Climate change theory meets hard reality: the assault on fertilizers

 

We've seen how, over the past several decades, "global warming" or "climate change" have become buzzwords for increasing attempts to regulate and control human behavior.  It used to be that proponents of a given philosophy or way of life would seek to be elected to office, then use that office to implement their plans with public support.  Now, it seems the autocrats are trying to dictate to us how we should live, what we should eat, and what we can and cannot do - and they're trying to make their ideas mandatory, regardless of whatever government is in power in a given nation.  They're trying to make them supranational, dictated by international consortia such as the European Union or the United Nations, and enforced by international sanctions against countries that won't go along with them, such as those enforced by the International Monetary Fund and other institutions.  Voters in the countries concerned aren't given a hearing any more, and they have no direct say in the matter.  Instead, they're told what's expected of them, and if they try to protest or refuse to cooperate, they're blamed as "guilty" for being "selfish" or "old-fashioned" or "uninformed".

None of those accusations are true, of course.  They're simply attempts to gaslight us, to make us think that things really are as black as they're painted, and it's our fault that they are.  Furthermore, they're being used to advance a theory, an ideal, a philosophy, over the interests of the human beings involved.  People literally don't count, compared to the demands of the theory.  If achieving the theory demands the sacrifice - in so many words, the death - of thousands, or tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands, or millions of people, well, that's too bad.  "You can't make an omelette without breaking eggs", even if millions of eggs are involved.  They have to be sacrificed for the greater good - and if they object, they're clearly bad eggs that don't deserve to survive.  Who are they to question what their betters know to be right and true, even if the eggs don't see it or agree with it?  Peasants!

That's why the priests of the COVID-19 pandemic sought to ride roughshod over any and all objections, and use it as a pretext for societal control extending far into the future.  If people get used to it under the threat of a medical emergency, they reasoned, they'll obey other restrictions as well.  We just have to persuade them to abandon their freedom to "experts" who'll tell them what to do.  That hasn't worked very well among most thinking people, but it's had astonishing success among those who don't want to think - who prefer to be told what to do, rather than study the subject(s) and make up their own mind(s).  (I suspect most of my readers fall well outside that demographic . . . thank heaven!)

We can see precisely and exactly the same dynamic at work right now in the fight to restrict the use of artificial fertilizers in farming.  This is a long-term project of the climate control movement, which sees modern agriculture as a threat to the "natural order of things", and believes that it should be curbed in order to "repair" the "balance of nature".  The fact that the human race is no longer capable of feeding itself without modern agriculture, and all the tools, techniques and trappings of that highly developed science, doesn't concern them at all.  The plan is the thing.  The theory is all-important.  Restrict non-natural influences, and Gaia will sort herself out and the world will be a much better place . . . albeit with a lot less people in it.  Those who will die in the process are merely numbers, digits, of no individual importance.

(Does that remind you of Pol Pot's attempts to impose true socialism on Cambodia in the 1970's, and the millions of deaths that resulted?  It should.  It's the same basic Marxist theory at work.  In Cambodia, it led to the Killing Fields.  Famine and mass starvation are likely to have similar consequences in the rest of the world in fairly short order, if things don't change.)

Efforts to curb modern agriculture and impose swingeing restrictions on the use of artificial fertilizers, pesticides, etc. were well under way before this year.  They were aided by supply chain problems caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, which climate change "true believers" have welcomed as another way to impose such restrictions willy-nilly upon the agricultural sector.  Natural disasters such as drought, flooding and other catastrophes have also played a part in cutting farmers' output.

Proponents of a "green" approach have even tried to defend the hunger that is resulting from their policies.  George Kent, an emeritus professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Hawaii, published an article in the United Nations Chronicle (since withdrawn, but still available in archived form) titled "The Benefits of World Hunger".  At first I thought it had to be over-the-top satire in poor taste, but it seems he's serious.

We sometimes talk about hunger in the world as if it were a scourge that all of us want to see abolished, viewing it as comparable with the plague or aids. But that naïve view prevents us from coming to grips with what causes and sustains hunger. Hunger has great positive value to many people. Indeed, it is fundamental to the working of the world's economy. Hungry people are the most productive people, especially where there is a need for manual labour.

. . .

For those of us at the high end of the social ladder, ending hunger globally would be a disaster. If there were no hunger in the world, who would plow the fields? Who would harvest our vegetables? Who would work in the rendering plants? Who would clean our toilets? We would have to produce our own food and clean our own toilets. No wonder people at the high end are not rushing to solve the hunger problem. For many of us, hunger is not a problem, but an asset.

There's more at the link.

Now, the Ukraine war is making things much worse by sanctions cutting off exports from three states (Russia, Ukraine and Belarus) that are among the largest food exporters in the world.  Putting it all together, we're staring famine in the face, as the Guardian reports.

The world is in the grip of an unprecedented hunger crisis. A toxic combination of climate crisis, conflict and Covid had already placed some of the poorest countries under enormous strain, but Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has sent grain and fuel prices soaring.

“We thought it couldn’t get any worse,” said David Beasley, director of the UN World Food Programme (WFP), in June. “But this war has been devastating.”

Globally, the UN says, the number of people living with hunger, or chronic undernourishment, rose to as many as 828 million last year, an increase of about 150 million since the outbreak of the pandemic. There is a “real danger”, warned Beasley on Wednesday, that the ripple effect of Ukraine will cause it to rise even further in the months ahead – and that some countries will be pushed into famine as a result.

“The result will be global destabilisation, starvation, and mass migration on an unprecedented scale,” he warned. “We have to act today to avert this looming catastrophe.”

Again, more at the link.

The problem is, the reality of famine has not stopped campaigners against the use of artificial pesticides and fertilizers.  They're doubling down on their demands for more restrictions, even if it means producing less food for an already famine-stricken world.  They're not interested in human suffering, misery and death.  The plan is the thing, and their plan demands further cutbacks in the agricultural industry, no matter what.  Saving the planet - as they see it - is more critical than saving people, and those who die in the process of saving the planet are, in fact, martyrs of a sort, dying so that Gaia can live.  They pay no attention to the value of a human being as such.  Human beings have no more relevance, as individuals, than cows, or deer, or mice, or even cockroaches.  They're just another form of life.

That's why, in the Netherlands today, farmers are doing their best to shut down the country in protest against government edicts that they have to reduce artificial pesticide and fertilizer use by at least 30%, even if that means shutting down farms - this, in the single most productive agricultural economy in Europe!  Nitrogen pollution is far more important to the powers that be than food production;  therefore, nitrate fertilizer use must be curbed, no matter what the impact on crops.  Again, the fact that this may mean actual starvation in Europe and many other parts of the world is neither here nor there.  The plan is everything!

EU proposals to slash pesticide use in half by 2030 — under its ambitious Farm to Fork strategy — will finally be presented in Brussels on Wednesday (22 June).

The sustainable use of pesticides regulation, set to be published after a three-month delay, will be the first binding EU law mandating farmers to reduce their use of chemicals. It is seen by many as a crucial step in tackling European complicity in the global climate crisis.

. . .

In an exclusive interview with Investigate Europe, EU Commission vice-president and European Green Deal chief Frans Timmermans explains why the legislation is essential to secure long-term food security and why it must not be sacrificed for short term gains.

IE: The long-awaited pesticides regulation will be presented tomorrow. Are you worried about what will happen to the overall green strategy?

Timmermans: Well, we have a very difficult situation because of the war in Ukraine. The war poses huge risks for food security in parts of Africa and the Middle East. But to use these problems as a reason not to have Farm to Fork would be killing the long-term health and survivability of our agricultural sector for very short-term considerations.

So you insist this is the right time to set targets for pesticides and fertiliser reduction, and to oblige farmers to change their way of doing agriculture?

... 70 percent of EU soils are in an unhealthy condition today, and 80 per cent of these soils are agricultural land or grasslands. Those are scientific facts. We are losing pollinators so quickly. That is a bigger threat to our long-term food security than the conflict in Ukraine, because 75 percent of top food crops depend on animal pollination. €5bn a year in Europe is directly dependent on animal pollination. Please, let us disconnect the immediate crisis from the long-term adaptation that we need.

. . .

I'm deeply convinced that if we don't do what we propose, then in 10, 15 years from now, the biodiversity issue will be so horrible that farming will not be sustainable in Europe. And then we will really have a food crisis in Europe.

. . .

Political leaders in Europe are wary of engaging in this debate because they know it is very easy to lose voters if they are seen as not helping farmers. I want to help farmers, but I want to help them in a sustainable way, not just for tomorrow, but also for ten years from now and 20 years from now. And for that, we have to become sustainable.

More at the link.

That's the "European Green Deal chief" reassuring you.  Forget the current reality of famine.  That's not important compared to the Plan!  Those silly people starving to death, or who will shortly be starving, must simply accept that sustainable agriculture tomorrow is more important than food in their bellies today.  That's the way it is, and there can be and will be no retreat from that position among True Believers.  In fact, their policies, and the policies they're trying to force upon nations and governments, are at least partly to blame for the current threat of famine - a manufactured crisis.

It's not just crops, either.  I live in the heart of cattle country.  Texas agriculture is heavily oriented towards livestock.  I'm talking to those in the industry, and listening to what they have to say, and what I'm hearing is scary as hell.  Farmers are citing drought, fertilizer and pesticide shortages, supply chain problems, fuel costs and constraints, and general economic woes as reasons to begin culling their herds of cattle.  They worry they may not be able to obtain (or afford) enough feed (hay, grain, etc.) to sustain their herds through winter and into spring.  Meat processors and butchers, in their turn, are warning that meat prices are likely to start rising steeply in September or October as the current surplus runs out and fewer cattle are available for slaughter.  One went so far as to say that beef may be almost unobtainable next year at an affordable price, if the current situation continues or gets worse.  (Around here, everyone who can afford it appears to be filling their freezer[s].  I know one man who's bought two whole steers, and multiple freezers to store all that meat.  In today's economic climate, I daresay that may not be a bad investment.)

One can only shake one's head at the ideological blindness of the climate-control clique.  They're lost in a moral and ethical maze where human life has no meaning apart from its place as a cog in the environmental machine.  If implementing The Plan will cost millions, or tens of millions, or hundreds of millions of lives, that's just a statistic - an inconvenient speed bump on the way to climate nirvana!  They're actually trying to govern us that way, in Europe and elsewhere.  Even here in the USA, our President is blithely telling us that we'll just have to put up with higher fuel prices in order to achieve a greener future - regardless of whether the infrastructure to support that future is there or no, and no matter what economic suffering the higher price of fuel is causing.  The Plan Is The Thing!

What will be the outcome of all this?  Your guess is as good as mine . . . but while we wait to find out, I'm going to make sure to store as much food as I can afford, in the expectation that I'm going to need it, because it won't be available in the usual quantities, from the usual sources, at affordable prices.  I can only recommend, very earnestly, that you do likewise.

Peter