In the wake of India’s ban on wheat exports, I thought a few statistics about global wheat production would be timely. Here are the world’s largest producers of wheat:
- China (137 million metric tons)
- India (110)
- Russia (75)
- U. S. (45)
- Australia (36)
- Ukraine (33)
while the biggest exporters of wheat are:
- Russia ($8 billion)
- U. S. ($6 billion)
- Canada ($6 billion)
- France ($5 billion)
- Ukraine ($4 billion)
Neither China nor India are major exporters of wheat—nearly all of their wheat is grown for domestic consumption.
Over the last 25 years U. S. wheat production has declined almost 30%. I don’t object to countries specializing in the economic activities they do best and can earn the most from doing. That just makes sense.
I do object to paving over or otherwise developing prime farmland. It is an exhaustible resource and they aren’t making more of it. If taken out of production, it should be required to just lie fallow.
Urban land accounts for 3% of the US total area, and farm land accounts for 40%. That’s a decrease of 1.6% in total farmland since 2012.
For now, organic farming is a bigger threat than urbanization, because organic farms are substantially less productive than conventional farms. The current shortages of fertilizer and diesel are a critical threat to this year’s crop, which could be much smaller than usual.
On the other hand, I do sympathize with restrictions on converting farmland to suburban and urban development. I live surrounded by forest and farms, and most of the farms near me are in land conservancy agreements, which limits the kinds of development possible. Having been in this area since 1984, I have gone feral and could not possibly live in an urban or even low density suburban neighborhood. To think, I lived 9 years in inner city Boston, Dorchester specifically. I don’ think I was sane when I left Dorchester for Purdue.
Antiplanner [ https://ti.org/antiplanner/ ] has several posts analyzing development restrictions in California, Oregon, and Washington. These restrictions generally impose high density development in a specified urban area, and prohibit residential and commercial development outside that area, in order to preserve farms. (And better control people.) California has essentially banned the construction of new single family homes.
The net result has been the creation of severe housing shortages and very high housing rents and purchase prices. The remedy for that is rent controls. And rent controls present all sorts of opportunities for corruption by regulators and renters. Which might be the actual, tacit point.
While the American birth rate (about 1.8 children per woman lifetime) is below replacement, we do have very large immigration underway, currently 2.5 million illegals per year plus the 675,000 legals permitted by law. That’s about 1% of the total population per year, and the total is greater than the populations of some 20 states:
[ https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_population ].
So, where are 3.2 million new immigrants to live each year? New England and New York were largely clearcut in the early 1800’s, but are now covered with second (third, fourth, fifth…) growth forest. Drive around Massachusetts; you are usually in forest. Or we could build in the desert, but where to get the water.
The allocations of the Colorado River were made during an wet period, and there presently is not enough water in it to meet them. Also, California is both tearing down reservoirs and diverting water away from farms to estuaries to preserve fish populations. California has just decided to cancel a large desalination plant, because the discharged brine would harm plankton.
California water policy is a bigger threat to farmland than is urbanization.
No money in wheat, with the right mix of chemicals and descent land you can grow 200 bushel/acre corn and 60 bushel soybeans with little water and sell them to make renewable fuels for transportation.
That’s green energy for the sake of the planet.
Speaking of land, 30% of the total area in the US is Federally owned.
640 million acres owned by an entity 10 trillion dollars in debt.
Time for an auction?
To some extent the issue of wheat shortages has been exaggerated by looking at projected declines in exports, when exports remain a relatively small portion of consumption because states enact policies to encourage self reliance on food stuff. I think in Ukraine, a wheat producer is capped at something like one-third of wheat for export. Before the invasion producers were urging the cap to be raised to two-thirds. India maintains high tariffs on food imports to protect its domestic production, which has its own role in limiting global markets.