X-Message-Number: 22010 From: "michaelprice" <> References: <> Subject: Feeding the six billion Date: Tue, 17 Jun 2003 09:04:10 +0100 Mark Plus says we are running out of wheat. The world is not running out of wheat. The wage-adjusted price of wheat has fallen by approximately 10 since 1900 and 40 since 1800 and is still declining. If we were approaching scarcity the price would be going up. Page 87 of The Ultimate Resource 2 shows that historically per capita food production is going up, not down. As for fish, Simon may well be wrong about that, since fishing suffers from the problem of the commons -- unlike crops fish can swim away -- and so don't benefit from capitalist exploitation! However no fish to eat is not the end of the world. Sad, perhaps, catastrophic, no. Cheers, Michael C Price ---------------------------------------- http://mcp.longevity-report.com http://www.hedweb.com/manworld.htm Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=22010