Worry about bread, not oil

The real question is whether we could now be approaching a new era of misery. Even at an arithmetic rate, the United Nations expects the world’s population to pass the 9 billion mark by 2050.

But can world food production keep pace? Plant physiologist Lloyd T Evans has estimated that “we must reach an average yield of four tons per hectare… to support a population of 8 billion”. But yields right now are, as we have seen, just three tons per hectare. And a world of eight billion people may be less than 20 years away.
Meanwhile, man-made forces are conspiring to put a ceiling on food production. Global warming and the resulting climate change may well be increasing the incidence of extreme weather events as well as inflicting permanent damage on some farming regions.

It is not just British crops that are suffering this year. At the same time, our effort to slow global warming by switching from fossil fuels to bio-fuels is taking large tracts of land out of food production.

According to the OECD, American output of corn-based ethanol and European consumption of oilseeds for bio-fuels will double by 2016. Only the other day, the executive director of the World Food Programme expressed anxiety about the unintended consequences of this huge shift of resources.

Some people worry about peak oil. I worry more about peak grain.

The fact is that world per capita cereal production has already passed its peak, which was back in the mid-Eighties, not least because of collapsing production in the former Soviet Union and sub-Saharan Africa. Simultaneously, however, rising incomes in Asia are causing a surge in worldwide food demand.

Already the symptoms of the coming food shortage are detectable. The International Monetary Fund recorded a 23 per cent rise in world food prices during the last 18 months. Maybe you’ve observed it yourself. I certainly have.

Telegraph