OUTGROWING THE EARTH
The Food Security Challenge in an
Age of Falling Water Tables and
Rising Temperature
By Lester R. Brown
Presented by David Quinn, 17th October 2007
Pushing Beyond the Earth’s Limits
 The growth in world population since 1950
exceeds that during the preceding 4 million
years.
 Perhaps more striking, the world economy
has expanded six-fold since 1950 - world
demand for food has tripled
 As the economy grows, its demands are
outgrowing the earth, exceeding many of the
planet’s natural capacities to provide food,
water, and the basic needs of daily living.
Growth: The Environmental Fallout
 The world economy, as now structured, is
making excessive demands on the earth:
 Evidence of this can be seen with:
collapsing fisheries…shrinking
forests…expanding deserts…rising Co2
levels…eroding soils…rising
temperatures…falling water
tables…melting glaciers…deteriorating
grasslands…rising seas…disappearing
species
Era of discontinuity
 Nearly all these environmentally
destructive trends adversely affect the
world food prospect:
 Two factors undermining food security
falling water tables - water use has tripled in
the past 50 years
rising temperatures - Co2 emissions have
increased 4 fold in the past 50 years
Falling Water Tables
 Water tables are now falling in countries
that contain over half the world’s people.
 Of even more concern, the vast majority of
the nearly 3 billion people to be added to
world population by mid-century will come
in countries where water tables are already
falling and wells are going dry.
 Historically it was the supply of land that
constrained the growth in food production,
but today the shortage of water is the most
formidable barrier.
Rises in Temperature
 The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change projects that during this century, the
earth’s average temperature will rise by 1.45.8 degrees.
 The projections are for the earth’s average
temperature, but the rise is expected to be
much greater over land than over the
oceans, and in the interior of continents
than in the coastal regions
 Each 1 degree Celsius rise in temperature
during the growing season reduces the yield
of grain—wheat, rice, and corn—by 10
percent.
 Higher temperatures in mountainous regions
alter the precipitation mix, increasing
rainfall and reducing snowfall. The result is
more flooding during the rainy season and
less snowmelt to feed rivers during the dry
season
 Since 1970, the earth’s average temperature has
risen nearly 0.7 degrees Celsius (1 degree
Fahrenheit). The five warmest years during 124
years of recordkeeping began in 1880 occurred in
the last seven years.
 In 2002, record-high temperatures and drought
lowered grain harvests in both India and the United
States. These reduced harvests helped pull world
grain production some 90 million tons below
consumption, a shortfall of more than 4 percent.
 In 2003, it was Europe that bore the brunt of rising
temperatures. The record-breaking heat wave that
claimed 35,000 lives in eight countries withered
grain harvests in virtually every country from France
in the west through the Ukraine in the east. The
resulting reduction in Europe’s grain production of
some 30 million tons was equal to half the U.S.
wheat harvest.
Assessing the World Food Problem
 No longer just a matter of trends
slowing or accelerating; in some cases
they are reversing direction:
Grain harvests are now falling
Fish catches are now falling
We are over-pumping, over-plowing &
over-grazing
Tightening Food Supply
 The world food supply is tightening because
world grain is continuing to expand at a
robust pace while production growth is
slowing as the backlog of unused agricultural
technology shrinks, cropland is converted to
non-farm uses, rising temperatures shrink
harvests, aquifers are depleted, and
irrigation water is diverted to cities
World Grain Production
Basic indicator of global food security
 Tripled from 1950 to 1996
 Flat for seven years in a row from 1996
to 2003
 And in each of the past 4 years,
production fell short of consumption
 …..with shortfalls of nearly 100 million
tons in 2002 and again in 2003 (largest
on record)
China
 Biggest reversal in recent times has been the
precipitous decline in China’s grain
production since 1998
 Between 1998 and 2004, China’s grain
production has fallen by 50 million tons
 Now stocks are largely depleted and China is
turning to the world market
 In 2004, China bought 8 million tons of
wheat which could mark the beginning of the
global shift from an era of grain surpluses to
one of grain scarcity
Redefining food security
 For more that 40 years, international trade
negotiations have been dominated by grainexporting countries (US, Canada, Argentina &
Australia) pressing for greater access to
markets in importing countries
 Now the world may be moving into a period
dominated not by surpluses but by
shortages…..
Tightening food security
 The exclusive province of agricultural
ministers—is a far more complex issue.
 Decisions made in ministries of energy can
have a greater effect on future food security
than those made in ministries of agriculture.
 Policies formulated by ministers of water
resources can also directly affect food
production and food prices.
 Ministries of health and family planning may
also have a greater effect on future food
security than ministries of agriculture.
The Challenge Ahead
 The three principal steps needed to secure
future world food supplies are worldwide
efforts to raise water productivity, cut
carbon emissions, and stabilize population.
 If countries do not act quickly to raise water
productivity, falling water tables could soon
translate into rising food prices.
 Given the effect of rising temperatures on
crop yields, the urgency of cutting carbon
emissions sharply cannot easily be
overstated.
 “We have inherited the mindset, policies,
and fiscal priorities from an era of food
security that no longer exists. The policies
that once provided food security will no
longer suffice in a world where we are
pressing against the sustainable yields of
oceanic fisheries and underground aquifers
and the limits of nature to fix carbon
dioxide. Unless we recognise the nature of
the era we are entering and adopt new
policies and priorities that recognise the
earth’s natural limits, world food security
could begin to deteriorate. If it does, food
security could quickly ellipse terrorism as
the overriding concern of governments”