"Minnesota chicken farmer culls 5+ million due to bird flu." OH NOES, NO MORE CHIKN AT GROCERY STORE, WE ALL DIES!!!!@#%!
Yeah, not so much. Fear porn is real. Most of the food shortage....not so much.
I won't be so flippant to say there aren't limited quantities for some things, but lets be realistic frens, when Team Evil messes with the supply chain, things happen. Yes, certain things may be short right now. Things will be short in the future too. Some things yes, but remember a certain other commodity was recently believed to be stopped in production but had actually increased production nation wide by over 400% (ammo anyone?)
The reason for the shortage was not so much gov't interfearance (though they've been trying), as new gun owners, hording, and general high demand.
Will we run out of food and have to eat dandelions, dirt and bugs? Unlikely. Right now we are seeing hording, and therefore high demand. We also collectively have millions more mouths to feed more than anticipated (immigrants eat food you know, even illegal ones).
Both take a toll on our generally precise just-in-time inventory system, which is a must up and down the food supply chain to prevent spoilage. Add to that some fairly simple shinnanigans on shipping and some media fear from the left and bingo, fake mass food shortages.
"But Rooks", you say, "With all this surplus food in peoples houses, won't demand dip down again when hrders reach 2 months reserve? Your argument defeated by logixs!"
Hold up there wonder puppy. You forget, NPCs arent firing on all cylinders...or even thinking straight, just left. Remember that guy in CA who filled his truckbed with gas, just by lining it with tarps, then drove off sloshing gas all over the road and sidewalks?
Yeah, its like that.
Last food run i saw people buying 2 months of not just canned corn, but also milk, bread, yogurt, fruits, and deli sushi.
Can't fix stupid.
.
Anyways, So I work with farmers every day. Cow, pig, chicken, duck, crops. Only reason i see they cull a barn herd is when it is actual threat to the barn (local labs/vets checking, plus the farmers themselves, many amish too).
Farmers tend to be pretty based, and don't have time for much nonsense. Any farmer still out there (the American farmer is NOT gone) tends to also have pretty good business savvy, they have to, to survive. Long story short, wiping out large volumes of product isn't something you just say "do it" and they comply.
In addition. Believe it or not, wiping out a million here/there is not that unusual. Uncommon, yes. Notable, barely. Had a farmer just down the road take out .5 million due to flu, 3 years ago. Heard about 40k pig put down due to swine flu (yes, it was real swine flu). Didn't bat an eye, both still in production to this day. One SMALL farmer alone has 5 chicken barns, .5 mill IN EACH BARN. There are hundreds of these all over northern indiana alone.
Once you realize the actual scale of food production in the US, you will see the fear is manufactured, and 5 million dead chickens is... uh... chicken feed compared to actual DAILY production.
Yes, there is a lot more to it than that, yes there is industrial espionage in farms. The whole PETA highring people to work undercover at farms, then inciting/forcing/coercing others to video them doing cruelty to animals, yeah that is real. I personally know a larger farm that was targeted like that by PETA.
You always hear about the leaked video, but not when they find the dudes that did it were plants, and are now in jail for lying to officials during an investigation, false pretenses, conspiracy, not to mention fired and sued by the farm for lying on job app, breach of policy, etc.
Anyways, just a little bit of my take on this.
Best if you are worried, get out of the city, plant a garden, live in the country and make friends with farmers. When a city starves, i guarantee today's farmers won't.
Now im gonna go grill the family some T-bones, sirloins, and make me some mashed 'taters, and a salad, just because i can.... and its mothers day weekend....that too 😉
What do those factory farmers feed their livestock?
Do they realize that they are almost completely dependent upon imported and GMO crops, which are vulnerable to a variety of impending events?
What is the cost of diesel fuel today? Where does liquid nitrogen come from? How much food do we import from China? What happens when migrant laborers don't arrive to do work that US citizens won't touch?
Your argument exacerbates my concern. Factory farming is a fragile and insustainable practice, due to economies of scale.
We simply haven't yet experienced the catalyst.
People need to get back in touch with their food. During previous periods of famine, people survived because they could grow, hunt or forage enough to avoid starvation. We are now looking at billions who either lack the knowledge or access to land required to feed themselves.
The ultimate form of slavery.
That is a lot to unpack. Also while there is a lot to be concerned about, some is regional, some is moot, and some idk.
Factory farms are sustainable, and reports of how they function is hyped up by members of Team Evil. Many "factory" farms are free range, chickens go out during day, and instinctually go in at night. Believe what you want. If you want to know the truth of them, I'd suggest you visit one, or even work at one for a spell. What you learn may surprise you.
Feed is local. Anything imported can be replaced from local sources. Local fertilizer plant is going online this spring/summer. Massive local plant will supply nationally. It's huge.
GMO crops are a boogeyman to a large extent. Ask a farmer about them.
I talked about diesel in another comment it will drive food prices up, real concern. L.nitro is situational use, and not required by vast majority.
We are a net exporter of foods. Some exotic stuff we will lack from imports.
Modern farmers here, out of hundreds of farms, I've seen one that used foreign labor.
Can't attest for other regions (west coast). If they want their crops and don't have imported labor, I suggest they get off their lazy butts and get to work, just my $0.02.
You seem to have Internet or school knowledge about how things work, not practical knowledge. Agreed, self sustained living is awesome, but just not practical for most people. A living society can afford to compartmentalize jobs and allow for specializations. Main thing I object to is when a town or city tries to restrict growth of food on private land. Cities are notorious for that.
Thank you for offering to enlighten me. I grew up in eastern Colorado and the other side of my family does equipment maintenance for warehouses and processing facilities. My family has worked in agriculture and trucking my entire life. I currently live in Florida and have connections to various types of fruit production and processing.
Between them all I have first or second-hand experience inside pork and beef CAFOS, poultry & beef processing, grain elevators, potato, hemp, corn, sunflower, fruit, bean & wheat farming, and hauling/application of manure, anhydrous, cattle, and every type of product that went in or out of the area.
My brother worked for an irrigation company and relayed the issues with depletion of the finite Ogalalla Aquifer, which supplies the irrigation and drinking water for a massive swath of the corn belt. The entire system of these factory farms depends upon thirsty plants being grown in an inhospitable area and dependent upon a disappearing water source.
Planting and harvesting is performed completely at the mercy of equipment manufacturers whose components are manufactured everywhere but here, which can be remotely disabled, and which rely upon a steady supply of affordable diesel.
Distribution is dependent upon trucking companies and owner-operators who are feeling the pinch with fuel prices, labor shortages and supply-chain issues resulting in parked trucks for lack of parts. And have you seen the price of tires, lately?
In regards to "free range chickens":
That is the easiest thing in this entire post to dispute. Certainly you know the requirements of a free range poultry operation? Spoiler: It requires a small outdoor area, which the chickens mostly ignore because the GMO grain food is inside.
Want to talk about "organic dairy"? In one of the largest US organic dairies, the cows live on concrete in a slimy, shit-filled barn. They have a required period to be on pasture, so when they are dry they are put out on a barren field for optics. They can't wait to get back into the barn to get filled back up with grain.
I'm happy for you, but that is not the overall case. See my above comments.
I don't have to ask. I have stood next to a mountain of corn on the ground because GMO and irrigation allows for colossal harvests and have seen farmers lose an entire crop due to inclement weather.
I know that the soil is dead and that monoculture farming is dependent upon petrochemicals. I know that farmers are in an arms race against noxious weeds and pests, due to resistance to said chemicals. And (as I stated) these crops are water-intensive and would not survive without irrigation and petrochemicals.
Glad that we agree about the diesel. Perhaps you know more about L.nitro than I do, but I don't see corn belt farmers doing without it.
Exotic stuff such as equipment, parts, fuel, chemicals, agricultural pharmaceuticals, labor, etc.?
It goes both ways. We are beholden to the global supply chain to sell our products and to purchase what we no longer manufacture here.
Since we are sharing anecdotes: I am connected to farming in Florida and the high plains and I don't know of a single farmer who doesn't utilize foreign labor. Happy to compare notes, if you like.
Americans and second-generation immigrants have proven to be adverse to migrant labor conditions. It's not even about laziness so much as the temporary nature of many of the jobs. You don't get a 9-5 asparagus picking job. Anyone is free to delve into the nuances of both sides of the migrant labor issue.
I hope that this misconception has been dispelled.