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Old 18th-June-2007, 12:50 PM
Cricket Tragic Cricket Tragic is offline
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It depends on how you want to define food shortages. There already are food shortages in various parts of the world for many reasons: drought, pest damage, storm damage, war and politics. These will no doubt continue into the future. The current concern stems from poor crops in a number of major exporting countries and increased demand in China, India and to a lesser extent for biofuels. Most corn grown in the US is fed to animals in the US, so if it goes to biofuels, they will need to find something else to feed to the animals. Costs of meat will rise and perhaps those who will suffer most will be the US poor.

Of course if food crop costs rise, there will be a switch from growing crops for fuel to crops for food as growers attempt to take advantage. At this point, provided agricultural productivity continues on its present rate of increase, we are in no danger of running out of food in the near future.
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