Very Very Very Very high confidence” is closer to “= pure belief, but dictated by political and NGO fools”
It’s just as likely to be true as it is false. The precautionary principle advises us to join a revolution.
I recall Judith Curry also pointing out that a conclusion of ‘just as likely to not happen as it is to happen’ isn’t much to shout about.
It certainly wouldn’t get you published in the real science journals I have read.
I tried to google “medium confidence”, but amazingly, I have found no definition with quantification.
UN pronouncements amounts to “Do as I tell you not as I do.”
The ideal ‘balanced’ diet for all is what the UN-IPCC has at any of it conferences, and what is served within the restaurants and eateries of the UN buildings. Everyone should have diets like UN scámmers.
Analysis of the last UN-IPCC meeting in Katowice, Poland was shown to very meat heavy…
It is only a few weeks since the publication of a study by James Cook University in Australia which found that the Increased Greening (circa 20%) from higher CO2 levels meant that plants and trees were now removing More CO2 each year than mankind was putting into the atmosphere !
Interesting conundrum for the IPCC …… but I’m sure they’ll find an imaginative and creative way to somehow find a massive global problem in that ……..
Old England: that JCU paper is brilliant – if burning fossil fuels has caused increased CO2 that then makes plants and trees grow faster, causing them to remove more CO2 from the atmosphere than the fossil fuels caused in the first place, then they have discovered a great new negative feedback mechanism of such power that we no longer have to stop using fossil fuels and no longer need to subsidise wind and solar generation, or send money to the UN! Fantastic news – your job is done, Mr Watts!
Can you post a link to this paper? In the main body of this UN report ( section 2.3) there is an interesting table detailing emissions and sinks over the last 50 years.
Interestingly land and ocean sinks have tripled since the 60’s decade. However there is no real discussion about why this is happening. Obviously the world is not just greening but the foliage must be getting more dense. Of course admitting this would destroy the meme of increasing desertification.
Can you provide a link to this paper from James Cook University please?
I have to admire them. They can say, in the very same paragraph, that “insecurity in land tenure” is bad for productivity – and then just a little bit later advocate for redistribution (the MAIN factor driving land tenure insecurity in much of the world) as a productivity booster!
I just would not be able to manage that with a straight face.
Private ownership of land is generally highly beneficial to a country’s agricultural production if the private owner is the farmer. Also, if the downstream distribution chain is not functional, farmers will find a way to get their produce to market, curing another common systemic issue. However errors have been made, typically by socialist governments, in ejecting farmers from their land and redistributing to people who aren’t capable of running the farm.
Private ownership of land is generally highly beneficial to a country’s agricultural production if the private owner is the farmer.
If it is a goliath agribusiness then you’re screwed and so is your land and your biodiversity and your water and your food quality and…
And guess who owns the farm these days?
@Loydo
“… goliath agribusiness …”
Apparently you never labored in a Soviet kolkhoz.
No, but I have owned a farm.
Loydo,
There are lost of long-distance farm owners today. Most of them have never actually worked the farm. Is this what you are?
Tim, I used to own and run a 2ha certified organic market garden from very close proximity.
Loydo,
So you *ran* a 5 acre organic farm? What does “running” an organic farm mean actually? Did you get your hands dirty every day? And what does that have to do with your comment about cattle anyway? Did yo own a cow you let wander through the garden eating it and naturally fertilizing it?
Like other leftists, Loydo actually believes that big is always bad, unless it’s government.
Actual data not needed or appreciated.
“Actual data not needed or appreciated.”
Nice motto, no seriously. I’ve probably read hundreds of your posts and I’ve never seen you post a single datum of information, just these meaningless banalities.
I guess I should thank you; you are obviously unaware but each time you post you help support my arguments.
Loydo
“No, but I have owned a farm.”
This is the internet and I can lie as well as you can.
More to the point, I asked Loydo if he had worked in a Soviet collective farm (‘kolkhoz’). And he replied that he owned and “ran” a 5-acre ‘market garden’. As if they were comparable.
Should we assume that Loydo (like Lenin) ran his ‘kolhoz’ according to Lenin’s own ruthless principles? (These are quotations from Lenin’s speeches and writings):
“A lie told often enough becomes the truth.”
“The goal of socialism is communism.”
“The press should be not only a collective propagandist and a collective agitator, but also a collective organizer of the masses.”
“There are no morals in politics; there is only expedience.”
“A scoundrel may be of use to us just because he is a scoundrel.”
“A revolution is impossible without a revolutionary situation.”
“While the State exists there can be no freedom; when there is freedom there will be no State.”
“Give me four years to teach the children and the seed I have sown will never be uprooted.”
Vladimir Lenin started the kolkhoz movement, as a means to control the country and reduce the power of the farmers (‘kulaks’), who had been quite wealthy and successful, even after the revolution.
Stalin succeeded Lenin in 1924 (probably murdered him)and managed to make Lenin look like a pussycat in comparison. He ordered the ‘liquidation’ of the kulaks and complete seizure of their lands and wealth. 3 million kulaks were literally starved to death
https://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/08/health/research/lenins-death-remains-a-mystery-for-doctors.html
https://www.rbth.com/multimedia/history/2017/08/25/collectivization-in-the-ussr-how-the-russian-peasantry-was-smashed_828512
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dekulakization
The Soviets (under the guidance of Trofim Lysenko) even created their own false genetics theory and declared it settled science. Anyone who dared “den*y” this theory was sent to jail. Or worse. (Sound familiar?)
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/12/trofim-lysenko-soviet-union-russia/548786/
So, yes western-style ‘goliath agribusiness’ may not be perfect. But the Soviet-style “Big State” alternative is far, far worse.
“The argument boils down to how much of it is due to relatively recent anthropogenic increases of atmospheric carbon dioxide compared with the Earth’s natural climate fluctuations caused by other factors including solar activity.”
The answer to this question is less than 5%. See Harde 2019 and Berry 2019 to understand that fossil fuel emissions have only accounted for about 5% of the rise in atmospheric CO2. SO if CO2 was responsible for all of the temperature rise (highly unlikely) we are on for .05X .8C or .04 C . Changing my eating habits will not help cool the earth.
Indigo Agriculture has launched what they call the Terraton Initiative.
https://www.indigoag.com/the-terraton-initiative
You should expect that to be a major global initiative going forward. Some facts:
– the term of art is “regenerative agriculture”. There are pure crop based techniques, pure grazing techniques, and hybrid techniques.
– there are at least 2 new regenerative agriculture certifications. One is all inclusive, one focuses exclusively on using grazing animals (cows, sheep, goats, etc).
– Both of the certifying bodies require 3rd party verification that soil health is improved by the farm/ranch. The measure of soil health used is the density of SOM (soil organic matter). SOM is ~50% carbon.
– Indigo Ag had 1.5% of US cropland (r.8 million acres) submitted for inclusion in their initiative in the first 6 weeks. June 15 -> July 31. This first submission period is open until October, so it could easily be 5% of US cropland submitted to the initiative in the first year.
– One of Indigo’s biggest innovations is a nationwide network of people in the field measuring soil carbon levels.
– Indigo is guaranteeing farmers $15/tonne CO2e build-up in their soil. Most farmers using a combination of no-till farming and off-season cover crops are seeing 2-10 tonnes CO2e/acre. That maybe enough to accelerate the transition of farmers to the new regenerative agriculture paradigm.
– soil with higher SOM levels is more tolerant to drought and heavy rain
– farmers using best practice regenerative agriculture techniques are seeing manor reductions in the need for fertilizer and pesticides. (Herbicide usage is often not reduced, but with some techniques is.)
– the Chesapeake Bay is coming back to health. Regenerative Agriculture techniques are given much of the credit.
It is hard to work out aspects of the general thrust to increase soil carbon. A crude way would be to grind up coal and spread it. But that is silly. So, you have to watch where the carbon is coming from. Logically, it could be any source that has a pathway leading to more CO2 in the air. One can imagine candidates like animal carcasses after the abbatoir, agricultural crops like wheat after the grain has been stripped, human waste after it has been through the treatment plant to recover useful water, and so on. One can envisage many candidates, but it must come down to detailed process economics to create best priorities, like a triage system.
The problems do not stop after the top C sources have been identified.
What happens to soil carbon in natural, undisturbed cases? It often seems to find a sort of equilibrium value somewhere around a few % of the dry weight. Frankly, I do not know the controlling or limiting factors. I do not know of ways to (say) double the total organic carbon of a typical soil by economically favourable management ideas. Those promoting management to give better TOC need more publicity of more widespread examples.
Some say that agricultural soils with enhanced TOC will usually grow crops with higher yield. That is usually in terms of a weight yield, like more bushels of wheat per acre, when we need to be looking at the carbon cycle changes. How much carbon is taken away with that extra yield? Is it pretty much a 1 for 1 equation, where kilogram of TOC added to the soil goes off to market as a kilogram of heavier product? Or does the enhanced TOC act more like a catalyst, enabling higher crop yields while staying behind in the soil after harvest?
(I worked at CSIRO as a young post grad, studying concepts like this, then did several more years of soil testing, lab style. I have kept generally abreast of these topics, so the need to ask questions about basics is probably my problem. But then, I have seen next to no depth of analysis of these topics in my daily scientific reading and would have expected more. So where is the best reading to be found? By best, I exclude organic farming papers with their origins of burying animal skulls at selected phases of the moon. Geoff S
Geoff,
I don’t know if you kept up, but in the last 25 years the science of the carbon life-cycle in soil has totally changed. As in pre-1996 knowledge has almost been turned upside down.
The carbon life cycle in natural environments as now known to 21st century soil scientists:
– plants consume CO2 and make a liquid carbohydrate out of it
– plants convert part (50% or less) of that liquid carbohydrate to a variation desirable to soil organisms
– in exchange for soil nutrients gathered by soil organisms, plants feed them the liquid carbohydrate. Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) are the most important soil organism, but there are many others. AMF exclusively consumes root exudates for its food source.
– AMF grows rapidly and produces a large number of hyphae. A major protein in the hyphae is the glomalin protein, often called GRP – glomalin-related proteins in scientific papers.
– AMF sloughs of the hyphae at high rates (humans slough off skin every second of the day).
– GRP are extremely durable and extremely sticky
– GRP take 7-42 years to break down in the soil after the hyphae have been sloughed off
– GRP attach to other SOM (soil organic matter) and form aggregates
– The aggregates have significant pore spaces where water and even more SOM can accumulate
– GRP also stick to each other and form a protective barrier (skin?) around the aggregates and protect the aggregate from both erosion and microbial decay.
– the soil aggregates are thus highly durable as a standalone entity
– the soil aggregates become a higher and higher percentage of the soil over the course of time
Pristine native prairies when buffalo still roamed had SOM levels around 7%.
Most US cropland is now 1-2% SOM. That’s because plowing fields kills off the AMF and interrupts the above process
The Terraton Initiative is all about focusing on the above cycle and leveraging it to re-establish global SOM levels in cropland at least twice what they are today.
Step 1 is to eliminate plowing of fields. 75% of US cropland is no longer plowed (intensively filled) per the 2017 USDA 100% farm census.
Greg Freemyer
“The carbon life cycle in natural environments as now known to 21st century soil scientists:”
Riiiight……Like the concept of a flat earth was known to man.
Like farmers believed, with the best science available at the time, that ploughing fields was the best farming method.
What will the next generation of ‘the best science available’ reveal?
Talking of water loss especially in Australia always blamed on mining when it’s more likely to be farming of non-native, water hungry crops like cotton and rice IMO. Australia is in an odd position with lots of water available in the west and not enough in the east.
Same happens in Chile, we have LOTS of water down south and not enough in productive areas in the central region, zones that are prone to drought too (as we’re experiencing this year after 3 good ones, sadly). We haven’t implemented the right water infraestructure yet to tackle this, but I think we’re taking good steps towards it. I hope!
Ironically too, the massive planting of Australian eucalyptus and American pines that took place from the late XIX century onwards didn’t help, as they suck water like nothing else. We have realized the mistake that was and now the public policy is to plant native trees only, as they are more resilient to water shortages.
Lastly, the appetite for avocados that started globally in the past decades has been terrible for otherwise productive agriculture areas in the northern parts of the central region; the big avocado plantations have taken up most of the water there, with terrible effects to small farmers. Vegans keep on saying eating only plants has *no* pernicious effects on the environment, but cases like disproportionate avocado planting here in Chile give the example that that isn’t the case at all. You have be careful not to overdo it, just like with any other food source
I could take a 170km drive today and not pass a single field with cattle in. All crops. No arguments that cows fart a lot, but the idea you can give up all that protein, swap it out to non meat sources and NOT increase deforestation while that deficit is saught to be cancelled out is just fiction. At best, and I really mean at best, there could be a case for promoting less farty (sorry) animals over others.
That’s
The UN is a totalitarian socialist organization. Why are the western democracies, members of this seedy excuse for world government?
Kroger was having a big sale on steak. I bought 9 sirloin strip steaks for $5.99/lbs to celebrate the UN report.
Who makes us tolerate these sinister (sinistral?) people? When the Iron Curtain came down freedom rushed in, but apparatchiks with a plan and infinite patience also quietly came out and moved up the ranks of academia, institutions, technical societies, government … etc. Their workover of the UN and enviro NGOs was a brilliant stroke. Look at the anti- science in the manifestoes on climate change by the American Physical Society, American Geophysical ‘Union’ (no less!) , Medical, Chemical…. etc.
A nation of chess players probably sacrificed its pawn, Gorbachev as its opening gambit. The West may be the most productive and inventive area on the planet but we dont seem to be the smartest. The gulibility is pandemic. The droves of useful idiots in the West even surprised Lenin and despite the killing of 50 million of their own people, the useful idiots now make up a sizeable part of population in the West.
The world seems to be waking up with the successes of political parties that want their countries back. I see desperation in the IPCC’s recent hysteria and those of other ‘occupied’ institutions. I think they know it’s over.
Gary,
In the eventual analysis of the global warming hypothesis in the broad, global sense, the failure of the Learned Societies to conduct adequate Due Diligence will be highlighted as a major deficiency.
It astounds me that, with each passing year offering a chance to redeem, there is no evidence of efforts to do do. Geoff S
You are correct Gary. Here is more evidence:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/05/25/sciences-untold-scandal-the-lockstep-march-of-professional-societies-to-promote-the-climate-change-scare/
[excerpts]
But things are different now. Whether it be chemistry, physics, geology or engineering, many of the world’s primary professional societies have changed from being paragons of technical virtue to opportunistic groups focused on maximizing their members’ financial gains in support of the climate scare, the world’s greatest science fraud. In particular, they continue to promote the groundless hypothesis that carbon dioxide emitted as a result of mankind’s use of fossil fuels is leading to environmental catastrophe. You have been hearing about it for the past decade and more, with 21 candidates for the Democratic nomination for the presidency in the next election promoting some form of a Green New Deal—a plan to eliminate the use of fossil fuels and replace them with wind and solar power thereby returning society to the lifestyle of the 1880s.
Dr. Patrick Moore, a co-founder of Greenpeace, wrote in 1994 that radical greens had taken over the organization after the fall of the Berlin Wall, leaving him no choice but to resign. The takeover of environmental institutions by extremists is now almost complete, the most important of which may be the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). President Donald Trump is aggressively trying to win back the EPA in the best interests of the nation, but it is an uphill battle as the climate cult has also taken control of academia, political parties, and governments themselves.
…
Another reader commented:
“The long march through the Institutions” as proposed by the Frankfurt school back in the 1930s was launched knowing it would be a generations long policy. Here we are three generations on and they have now taken control of all the western institutions as planned. The socialists do not stop just because their prime construct, the USSR failed in 1990. They regard that failure as simply work in progress. The climate as a tool which can never be tamed, was a genuine piece of strategic genius by the COGS (constantly offended green socialists). They will not stop. The destruction of humanity is too big a prize, they view this activity as pressing the Earth’s reset button.
_________________
Bjorn Lomborg takes down the report:
“Vegetarianism as Climate Virtue Signaling: First World solipsism misses the point of a new U.N. report.” By Bjorn Lomborg on Aug. 8, 2019
https://www.wsj.com/articles/vegetarianism-as-climate-virtue-signaling-11565301932
Excerpts:
pundits are fixating on the supposed need for people in rich countries to change their dining habits radically. This is an ineffective and unachievable policy response. It relies on a 2016 paper that finds if the entire world switched to a vegan diet, giving up dairy and eggs as well as meat—what the U.N. calls the “most extreme scenario”—food-related greenhouse-gas emissions could be cut by up to 70%. This sounds more impressive than it is: Only a seventh of all emissions are food-related. Besides, the estimate also assumes that “people consume just enough calories to maintain a healthy body weight.”
Rather than false hopes about dietary change, the focus should be on improving agricultural practices. First, organic food is bad for sustainability. A 2017 paper found organic farming takes 70% more land on average to produce the same amount of produce as conventional methods.
Second, agricultural yields must increase. The Green Revolution of the 1970s spread fertilizers and modern practices, making a lasting difference in Asia and South America. A second Green Revolution is needed to make agriculture even more efficient.
This means more spending on agricultural research and development … Copenhagen Consensus research estimates that increasing research spending by $8 billion a year would increase crop yields annually by an additional 0.4%. … it would improve food security, reduce prices, and achieve social good worth more than $30 for every dollar invested.
Focusing only on vegetarianism is more about virtue signaling than improving the food system. Instead of shaming people for eating hamburgers, let’s ramp up agricultural R&D.
…ditching non-essential foods…
Less caviar for the UN?
Well, no. Mustn’t be extreme. A reasonable approach is to limit caviar consumption to the UN apparatchiki.
If you see the farmers around where I live in operation you really appreciate the amount of work that they do to bring in a crop. Starting in the early spring they till the soil, then seed and fertilize in one operation with a LARGE tractor pulling an EVEN LARGER Air seeder and fertilizer rig combined. Then maybe once or twice a season spraying for pests or weeds. Then maybe spraying again to force the crop to ripen to allow for custom combining on a set date because the combining crew is scheduled in a certain time frame when they are in the area. All the while hoping for the right amount of rain and temperatures to grow a good crop.
Last year because of the poor forest fighting practices in the neighboring province we were under a heavy smoke cloud for most of the summer and the crops were late due to lack of effective sunshine. The quality of the crop was down 20% from ideal but due to the lack of yield overall the price remained high for the lesser quality.
Now without fossil fuels or chemical fertilizers this type of intensive farming and high yield land use would be IMPOSSIBLE. Add to that the the tractor that is needed for this type of farming runs 1.2 Million dollars and the tricked out air seeder/ fertilizer rig is another 1.3 million dollars. The amount of people involved in this food production process is very low for the yields that are generated. One farmer now supports almost 100,000 people with wheat for a year to make bread for that year. It goes without saying if we STOPPED this type of food generation a lot of people would flat out starve. If these IPCC idiots want to control the way the world produces food I would suggest to all sane people out there to start laying in a years food supply now like a lot of devote Mormons do in case of a major disuption.
Re: Starting in the early spring they till the soil
That is happening less and less!
The USDA’s education efforts have been urging farmers to quit tilling their fields for at least 15 years.
Per the US 100% farm census of 2017, 35% of US cropland overall is now no-till.
75% of the cropland in Tennessee is now no-till.
“If you see the farmers around where I live in operation you really appreciate the amount of work that they do to bring in a crop.”
I have a farmer living near me who raises chickens and cattle and he is the hardest working man I have ever seen. Dawn to dusk, seven days a week, rain or shine, for the last forty years.
Hey look, they have a face-saving contingency waiting in the wings.
https://metro.co.uk/2018/01/02/mini-ice-age-hit-2030-save-us-global-warming-scientists-claim-7196604/
They’ll still claim “it’s consistent with”…………..
“Consistent with” is the mantra of the post-normal and political sciences.
“They” lol.
From the same “they”:
“The moon may have been invaded…”
https://metro.co.uk/2019/08/07/moon-may-invaded-super-tough-creatures-called-tardigrades-water-bears-10531933/?ito=cbshare
About the same level of rigour.
“About the same level of rigour”.
Aye me old mucker, ain’t it all.
@Loydo
“About the same level of rigour.”
Apart from this laughable attempt (by Jasper Hamill) to sensationalize this story (as journalists are wont to do), what part of this story is non-factual? Do dispute that an Israeli spacecraft (named בְּרֵאשִׁית) crashed on the Moon with these creatures on board, in suspended animation?
No Johanus, I was poking fun at the “invaded” tabloid headline.
@Loydo
““The moon may have been invaded…”
Definition invade
(of a parasite or disease) spread into
So Loydo dismisses the “rigor” of the tabloid statement above, yet it is very rigorously true that these nearly indestructible creatures have indeed “invaded” the Moon.
I bet I could destroy one.
“I bet I could destroy one.”
There are several thousand now on the moon, and are nearly microscopic ( down to 0.002″). It would be difficult to _find_ one, assuming their containers were smashed.
But probably not a really big deal, considering that previous manned and unmanned missions from Earth may have already leaked other micro-organisms into the Solar System.
Time will tell.
All these diet changes are just for the peasants, of course. The elites still get to eat what they want, travel wherever they want, live in big houses, etc., as long as they think pure thoughts…bonus points if they buy a hybrid or EV.
George Monbiot is an odious little worm.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-49255642
Cognitive dissonance at its best.
Regards
Climate Heretic
The IPCC hardly have any expertise in the climate (having demonstrated they are incapable of predicting what the climate does … and have to resort to fiddling the data).
For them to now get involved in areas where they are just lay people with ZERO credibility is bizarre and just shows the IPCC is just a political campaigning body with a nano-scopically thin veneer of “science”.
In Summary for Policy Makers ( A2.3) they give four reasons for global ‘greening’. One of them is CO2 fertilisation. That is obviously at too good message for the polititians. That is why they also mention global ‘browning’. But the reason for the browning is not one of the previous four reasons but a fifth. Two different messages put together and compared, just to keep up alarmism.
The USSR and communist China have both tried telling farmers what to grow and how to grow it. It didn’t work out well.
Another holy text from the church of unicorns that will be used by wide-eyed preachers to tell people how to live their lives.
Yet another in the 40 year parade of lies from the UN. Their initial report stated that they
were certain that the Earth was warming due to the “Greenhouse Effect”.
The model used to determine the Greenhouse Effect took the incoming Solar constant
of 1370 Watts per square metre and spread that across the whole spherical surface of the
Earth giving 342.5 W/m^2 as the average irradiance. That is, the model had no night or day
and no polar ice caps or Equatorial tropical zone, simply the same irradiance causing the same
constant temperature everywhere. This means a non-rotating, non-orbiting Earth receiving
equal radiation from all directions of the three dimensional Universe.
This is manifestly different to reality, whereby, at any instant in time there is only one
spot on the surface potentially receiving the full irradiance of 1370 W/m^2. That spot
circumnavigates the globe every 24 hours along a different path each time but always lies
within the Equatorial zone. The remainder of that part of the globe facing the Sun receives the
Solar constant reduced by the sine of the angle of inclination of the surface with respect to the
incoming radiation. This diminishes to zero along the circumference of the plane facing the
Sun and over all of the surface facing away from the Sun. That is, the temperature is always
fluctuating back and forth between daily maxima and minima and these constantly change as
the Earth orbits the Sun.
Astrophysicist Joseph Postma has devised a rational model for the Sun warming the Earth which
gave a result of +15.5 degrees Celsius for the average surface temperature of the Sun-lit side, an
acceptable estimate without invoking a Greenhouse Effect.
In summary, the UN IPCC model defines an isolated sphere in space exhibiting no change in surface temperature whatsoever in marked contrast to the ever-changing temperature both with time and
location across the Earth’s surface.
The contrived 33 degree Kelvin Greenhouse Effect is not a property of the atmosphere but a measure of the bias inherent in the artificial model used to estimate the average temperature of the surface of an
imaginary Earth. There is no “Greenhouse Effect” other than inside a greenhouse and that has nothing to
do with CO2.
1981, and S Schnieder explains how a computer models CO2 induced global warming and the consequential result of 2 degrees.
It would appear that no matter how sophisticated computers have evolved over the years, they have all arrived at the same conclusion as 1981.
– 3.00, S Schnieder: “ Then, you literally pollute the model.
You of course just go to a type writer, you type in a couple of cards which end up saying, model, here is a different CO2 concentration.
Then, part of the model which computes the greenhouse effect computes a different kind of greenhouse effect.
You run the model so many years forward in simulated time, ‘computer, new climate’, and that’s where these predictions of 2 to 3 degrees warming in 100 years come from.”
Bevan,
You are fundamentally incorrect.
The amount of heat being radiated from one surface to another is
q/a= [k/(1/ehot+1/ecold-1] x (Thot^4-Tcold^4).
The ground is at Thot due to being warmed by sunshine,
If the atmosphere was only N2 and O2, it would be completelely transparent to Infrared. The “surface” the ground would radiate to is outer space at -270 C. But CO2 and H2O readily absorb and reradiate IR. Because the H2O and CO2 are the same temperature in the atmosphere as the N2 and CO2, the “surface” the ground radiates to is “the sky”, and the “sky” is much warmer than outer space. You can take an IR thermometer and typically read the temperature of clouds at about freezing and blue sky down to -80, but $40 IR guns do not have proper emissivity settings for this job. Anyway my point is that the ground temp has to get warmer as it heats in the sunshine in order to radiate the same amount of heat it receives from the sun, when there are radiating gases between the ground and outer space.
The Earth’s Albedo of .3 is used to come up with the often stated 33 C number, however Albedo is so dependent on clouds and clouds are made of water, but people who make this generalization are only trying to show how the radiative gas effect works.
So the GHE effect exists, caused by “back radiation” from the radiative gases in the sky.
DMacKenzie,
Using the facility on the HITRAN website, a listing of the emission spectra for
isotopologue 16O12C16O was calculated for a temperature of 280 degrees Kelvin (7 deg. C) and
pressure of 0.9 atmospheres, roughly the conditions at an altitude of 1000 metres above sea
level. This isotopologue has a natural abundance of 0.984 so is a reasonable representation of
the atmospheric CO2 absorption.
Taking a cutoff level of one thousandth of the maximum line strength gave three absorption
peaks. These were :
(a) the maximum of 3.687E-18 cm/molecule at wavelength 4.23 microns within the band 4.19
microns to 4.37 microns,
(b) a lessor maximum of 3.106E-19 cm/molecule at wavelength 14.98 microns within the band
14.09 microns to 16.19 microns, and
(c) the third maximum of 6.169E-20 cm/molecule at wavelength 2.68 microns within the band
2.67 microns to 2.8 microns.
Applying Wein’s law determines that
(a) is indicative of a source temperature of 685 degrees Kelvin (412 degrees Celsius)
(b) is indicative of a source temperature of 194 degrees Kelvin (-79 degrees Celsius), and
(c) is indicative of a source temperature 1081 degrees Kelvin (808 degrees Celsius).
As (b) is less than the assumed average temperature of the Earth it cannot cause the Earth’s
temperature to increase. Only radiation in (a) the 4.23 micron band and (c) the 2.68 micron
band can increase the Earth’s temperature.
For a source at 288 degrees Kelvin, Planck’s law determines that the 2.68 micron band has an
energy density of 5.016 x 10^-11 Joules per cubic metre and the 4.23 micron band has an
energy density of 5.344 x 10^-9 J/m^3, making a total of 5.39416 x 10^-9 J/m^3 radiated from
the Earth’s surface. Of this, one quarter may be back-radiated towards the Earth where the
surface, due to the albedo, may absorb seven tenths as heating, which is 0.944 x 10^-9 J/m^3
or one part in 21.25 of the supposed Greenhouse Effect. If there is to be a Greenhouse Effect
then the UN IPCC needs to explain from where do they source the other 95% of the backradiation
energy.
Thank You Geoff.
The fact is that analysis of climate data shows that satellite lower troposphere temperature is independent of atmospheric CO2 concentration and temperature drives the rate of generation of CO2 so there is no Greenhouse Effect. Further, if there was, then there would be far more of the Sun’s incoming radiation back-radiated into space than the possible Earth’s heat back-radiated to the surface and the Earth would cool with increasing CO2 concentration.
I will have to find a better way of expressing the problem.
DMacKenzie,
The sky is not a surface so your formula fails.
Also the ground does not radiate the same amount of heat as it receives from the Sun – it is not a mirror. In-coming radiation evaporates water, melts ice, makes vegetation grow via photosynthesis and more.
Apart from the fact that much livestock grazing takes place in areas where topography and rainfall make arable farming unsuitable, when grassland is cultivated there is a large breakdown in soil organic matter releasing CO2. This happened in the US prairies where thousands of years accumulation of carbon was lost in under 100 years. Result, the Dust Bowl years.
Organic farming methods are often suggested as an alternative, but rely on cultivations for weed control which results in soil organic matter loss unless fertility building crops are grown. The resulting yields of edible produce per acre per year are considerably lower.
Minimal tillage techniques can reduce organic matter losses, but usually rely on Glyphosate (shock, horror) for weed control. Flame weeding would release significant amounts of CO2, even if we are still allowed to use gas.
I suppose we could use infra red lamps powered by the batteries that power the tractors.
The other problem is the steady drain of nutrients in the harvested crops. The Chinese got round the problem by fertilising their crops with ‘night soil’. Who would be volunteered for that job, and would the neighbours complain about the smell?
The whole fuss in the MSM seems to be caused by a degree of ignorance concerning the complexity of the whole food production system, possibly with some egging on by closet vegans.
Zimbabwe, and now possibly South Africa are shining examples of what happens when politicians get involved in farming and land ownership policy.
“StephenP August 10, 2019 at 1:58 am
…now possibly South Africa are shining examples of what happens when politicians get involved in farming and land ownership policy.”
SA is on the brink of all out civil war. Crime, poverty, water shortages etc etc…
Stephen,
Sounds like you would find this video interesting at the least:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=YuvSbmumgcI
They are doing weed control a totally different way.
Immediately after harvest, seed the land with winter wheat or similar (a cover crop).
The cover crop out competes the fall/winter weeds and keeps them from establishing.
Then, when you’re ready to terminate the cover crop to free the soil for your cash crop use a roller-crimper to level it. But leave the plant litter in place to prevent spring/summer weeds from getting established.
The plant litter will degrade over time, but much of the organic material will end up integrated into the soil.
Prof debunks flatulence as major cause of global warming
“In 2006, the United Nations concluded that the livestock industry was a big contributor to [global warming].
In its report “Livestock’s Long Shadow,” the U.N. concluded that livestock were contributing 18 percent of the world’s greenhouse gases — allegedly more than the entire world’s transpiration.
The U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change used the report to forecast that Himalayan glaciers might vanish within 25 years.
Outside groups reacted to the U.N.’s claims by launching efforts to slow global warming by getting the public to go meatless one day a week, as way of lowering demand for livestock products.
Mitloehner convinced the U.N. to recant its claim in 2010.
The U.N. report estimated the amount of greenhouse gases emitted from every aspect of raising meat.
The U.N. did not do the same when estimating the greenhouse gases from cars.”
https://helenair.com/news/state-and-regional/prof-debunks-flatulence-as-major-cause-of-global-warming/article_1c6c9c5e-2dbb-11e2-9e51-0019bb2963f4.html
The more the UN pushes this climate nonsense, the more words like oppression and tyranny come to mind.
Regards,
Bob
The IPCC has become the world’s Super Duper Uber Nanny. If we don’t change our ways, we might have to sit in the naughty spot for a while. Honestly, they do raise some important issues, but they are localized concerns, and the attempt to conflate some real concerns with the fake one, CAGW is just pathetic.
..How did that “Let them eat cake !” thingy work out last time ?
“Frankly I don’t see a case for radical global land use change and massive government intervention” massive government intervention is the IPCC’s middle name
We already have technologies to remediate all aspects of food science worries mentioned in the article. First, if CO2 doubles (it won’t, but it would be great), this would be a good thing, allowing crops to be more adaptable to drought, as well as growing faster.
The technology we have already in hand, in genetically modifying crops and meat producing animals (OH NO! He said GMO!!!). It is ludicrous that the cognitively impaired have stigmatized this amazing blessing of technology. Just Golden Rice alone would be a nutritional boon to billions. Please let not the Luddites determine our futures!
“We have met the enemy, and he is us!” — Pogo
22 minute talk summarizing my views on global warming
By Nir Shaviv, Science Bits, Aug 4, 2019
http://www.sciencebits.com/22-minute-talk-summarizing-my-views-global-warming
At 2:48 in the presentation, Shaviv says:
“In all cores where you have a high-enough resolution, you see that the CO2 follows the temperature and not vice-versa. Namely, we know that the CO2 is affected by the temperature, but it doesn’t tell you anything about the opposite relation. In fact, there is no time scale whatsoever where you see CO2 variations cause a large temperature variation.”
At 5:30 Shaviv shows a diagram that shows the close correlation of a proxy of solar activity with a proxy for Earth’s climate. More similar close solar-climate relationships follow.
Shaviv concludes that the sensitivity of climate to increasing atmospheric CO2 is 1.0C to 1.5C/(doubling of CO2), much lower than the assumptions used in the computer climate models cited by the IPCC, which greatly exaggerate future global warming.
At this low level of climate sensitivity, there is NO dangerous human-made global warming or climate change crisis.
“At this low level of climate sensitivity, there is NO dangerous human-made global warming or climate change crisis.”
Told you so – 17 YEARS AGO!
The four most beautiful words in our common language: “I told you so.”
– Gore Vidal, October 3, 1925 – July 31, 2012
“Climate science does not support the theory of catastrophic human-made global warming – the alleged warming crisis does not exist.”
Source:
DEBATE ON THE KYOTO ACCORD
PEGG, reprinted in edited form at their request by several other professional journals, the Globe and Mail and La Presse in translation, by Sallie Baliunas, Tim Patterson and Allan MacRae.
http://www.friendsofscience.org/assets/documents/KyotoAPEGA2002REV1.pdf
DEBATE ON THE KYOTO ACCORD
The PEGG, November 2002, reprinted in edited form at their request by several other professional journals, the Globe and Mail and La Presse in translation, by Sallie Baliunas, Tim Patterson and Allan MacRae.
http://www.friendsofscience.org/assets/documents/KyotoAPEGA2002REV1.pdf
Note the “cold tongue” extending west into the equatorial Pacific through July and August 2019.
The equatorial Pacific Nino34 area SST is a good 4-month predictor of future global atmospheric average temperature.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/06/15/co2-global-warming-climate-and-energy-2/
[excerpt]
5. UAH LT Global Temperatures can be predicted ~4 months in the future with just two parameters:
UAHLT Anomaly (+4 months) = 0.2*Nino34Anomaly + 0.15 – 5*SatoGlobalAerosolOpticalDepth
In the absence of major (century-scale) volcanoes this can be simplified to
UAHLT Anomaly (+4 months) = 0.2*Nino34SSTAnomaly + 0.15
Let’s see how the duration and the magnitude of this Nino34 predictor unfolds, and how much global cooling results.
The IPCC is not an objective scientific body. It is an agency of the UN and the UN has a climate agenda in the heels of its ozone success.
https://tambonthongchai.com/2019/08/11/ipccisun/