My midterm exam in one class asked me a question that I really enjoyed answering. Infact, I enjoyed it so much that I thought you might enjoy reading the answer too. My only regret is that the footnotes won't post.
Q: Make a case that the world has, or has not, reached its limits. Support your case (either way) with evidence. (15 points)
A: The first thing that has to be decided is what is meant by limits. I don’t know what that means. Does it mean there is no more room for anyone to live here? Does it mean there is not enough food for one more mouth? Or does it mean there are too many people for certain other people to live they way they want to live? The population of the earth grows every day. So, obviously, the earth did not reach its limit last year, last week, or even yesterday as the population grew today.
People have always moved from one place to another depending on resource availability. Hunter/gatherers and pastoralists are known for their nomadic way of life; the former following game, the latter following pasture. They run out of their required resource and move somewhere else. But those types of societies do not produce enough food for large populations. Large populations require agriculture. I assume that we will continue to adapt. When we run out of something we will do without or find a substitute.
It was only with the cultivation of grain in Anatolia and the ”fertile crescent”, grapes and olives in Greece and Italy, corn in meso-America, and rice in India and China that populations could grow and great nations develop. But is there a limit to how much can be grown? Well, yes. The world is finite. It stands to reason that there is a limit to how many people can live on this globe. But have we reached that limit? No. I don’t think so.
Much has been made of higher prices. The CRB Commodity Index shows a dramatic increase in prices from 1970 to 2008. But what does that mean? Does it mean more people are going hungry? Not necessarily. It means that more people have the money to buy commodities, thus there is upward pressure is put on the price. But that doesn’t mean there is no other food. It means that the food people desire is going up in price. But what about food people do not desire? I could have a rich diet in acorns if I wanted. And it would be free since there are oak trees all around where I live. But I prefer wheat, corn, barley, rice, etc. I could eat miner’s lettuce and wild fennel which grow all over the bay area. But I prefer cabbage and onions. I turn down free food and opt for buying commodities, applying my own little bit of upward pressure to the price.
But back to the question, has the world reached its limits? I am a man, and very anthropocentric, so I can only think this must mean, are we able to produce enough food to feed ourselves? To that question the answer is yes.
The United States (And I really am only concerend with the Untied States. Other countries have more or less arable land per capita.) has 9,161,923 sq km, or 2,263,960,480 acres of land. 18.01% of it, or 409,776,847 acres of that land is arable.
According to the Kansas Wheat Commission, on average, in the U.S. an acre of land produces 37.1 bushels of wheat. (This yield does not depend on synthetic fertilizers. There are some organic farmers in Montana getting 80 to 100 bushels per acre.) Those 37.1 bushels can be made into 2,226 pounds of whole grain flour. That flour can, depending on the recipe, be made into 1,400 to 2,500 loaves of bread.
One acre of US farmland combined with the sweat of the farmer produces enough wheat for about 2,000 loaves of bread …How many acres do you need to feed you for a year? The answer is not very many. So, how many bushels of wheat did American farmers produce in 2007? Well, it was only 7% of total world production, so it might not seem like much. But it was. It was a whopping 2,066,723,000 bushels. And 2008 is even bigger.
But what about Hawaii and south Florida? That’s tropical and wheat doesn’t grow well in tropical weather. No problem! Already, citrus fruits, papaya, pineapple, macadamia nuts, and sugar cane produce a tremendous amount of calories. But what else grows well in the tropics? Yams. According to the University of Hawaii, an acre of tropical farm land can typically produces 12,000 pounds of yams per year. Assuming someone eats 5 pounds of yams per day, this being a goodly portion containing nearly 2,700 calories, six people can live off the yams produced on one acre of land, and there will be enough yams left over (about 1/8 of the entire crop) to sell on the market or feed to milking goat.
And I could go on and on about the abundance of protein in our bean crops and from dairy sources. I could write page after page dealing with corn, oats, rice, barley, rye, potatoes, apples, olives, plums, grapes, oranges, and oats. There is no food shortage. There won’t be a food shortage in the United States for many many years because of three facts:
Fact: One acre of land can feed four people.
Fact: 1,637,000,000 (approx.) people can eat off the arable land in the United States. (Arable acres x 4)
Fact: The population of the United States is only about 300,000,000
We have a whole lot of growing to to before we run out of food.
And one more thing: Arable land doesn’t even count rangeland unsuitable for farming. Just think about the possibilities in Alaska! Right now there is almost no food production up there, but in time, there could be vast herds of reindeer supplying people all over America with protein! We have not even come near the Earth's limits for sustaining life. But when we do some of us will die and we'll just keep going.
