Food Questions

We're going to have to rethink our entire agronomic system to determine how to deal with climate change.  We have just started to think about the questions - - we don't know the answers yet. 

Economist Paul Krugman addresses this in his New York Times column today - - Droughts, Floods and Food:

But the evidence tells a different. much more ominous story.  While several factors have contributed to soaring food prices, what really stands out is the extent to which severe weather events have disrupted agricultural production.  And these severe weather events are exactly the kind of thing we'd expect to see as rising concentrations of greenhouse gases change our climate - - which means that the current food price surge may be just the beginning.

Consider the case of wheat, whose price has almost doubled since the summer.  The immediate cause of the wheat price spike is obvious: world production is down sharply.  The bulk of that production decline, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture data, reflects a sharp plunge in the former Soviet Union.  And we know what that's about: a record heat wave and drought, which pushed 100 degrees for the first time ever.

The Russian heat wave was only one of many recent extreme weather events, from dry weather in Brazil to biblical-proportion flooding in Australia, that have damaged world food production.

The future is going to be really complex for engineers - - both questions and answers.  What are we to plan for?  A world of less water (except when there is more)?  At a certain point the global community will ask us to help them avoid the unmanageable and manage for the unavoidable.  We need to be thinking about what we are doing to do when that scenario arrives at our door step.