Solving Food Problem?

Question

Do you think of governments of all countries encouraged FARMING and AGRICULTURAL Careers would help save our world? An Average person is hardworking when he sees his dreams coming true. Do you all agree with me?

Now, if he got good perks and a salary to grow food, would he not want to do it? He can be given a target to set to meet a montly or quarterly growth of a certain food.

And then, can we not get the food grown with the help of natural resources? I mean, is bio gas really too necessary to grow food?

I think the govts should really think of bringing up the farming profession. I am sure it will have a very positive effect on world's growth.

What say?

Answer 1

No, it would be terribly harmful to both the food supply and the world's nations.  Also, every government of the world does that now anyway.  We have thirty three nations reporting food shortages most of which can be seen to be caused by your suggestion above.

It isn't obvious what is wrong with your idea, so let me provide you with three real world examples.  In the United States the price of sugar is more than twice the price on the world market.  The reason is that the government provides a price floor for sugar well above the cost.  It cost the US 5 billion dollars last year to support the sugar price.  This $5 billion went entirely to only 5000 people, someone tracked them down, many of which are members of Congress who got donations.  This money is a direct transfer from your pocket to others.  When Congress passed this subsidy in the 70's industry switched to corn syrup based foods, which have been shown to be a larger cause of obesity than the sugar equivalent.  Further, sugar is more valuable in the US than anywhere else, so sugar that could be fed to people who are starving, if sold at fair prices, flows into the US causing waste since Americans are not buying the higher priced sugar anyway, but since the price is so high it still attracts sellers taking the gamble an American will pay more than twice the price they would get elsewhere.  Sugar farmers make a good living, but not above market because if they paid above market it would shift wages elsewhere and they would be back to zero gain again.  It is the corporate owners of the farms that get all the money, competition drives out the higher wages.

The second and obvious one is ethanol.  It was designed to pass money from the gas tank to farmers.  However, Brazil already has a superior ethanol solution in full use.  We could adopt it, except it is illegal.  The reduction in corn for food has created starvation planet wide and is part of why we now have food shortages.

The third is New England milk.  As people moved from New England to California, Arizona and so forth, the demand for milk fell, since there was no one there to drink it.  Instead of allowing farms to convert to other crops or fail, Congress placed a minimum legal price on milk well above market prices.  Since you win big with each gallon you sell, you produce tons of milk, which grocery stores then throw away because people who would buy milk cannot afford it anymore.  The milk is produced in excess because each gallon is like a farmer winning the lottery, but there is no one to buy it, so most go unsold.  

Finally, most arable land is already in farm use.  As such, there really isn't a lot of additional crop land to expand into.  So all you would do is either subsidize wages, reducing tractor costs or putting farm machinery manufacturers out of business, or subsidize farm capital and fire workers and substitute machinery.  Only the shareholders make any money, there is less food available, and wages will be largely unchanged.

Answer 2

Most of the better cropland is being cultivated; that is, what hasn't been "developed" into houses and commercial property.  I come from a place with some of the best farmland in the country and I watched buildings take over the fields.

But that's only a small part of the problem.  There are ever more people (200,000 a day more) who need places to live and work.  Keeping up with all those new mouths to feed is often impossible, so many must starve.

Some day the overpopulaters will stop following their anachronistic traditions and the situation will improve.