Posted by msrb on July 2, 2008
Could When Will Food Riots Break Out Across the U.S.?
Accelerated land degradation threatens food security of a quarter of the world’s population: FAO
An Egyptian rice farmer shows his drought damaged rice crop and cracks in the rice terrace soil caused by more than 30 days of no rain in a village near Balqis, northeast of Cairo June 14, 2008. REUTERS/Nasser Nuri. Image may be subject to copyright. See MSRB Fair Use Notice!
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Posted in biocapacity, cabal, China, collapse, Earth, ecosystems, Energy, environment, Global Warming, government, lifestyle, money, Omnicide, politics, war | Tagged: agriculture, Bush, CBOT, Cedar Rapids, clearcut, Climate Change, collapse, corn, cornfields, cropland, cultivated land, deforestation, desertification, Drying Aquifers, ecosystems, Energy, environment, failing ecosystems, farmland, First Wave of World’s Collapsing Cities, floodwater, Food, food export, Food insecurity, Food Security, GHG, global food prices, Global Warming, grassland, Gulf of Mexico, Health, human rights, Iowa, Iowa flooding, Land and Water, Land clearing, land degradation, land for survival, loss of biomass, loss of organic matter, Midwest flooding, Mississippi River, Mojavefication, politics, rangeland, Root Cause Matrix, Severe soil erosion, sinking cities, soybean, soybenas, State of the World, storms, The Economy, topsoil, tornadoes, war, wheat, Year of the Fire | 3 Comments »
Posted by msrb on June 21, 2008
The Best Caption Competition Winners:
– There’s no war here.
– Don’t trouble me with national emergencies, I have a war to fight.
– Our troops need all the money we can send them to fight the enemy over there.
– Don’t be sissies! This is nothing like the 1993 deluge.
President George W. Bush talks to the media after viewing receding floodwaters on Normandy Drive in Iowa City, Iowa, USA, on 19 June 2008. EPA/MATTHEW HOLST / POOL. Image may be subject to copyright. See FEWW Fair Use Notice!
“They all told us, `The levees are good. You can go ahead and build,”‘ said Parks, who did not buy flood coverage because her bank no longer required it. “We had so much confidence in those levees.”
“People put all their hopes in those levees, and when they do fail, the damage is catastrophic,” said Paul Osman, the National Flood Insurance Program coordinator for Illinois. “New Orleans is the epitome; a lot of those people didn’t even realize they were in a floodplain until the water was up to their roofs.”
This used to be a road, and we parked our trucks right there!
Volunteers sandbag a building submerged in Burlington, Iowa June 15, 2008. Officials moved paintings, books and documents out of harm’s way on Sunday as record flooding in parts of the U.S. Midwest partly submerged the University of Iowa campus in Iowa City. REUTERS/Eric Thayer (UNITED STATES). Image may be subject to copyright. See FEWW Fair Use Notice!
“We reported to the president in ’94 that the levee system was in disarray, the levees were not high enough to take care of any potential problem. People didn’t understand their flood risk and there wasn’t good co-ordination across federal, state and local governments,” said Gerald Galloway, a professor of engineering and flood control expert.
“The same thing applies today,” Galloway said. “It’s amazing that in the face of [Hurricane] Katrina and now this particular challenge that we continue to relearn the same lessons.”
Galloway’s recommendations to improve the levee system were basically ignored. He said that he’s experiencing much the same response now from officials as in 1993.
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Posted in Bush, collapse, ecosystems, Energy, environment, Global Warming, government, money, politics, war | Tagged: China, Climate Change, climate refugees, CO2, crop damage, Drought, Energy, environment, Extreme Rain Events, extreme weather events, floods, Food, Gerald Galloway, GHG, Global Warming, government, Health, historic hydrological event, levee system, Midwest Flood Victims, Midwest Floods, Misled by Feds, Mississippi River, Missouri river, National Weather Service, northern Louisiana, Quincy, St. Louis |, tourism, travel | 3 Comments »
Posted by msrb on June 17, 2008
Could Food and Fuel Riots Break Out Across the U.S.?
Iowa Survives, But only Just!
Climate fury stays execution of Iowa—for now, any way. The worst flooding in the Midwest, at least in the last 15 years, is receding.
A home is flooded along the Mississippi River near Gladstone, Illinois June 16, 2008. Flooding in the U.S. Midwest is taking a toll on freight carriers, costing barge lines about $1 million per day and likely disrupting railroads for months to come, said traders and industry executives on Monday. REUTERS/Eric Thayer. Image may be subject to copyright. See PRO fair Use Notice!
The early dividends are as follows:
- The price of corn at the Chicago Board of Trade rocketed past $8 a bushel [a bushel of corn or maize weighs about 25.4kg; wheat and soybean, about 27.22kg.]
- About 3.3 million acres of cropland was deluged [2 million acres of soybeans, and 1.3 million acres of corn.]
- An estimated 2 million acres wasn’t planted.
- About 21 percent of Iowa’s 25million acres of cropland were flooded.
- At least twenty-six people have died since May 25 as a result of the storms or tornadoes in the Midwest.
- Up to 40,000 Iowans in 11 counties, declared federal disaster area, including 30,000 in Cedar Rapids were evacuated.
- About 200,000 gallons of drinking water were distributed.
- Nearly 5 million sandbags were used.
- Mississippi River, the main shipping artery to the export terminals in the Gulf of Mexico is closed due to high water levels caused by heavy rains throughout last week.
- The President [sic] is spending a day in Iowa
The Iowa flooding will have a significant impact on the global food prices because the United States exports 54 percent of the world’s corn, 36 percent of soybeans and 23 percent of wheat.
“Estimates show 3 million acres of corn under water and probably 2 million didn’t get planted. So that gets you up to 5 million or over 700 million bushels, and that takes out the entire carry-out [stocks carried over to the next crop,]” said Glenn Hollander, a grain merchant on the CBOT trading floor.
NO estimates are yet available concerning the permanent damage done to the soil.
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Posted in Bush, collapse, ecosystems, Energy, environment, Global Warming, government, money, politics, war | Tagged: agriculture, CBOT, Cedar Rapids, corn, cornfields, cropland, farmland, floodwater, food export, global food prices, Gulf of Mexico, Iowa, Iowa flooding, Midwest flooding, Mississippi River, soybenas, storms, tornadoes | 6 Comments »
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