Geoscience Reference
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come together then it is possible for the resulting effect on global food supply to be
considerable. This happened in 2007/8.
The year 2007 and first half of 2008 saw food staples on the international market
rise sharply in price. The causes were several. First, extreme weather events in 2005-7,
including drought and floods, affected major cereal-producing countries. World cereal
production fell by 3.6% in 2005 and 6.9% in 2006 before recovering in 2007. Two
successive years of lower crop yields in a context of already low stock levels resulted
in a constrained supply in world markets. Growing concern over the potential effect
of climate change on future availabilities of food supplies aggravated market fears.
Second, until mid-2008, the increase in energy prices had been very rapid and steep,
with one major commodity price index (the Reuters-CRB Energy Index) more than
tripling since 2003. Petroleum and food prices are highly correlated. The rapid rise
in petroleum prices exerted upward pressure on food prices as fertilizer prices nearly
tripled and transport costs doubled in 2006-8. (Urea, a major component of fertilizer,
requires considerable energy to fix nitrogen from the air - and hence fossil fuel
in the absence of non-fossil carbon energy - as well as the use of methane as
a chemical feedstock for its manufacture, again commonly from fossil fuel. So,
fertilizer prices are linked to those of fossil fuel.) Third, the emerging biofuel market
is a significant source of demand for certain agricultural crops. The stronger demand
for these commodities caused a surge in their prices around the world. And then
there were the longer-term drivers of restricted availability of quality agricultural
land and population growth (both of which we will return to shortly). All these
factors together served to restrict food supply and to drive food prices upwards so
that between 2005 and 2008 the FAO food price index doubled (over a 100% increase)
from its 1975-2004 average (FAO, 2008). The shortages sparked food riots in 2007-
8 in Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Senegal, Mauritania, Cote d'Ivoire, Egypt, Morocco,
Mexico, Bolivia, Yemen, Uzbekistan, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and South
Africa. Conversely, if you were to ask anyone in Western Europe or North America
as to the biggest event affecting their lives in the latter part of the first decade of the
21st century they would undoubtedly instead refer to the financial market crash of
2008/9.
Here from a human-ecology perspective it must be stressed that the increase in
food prices and global unrest of 2008 were due to a real shortage of a physical
environmental resource. Conversely, the financial crisis of 2008-9 was 'just' due to
the notional revaluation of sub-prime mortgages: no loss of crop, farmland, mine
output, fishery or any physical (i.e. 'real' as opposed to 'notional' or abstract) resource.
Indeed, the physicality of the houses to which the sub-prime mortgages related
remained unchanged. All of which begs the question of what will happen with climate
change impacts on environmental resource use later in this evermore populated
century?
Leaving aside economic and extreme weather variables, there are two fundamental
dimensions undermining the future sustainability of food supply. First, on land much
of the most productive ecosystems are already heavily exploited. Much of the most
suitable land has already been turned to agriculture while other land has gone to
urban sprawl and related infrastructure. Worldwide from 1700 to 1980 crop lands
increased by 466.4% from 265 million ha to 1501 million ha. Most of this has been
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