Rising food prices raise spectre of Malthus [View All]

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Rising food prices raise spectre of Malthus

Pessimists have believed that humanity is doomed due to overpopulation and overconsumption ever since economist and scholar Thomas Robert Malthus forecasted this fate over two centuries ago. Conversely, optimists have argued that technological innovation will improve standards of living and that population growth is at most a minor issue. But, now, rising food costs have once again raised fears that the population is outstripping the planet’s food supplies.

Although the recent price spikes are partially the result of short-term factors – droughts, floods, speculative investing, low reserves, and hoarding– food prices are likely to remain high as rising demand runs into supply constraints. While higher food prices will have a negative effect everywhere, they will have a particularly devastating impact on the poor, who already spend a large part of their incomes on sustenance and will be forced to spend more.

On the supply side, environmental constraints impede our ability to grow more food. In much of the world the most productive land is already being used for agriculture or covered by artificial structures; the best river sites have been dammed; and the benefits of the technological advances in agriculture production, known as the Green Revolution, have been heavily exploited. Further, in many densely populated countries water shortages are acute. The latest threat comes from rising energy prices. Energy is an integral part of every step in the food production system – cultivation, harvesting, transportation, refrigeration, packaging, and distribution. Even some of fertilizers and pesticides are hydrocarbon-based; consequently these products are becoming more costly as well. Another restriction to our food supply is the recent diversion of crops formerly meant for our dinner tables are now winding up as biofuels.

On the demand side, food consumption is expected to increase by 50 percent over the next two decades because of population growth and higher incomes. As developing countries climb out of poverty, diets become more calorie-and protein-rich, and consumption of animal products grows. World population, now near 7 billion, is expected to rise to 9.2 billion in 2050. Nearly all this addition to population will occur in the poorest regions of the world. Prospects are grimmest for the poorest countries with limited natural resources and extremely rapid population growth, most of them in sub-Saharan Africa. Despite the AIDS epidemic, sub-Saharan Africa is expected to add more than a billion to its current population.

The author mentions the usual limp litany of potential ameliorations: voluntary family planning, the education of women, the reduction of meat-eating in rich nations along with the elimination of subsidies to flesh-growers. It remains to be seen whether such well-intentioned palliatives will overcome the simultaneous rise in both population and food prices. It may not remain to be seen for much longer, though.