PILLARS

The Shortage

Hate to Say We Told You So, But...Report sees rising population leading to global food shortage!

Massive food shortages will develop over the next 40 years as a population explosion outstrips the world's food supply, researchers reported yesterday.

"Science and technology can no longer ensure a better future unless population growth slows quickly," said a report compiled by the environmental research institute Worldwatch. "Food supply is the most immediate constraint on the Earth's population carrying capacity."

Projections of current trends indicate the world's population could expand from today's 5.5 billion [try 5.7 billion. -Ed.] and reach 10 billion to 14 billion by 2050. The biggest increases are expected in some of the poorest areas, such as Africa and southern Asia.

World watch's Full House report, released yesterday, predicted population at 8.9 billion by 2030. [more like 8 billion by 2020, but close enough. -Ed.]

At that level, the projected yearly grain supply will amount to 528 pounds per person, the report said. That is a quarter of what the average American now uses and just 20 percent above consumption in India, one of the worlds poorest countries.

The UN Population fund, responsible for family planning, unveiled a proposal in April to try to stabilize world population at 7.8 billion by 2050.

But food supplies will be too short to feed the world even if that goal is reached, said Lester R. Brown, co-author of the Worldwatch study, which was prepared in anticipation of next month's UN Population Conference in Cairo. The institute told of failed attempts to increase rice production and fish catches - illustrating that new technology cannot be counted on for breakthroughs.

After decades of steady growth, world farm production will no longer be able to keep up with the increasing demand, the study predicted.

The Washington-based Institute's pessimistic forecast on the limits of food supply is not shared by world farm bodies. [i.e. transnational corporations, big surprise! -Ed.]

Brown dismissed their projections as based only on past trends, and not applicable in the future.

They failed to take into account factors such as the loss of cropland to urbanization or reports that increased use of fertilizer no longer brings much more production, he added.

Worldwatch said grain production increased from 631 million tons in 1950 to 1.6 billion tons in 1984, or 3 percent a year. Growth in the last decade was just 1 percent a year, and Worldwatch predicted it would continue to slow, with production leveling off at 2.1 billion tons in 2030. [The population is increasing by 1.6 percent a year! Hello? -Ed.]

-excerpted from AP, August 14

World's seas arefished to the limit, study finds..

The oceans have been fished nearly to the limits, after decades of fishermen using bigger boats and more advanced hunting technologies, according to a report released yesterday.

"Although worldwide environmental degradation of the oceans contribute to the decline of marine life, overfishing is the primary cause of dwindling fish populations," said the report, which was issued by the nonprofit Worldwatch Institute. A 5 percent decline in the worldwide catch since 1989 is due largely to more people fishing in large-scale, industrial operations, often in waters that are becoming more polluted, the report said.

Meanwhile, world population is growing at 1.6 percent annually, equivalent to the population of Mexico being added to the world each year, the report said.

"This ... has already caused armed confrontations between fishing nations, gunfire between fishers and hunger in the developing world," said Peter Weber, author of the report, "Net Loss: Fish, Jobs and the Marine Environment."

The total catch has shrunk by more than 30 percent in four of the hardest-hit areas - the Pacific's east-central region and the Atlantic's northwest, west-central and southeast sectors.

-excerpted from AP, July 24

2 billion more Third World people predicted by2030

By the year 2030, the world will have nearly 3 billion more people than now, [actually 3.6 billion. -Ed.] 2 billion of them in countries where the average person earns less than $2 a day, the World Bank predicts in its latest report. It estimates that the global figure will reach 8,474,017,000, compared with 5,692,210,000 in 1995.

People will live longer, too. The average African baby born today can expect to live to age 54; one born in 2030 in Africa should have 63 years ahead of it. [Not bloody likely! -Ed.] By 2030, the bank says, Africa will grow from 720 million to 1.6 billion.

"Who will feed and house these people?" the bank president, Lewis T. Preston, asked in a statement. The bank is the largest source of aid loans to the Third World, many of them for houses, schools and public services.

-excerpted from AP, August 4

    Bullshit!The World Bank spent the last twenty years destroying sustainable agricultureall over the world. Countries that can barely feed themselves are forced togrow export crops and import our manufactured crap in return. The"loans" go straight into the pockets of the local CIA-traineddictators so that giant corporations can come in and buy up all the land. The"peasants" get kicked off the land they've lived on for generations,but that's okay because they make good slave labor. American livestock get faton imported grain while the "third world" starves. Delicioushamburger! Pass the ketchup! The World Bank also arranges for toxic heavyindustries to relocate to places where there aren't any environmental laws.Isn't that nice? Fuck the World Bank! They suck!

Senate OK's $12.5b in funds for schools, antigayplan

The Senate adopted a $12.5 billion school funding bill yesterday, but an antigay provision almost guarantees a continuing debate before the legislation becomes law. The Elementary and Secondary Education Act was approved, 94-6, after almost three days of sometimes contentious debate that saw inclusion of an amendment that would cut federal funds to school districts that teach acceptance of homosexuality.

"This legislation represents another main part of our efforts in this Congress to improve American education," Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, chairman of the Senate Labor and Human Resources Committee, said after the vote.

Schools that distribute instructional materials or offer counseling services portraying homosexuality as an acceptable lifestyle or that refer students to gay organizations for counseling could lose their federal funds under the provision.

-excerpted from AP, August 3

    Thiskind of shit makes me sick to my stomach. The population is increasing by amillion people every four days and these morons want to close down schools thathelp queers. People wonder why I support human extinction. We should worshipqueers! At least they don't reproduce! Hello? Senator?

SAVE THE PLANET! KILL YOURSELF!