Abundance vs Scarcity

Much of what's been written on this blog over the past 60 days has dealt with two visions of the future. In one, there is abundance with new sources of energy, food and clean water. In the other, there is scarcity creating competition for a dwindling supply of resources. 

The abundance vs scarcity question is a fairly common issue when looking at future scenarios and many others have written on it. What I would like to stress is that the hemisphere shouldn't view either vision as being imposed on it by some outside force. It should be investing in science, technology and education to try to build that future of abundance. It should be looking at government policies and private sector investments that can help eliminate problems of scarcity. We should plan for the worse of the two scenarios. I wouldn't want to avoid planning for potential scarcity in the future. But we should be working and investing to build the better of the two, because if we have a choice, it's certainly the better future to live in.

Urban farming in a breadbasket

I've been spending time reading about vertical farming in urban environments as a possible way to feed future populations and conserve water supplies.

The biggest megacity regions in South America - Rio, Sao Paulo, Buenos Aires and Bogota - all exist right near some large agricultural areas that are fully capable of feeding them. Unlike other urban areas of the world, the need for vertical farming doesn't seem particularly urgent. It would help save water and it could help boost exports to regions like China where the demand for food continues to outstrip supply. However, those are secondary benefits not currently driven by local demand.

All this is to say that I think some form of vertical farming is likely in the future around the world, but without significant leadership or some economic incentive, South America may be one of the last regions to adopt it.

On the other hand, the Caribbean where land for agriculture and fresh water are at a premium could have the conditions to be an early adopter.

Economic warfare vs food speculators

Recent food price spikes were largely driven by speculators. Another spike is expected in 2013 and there are fears that a food price bubble could impact the entire global supply chain.

Could a Latin American country use deception and economic warfare to fight back? Regulating the speculation market, one of the leading and more sensible recommendations, is playing defense. It will take significant resources while speculators work to get around regulations.

All it takes is a few vindictive leaders with resources and motivation to finally break the speculator's economic games for that war to begin. One leader of a major economy or a few key countries from smaller economies could coordinate to distribute misleading information and try to force speculators into making mistakes. A country attempting to manipulate the market prices to throw off speculators and harm their businesses would be criticized by most major economies, but it's likely they would have reached a point where they don't care.

This sort of deception and economic warfare would be difficult, but not impossible. More troubling, like real wars, the ongoing dispute if done correctly would likely cause world markets to shake violently, leading to a number of second and third order consequences that would likely hurt everyone.

It's best if we don't get to that sort of economic war moment that impacts the food everyone needs. However, the food price speculation debate is usually put in terms of regulate or not regulate. If a group of countries force that debate into terms of regulate or economic warfare, it would draw attention to the issue and create a more likely environment for regulation.

Like most things on this blog, I'm not recommending any country go down this route, just speculating on an out of the box scenario.

Bill Gates on innovation in agriculture

Bill Gates speech at the FAO:

The digital revolution also provides opportunities to collect better data. In an age when a satellite can determine instantly how much wheat is in a field, it is a shame to ask countries to use limited resources to send enumerators around with pen, paper, and tape measure. What we get is a lot of wasted time and inaccurate or incomplete data. The digital revolution can improve the quality of critical data while freeing up people to do other high-impact work.

The problem is that the country programs, agencies, and research centers don’t have expertise in digital agriculture, and they don’t have the time to build it from scratch. The real expertise lies with private sector companies, and with rapidly growing countries like Brazil and China where the agricultural sector is booming.

Gates also spoke about using genome sequencing technology, which has rapidly declined in cost over the last decade, to improve yields and have plants resistance to drought and disease. While his remarks generally focused on sub-Saharan Africa, they certainly apply to the agricultural sector in Latin America.