A Brief Apology: For over a month now, we here at PrudentHome have been dealing with a severe illness in one of the senior members of our family. It has taken our time, our effort and our concentration in order to give that family member the care and help they so richly deserve. It has not taken our commitment to strive to give the readers of PrudentHome our best efforts in helping them prepare for what we are sure are the difficult times ahead. We have been sporadic in our postings during this trial but we have been posting. We will continue on with our best efforts. Thank you.

Fragile Food Production: Food production in the world appears to be growing more fragile by the day as food producers fight challenges like the weather (climate change), oil price fluctuations, pests (Ug99), water availability, and a growing shortage of farmland. Now there’s a new concern: food production expectations. Here’s what it looks like in the headline from a World Net Daily (wnd.com) post this 1/10/10: “Government cover-up of food production shortage feared – Reports show demand growing, production declines estimated at 30%”. Here are some of the articles key points:

• “While trend experts, economists and investment gurus have been predicting food shortages for some time, new evidence indicates the U.S. Department of Agriculture mat be covering up the greatest food shortage in modern history.”

• “ … growing economies in Asia have ben consuming record amounts of raw goods, particularly food staples as consumers move to higher calorie diets. When supplies are reduced and demand is constant or growing, pieces normally rise.

Industry observers and economists remained mystified by the low agricultural prices in spite of this trend.One analyst, Eric DeCarbonnel from MarketSkeptics believes the answer is found in data he believes the U.S. Department of Agriculture has manipulated to keep prices low.

“Instead of adjusting production estimates down to reflect decreased production, [the USDA] adjusted estimates upwards to match increasing demand from China. In this way, the USDA has brought supply and demand back into balance (on paper) and temporarily delayed a rise in food prices by ensuring a catastrophe in 2010,” he said.

DeCarbonnel points out that across the Midwest United States, many counties already have been declared federal disaster areas, which is defined by a decrease in crop production of at least one type by 30 percent or more. Hundreds of other counties across the country have experienced crop failures of 10-20 percent, not enough to qualify as federal disaster areas but still contributing to the overall poor harvest.”

• “DeCarbonnel’s conclusion is that the government is intentionally covering up the nature of the food shortage because if the public realized the true extent of the crisis and/or prices rose dramatically, economies could collapse and governments could fall.

He’s not alone in his claims, as researchers around the world are now publishing similar accusations.”

For a more extensive treatment of this subject/information, go here:
http://www.marketskeptics.com/2009/12/2010-food-crisis-for-dummies.html

This is the kind of information that has led/leads PrudentHome to encourage its readers to: expand your food storage program (and purchase your garden seeds for this years garden ASAP – enough for two gardens MINIMUM) and keep your awareness of what’s going on at the highest level.

Until next time, keep your eyes on the horizon as the weathers changing fast.

The Planet’s Future: “The planet’s future: Climate change ‘will cause civilization to collapse’ “, an “Authoritative new study sets out a grim vision of shortages and violence …” is the title and ‘sub’ of the Jonathan Owen piece on 7/12/09 posted by the UK’s The Independent (independent.co.uk) on 7/13/09. Here are some of the highlights:

• “…the authors of the report, produced by the Millinium Project – a think tank formerly part of the World Federation of the United Nations Accociations- set out a number of emerging environmental security issues, “The scope and scale of the future effects of climate change – ranging from changes in weather patterns to the loss of livelihoods and disappearing states – has unprecedented implications for political and social stability.”
• “An effort on the scale of the Apollo mission that sent men to the Moon is needed if  humanity is to have a fighting chance of surviving the ravages of climate change.’
• “This is the stark warning from the biggest single report to look at the future of the planet – obtained by The Independent on Sunday ahead of its official publication next month. Backed by a diverse range of leading organizations such as Unesco, the World Bank, the Us Army, and the Rockefeller Foundation, the 2009 state of the Future report runs to 6,700 pages and draws on contributions from 2,700 experts around the globe.”
• “The impact of the global recession is a key theme, with researchers warning that global clean energy, food availability, poverty, and the growth of democracy around the world are at “risk of getting worse due to recession” …”.
• “The immediate problems are rising food and energy prices, shortages of water and increasing migrations ‘due to political, environmental and economic conditions”, which could plunge half the world onto social instability and violence.”
• “The effects of climate change are worsening – by 2025 there could be three billion people without adequate water as the population rises still further. And massive urbanization, increased encroachment on animal territory, and concentrated livestock production could trigger new pandemics.”

Home Garden Warning: From Reuter’s today we get “Potato famine disease striking home gardens in U.S” by Julie Steenhuysen. Here is some of the key information:

• “Late blight, which caused the Irish Potato Famine of the 1840’s and 1850’s, is killing potato ant tomato plants in home gardens from Maine to Ohio and threatening commercial and organic farms, U.S. plant scientists said on Friday.”
• “… the fungal disease spread by spores carried in the air, has made its way into the garden centers of large retail chains in the Northeastern United states.”
• “Wal-mart, Home Depot, Sears, Kmart, and Lowe’s are some of the stores the plants have been seen in …”

“What’s unique about this year is we have never seen plants affected in garden centers being sold to home gardeners …”

*PrudentHome Note: ALL of the above information should provide additional incentive for the home gardener and food producers to consider PrudentHome’s recommendation to have at least two gardens worth of seeds (open-pollinated, natural &/or organic) on hand always, and we now add; each of your garden seed collections/selections should come from at least two sources, preferably in different areas of the country. That and SAVE YOUR SEED.

A Valuable Source: You’ll find a link at PrudentHome to M.D. Creekmore’s “The Survivalist Blog” (thesurvivalistblog.blogspot.com).

You’ll want to put this site on your list as Mr. Creekmore’s perspective on survival is at once tactical and practical. He supports individual/family independence via economy, simplicity and reliability in preparation (as do we at PrudentHome) from his skills as a gunsmith, martial artist, and practitioner of independent living. He’s worth your read.

Until next time: keep your eyes on the horizon as the weathers changing fast.

‘Investments’ Part 2: ”Betting the Farm”, a Fortune Magazine article by Brian O’Keefe, accessed via money.cnn.com on 6/10/09, is sub-lined “As world population expands, the demand for arable land should soar. At least that’s what George Soros, Lord Rothschild, and other investors believe.”

At PrudentHome we’re not so much interested in the investment nuances of farmland as a commodity as we are in why some of the world’s foremost investors are interested in it and how those reasons might impact the average family/prudent home. Here are some of the ‘why’s” in the article:

• “In the spring of 2008 spiking grain prices caused food shortages and rioting in dozens of countries before falling some 50% by December. … That crash has obscured a broader trend. Even after the correction, grain prices remain above their 20-year average, and food stocks around the world are still near 40-year lows. For many investors, last year’s shortages are a preview of what could lie ahead.”
• “The fundamentals … . The simplest metric to consider is the amount of farmland per person worldwide. IN 1960 THERE WERE 1.1 ACRES OF ARABLE FARMLAND PER CAPITA GLOBALLY, ACCORDING TO DATA FROM THE UNITED NATIONS. BY 2000, THAT HAD FALLEN TO 0.6 ACRE (caps from PH) …. And over the next 40 years the population of the world is projected to grow from 6 billion to 9 billion.”
• “… says Joachim von Braun, director general at the International Food Policy Research Institute, “With limited land and water resources, this will automatically lead to increased valuations of productive land. And it goes hand in hand with water. Water scarcity will probably increase even more than land.”
• “The biggest investors in farmland over the next decade will probably be sovereign wealth funds and governments of crop-starved  countries eager to secure food supplies (PH note: they’re already doing it with essential raw materials such as oil and copper) for their rapidly growing populations. In 2008, China announced a $5 billion plan to develop agricultural assets in Africa. That’s just a start. Given that it has 20% of the worlds population but only 7% of it’s arable land and 7% of it’s freshwater resources.”

Regarding the views of one of the investors the article highlights: “There’s another thing she finds comforting about what she’s doing, “I’ve always personally liked the idea” she says, “that even if the bottom dropped out of this whole credit bubble and the world blew up, that the farmland, while it might not make a return for two or three or four years, was going to be there down the road. Because in the end, people have to eat.”

Last week, we mentioned in Part 1 of our “Investments In Farmland?” post, that we’d present some ideas regarding how the “why’ of farmland investments would affect the individual family. And here’s how: limits on the availability of farmland in the future will ensure the rise in cost of food and may very well bring into question its availability altogether.

There are additional factors regarding probable food cost increases and availability. These factors revolve around key “inputs” (positive & negative, direct & indirect) to farming/food production beyond the land itself and include: water (already mentioned), oil (90% of the worlds agriculture is fossil fuel dependent), phosphate (comprises about 12% of commercial fertilizer), weather/climate, the economy (national & international), pests (Ug99-wheat rust), population (numbers), and population – diet (what that population eats, i.e., it takes about seven pounds of grain to produce one pound of beef/USDA).

How can the individual family hope to confront these challenges from rising food costs and questionable availability? Here’s how: through the in-home storage of food (and life essentials), food processing (e.g., cooking, canning & drying equipment) and production necessities (e.g., tools, open-pollinated seeds, natural fertilizers & insecticides.)  Also add the knowledge and skills necessary to effect the foregoing. The family will have to know how to do more and more for itself in order to thrive: self-sufficiency must be the goal.

Until next time, keep your eyes on the horizon as the weathers changing fast.

Although the article is a work designed to inform the investor, the excellent background context for the investment advice in very pertinent to the home gardener. Here’s what we mean;

1. The critical shortage of fresh water worldwide is described as the “worst crisis of all time” and is the result of: 1. The global financial and credit crisis, 2. Ongoing world modernization that is increasing water demand and pollution, and 3.Major droughts around the world including the U.S. which is officially in drought over 60% of the country (While not specifically mentioned in the article, many of the world’s hardest hit areas are also the largest food producing countries such as Australia and Argentina).
2. In pulling some specific U.S. water situation information from the article we note that the ground water in the U.S. in being consumed “ … at a rate 25% faster than it is being replenished.” and that currently “…the Western U.S. is experiencing it’s worst drought in 500 years.” and that while agricultural irrigation accounts for 70% of fresh water use it is only 35-50% of that water that “…actually helps grow crops.”

‘Wise Water Use’: Prudent Home concludes: The bottom line is that water is such a critical resource that the home gardener must take the view that wherever one lives, “drought gardening”, with its emphasis on water conservation techniques, is the only reasonable and sustainable approach to home gardening.

What-you-can-do and ’How’: Drought Gardening: We’re going to use as our guideline, a University of Vermont Extension Department of Plant and Soil Science post (pss.uvm.edu/ppp/pubs/oh72drought.htm) that contains about three pages of key information that could generally be applied to almost any location. We recommend that you contact your county extension service and state university for guidelines more specific to your geographic area. Here are some of the keys:

• With the help of your county extension service, state university, and seed catalog, search for plant varieties specific to your geographic area with drought resistance as one of your considerations.
• When watering: water early either manually (our preference), or use soaker hoses or drip systems combined with mulching to reduce water loss.
• Water deeply and less often (we water at least once/day early) noting that “One inch of water will wet a sandy soil to a depth of about 12 inches.
• Save water by using “gray” water from your dishes, washers, beginning shower use, window A/C’s, and dehumidifiers.
• Collect water from gutters and down spouts (rain barrels are best but clean garbage cans or buckets will do) for garden use (watering cans-manual watering- are a natural fit to these collection techniques).
• Mulch 3-4 inches with organic matter, ie. Straw (or dried grass clippings). This helps water retention in soil and leave a 4 inch space around the plant for watering and fertilization. Newspaper works great too with mulch on top. These efforts reduce weeds and the necessity for soil surface disturbance from hoeing and weeding thus aiding in water retention.
• Work organic matter into the soil (compost) to aid in water retention and add nutrients.
• Fertilize with organic fertilizers as they help water retention and soil humus.
• Use natural pesticides, as they’re effective and less stressful to plants, as needed only.

Notice that what we’ve described here are essentially organic and sustainable gardening methods for the home garden. They are the basic basics so learn and do more. Good luck!

Until the end of the week, keep your eyes on the horizon as there’s weather moving in.

A month or so ago the Democrat members of congress proposed a second stimulus and it appeared at the time to have been a “sweetener” for their election efforts but just within the last 48 hours, the “ Head of the Fed” allowed as how this idea was the “wine of wisdom” and needed to be enacted as quickly as possible (money.cnn.com of 10/20/08-”Bernanke: It’s time for stimulus plan”).

So here we are at PrudentHome, having to fall back on the comments of a former hedge fund manager to offer a possible explanation for how we got here and perhaps some insight as to just who’s running this “show” : “ So long, suckers. Millionaire hedge fund boss thanks ‘idiot’ traders and retires at 37” (guardian.co.uk of 10/18/08)

“The low hanging fruit, ie idiots whose parents paid for prep school, Yale and then the Harvard MBA, was there for the taking,” he ( Andrew Lahde) wrote. “These people who were (often) truly not worthy of the education they received (or supposedly received) rose to the top of companies such as AIG , Bear Stearns, and Lehman Brothers and all levels of our government…. God bless America.”

The problem Mr. Lahde, isn’t just with people educated beyond their ability but with people educated beyond any common sense.

THE 11TH HOUR: We refer our readers here to survivalblog.com of 10/19/08 to a letter from one of their readers, Mr. Yankee, entitled “Letter Re: 11th Hour Preparation: It is Not Too Late to Start”

The letter points not to just the timeliness of preparation but to the priorities of preparation. Mr. Yankee notes the value of water, food, hygiene, shelter, medicine, proper clothing, etc. over things like barter goods and even home defense in terms of preparation priorities.

It’s worth a read.

A RECURRING RECOMMENDATION: Over at Post Carbon Institute (postcarbon.org/food-10/15/08), a recent article by Richard Heinberg entitled “Food Crisis on the Way” comments on the global nature if the current economic crisis and it’s effect on the U.S. and Europe as well as other input factors in rising food costs. The article is insightful and informative and ends where a growing number of food and economic articles seem to be ending: “Time to start planning next years garden”.

Keep your eyes on the horizon.

ECONOMICS:  business.times online.co.uk on 9/5/08 notes “ Dow plunges after warning of ‘ financial tsunami ‘ “ . This article points out that the most recent unemployment figures (6.1%) exceeded a consensus forecast and elevated claims to a near five-year high.

In addition, PIMCO’s co-chief investment officer Bill Gross said that the U.S. was confronted by “ systematic debt liquidation “, adding “ Unchecked, it can turn a campfire into a forest fire, a mild asset bear market into a destructive financial tsunami.” He went on to propose a solution , “ If we are to prevent a continuing asset and debt liquidation of near-historic proportions, we will require policies that open up the balance sheet of the U.S. Treasury.” It should be noted here that PIMCO is the worlds largest bond fund.

WATER: REUTERS:  (via reuters.com of 9/5/08) presented a particularly pertinent article on one of the critically diminishing natural resources we’ve been covering here at PrudentHome recently, entitled “California ‘water bank’ in works amid drought .”

Nine counties in the agricultural Central Valley area have recently been declared to be in a state of emergency after a ten-year shortfall in rain left water levels critically low. The solution devised is the 2009 Drought Water Bank created from the purchase of water from water agencies and farmers upstream from the delta area east of San Francisco. The water will be allocated “… for the greatest and highest public service.”

FOOD-MICRO: PrudentHome is again briefly covering an article concerning the growing movement in Britain towards British gardeners growing their own food thus making them and their country less dependent on outside sources for their food.

The article we’re referring to today is “ Dig for victory” from guardian.co.uk on 8/30/08. The article is by Leo Hickman and involves an interview with Monty Don, a contender for “ Britain’s best-loved gardener” and, the new president of the Soil association.

Mr. Don’s interview covers a number of interesting subjects but none seems more compelling than the “dig for victory” ethos of WWII applied to the currently tenuous world food supply situation. British gardeners are being encouraged to develop a ” sustainable “ food production at the “ eleven million gardeners “ level through ideas like the development of networks of community gardeners who would “exchange seeds, labor, tools and time to grow food…”

A DISTANT WAVE:  The apparent movement in Britain to develop greater food independence has been mentioned before at PrudentHome because we thought that it might apply well in the U.S.. We view food production at the individual garden level to be a vital part of family preparedness. Evidently we’re far from being alone in this. Next week we’ll discuss some of the efforts by American gardeners to develop greater family preparedness through sustainable gardens at the level of the individual home.

Until next week then, keep your eyes on the horizon.

Like the weather, economic, political, and environmental events are beyond our individual capabilities to control but like the weather too, we’re somewhat able to predict their coming and prepare. So what does the weather look like as it begins to move toward us just at the horizon ? Our economy thrives on cheap, available credit and fossil fuels (oil). Now, if credit is cheap it is certainly less than readily available while oil is not cheap and probably becoming less available.

Three major European banks and a major U. S. investment house are predicting a financial situation , in the U. S. and the world , during the coming months characterized by words like “crisis” and “catastrophic” . This while our own central bank, “ The Fed”, is described as an institution “ without credibility “.

World food stocks, primarily grains, are at a half-century-plus low with major countries preventing grain exports altogether or heavily discouraging those exports thru taxes. While world production is currently at a marginally adequate level, it is fragile. Any significant economic, climate, or geo-political interruption could spell famine on a large scale.(Note: Both China and Saudi Arabia are currently buying farmland in places like Africa and South America)

World oil production levels are nearly maximized though they are currently pretty stable. This stability however, exists in the face of an increasing world demand with it’s attendant price increases.

World fresh water stocks seem to be in about the same shape as food and oil : marginally adequate at current levels barring interruption.

Climate change (warmer, more variable and uncertain weather) brought about by, or significantly influenced by, human activities appears to be a generally accepted scientific position. This change could effect world food production in both the short and long term.

Geo-politically, the world seems to be stumbling along about as usual however, current potential conflicts in major oil producing areas of the middle-east and Africa cause special concerns regarding world oil production interruptions with their attendant price increases.

Now we come to the shy, retiring, 800 pound gorilla in the room…population . While critical world resources, though stretched thin , might be adequate in the short-term we’re adding a population to the world equal to that of the U. S. every 48 months!

What does all this mean to the family and the prudent home? In a word, PREPARATION. This is the same response the family and prudent home gives to any severe weather challenge.

More specific discussion about the “weather” and family responses to it will be found here next week on Tuesday, July 8.

Meanwhile, keep your eyes on the horizon.