Something to think about... for the ag chem and GMO haters.

"By contrast, wheat production has lagged behind, and the crop?s profitability has recently dropped. That?s problematic because researchers estimate that the world will need to grow 60 percent more wheat by 2050 to feed its booming population."

For you "haters", do you think this can be accomplished by going back "to the old ways" of farming?

I certainly don't pretend to have a solution, and just think, this only covers ONE "staple crop"!
Source

Go back to the days BEFORE fertilizer and pesticides. Corn yielded MAYBE 60 bushels per acre.

And plent of corn boars too.

Bad Gov'ts are mostly the cause of people going hungry in the World today,just look at Venezuela one of the most oil rich countries in the world and the people are staving because
of the terrible socialist/communist gov't.South Africa used to be the bread basket of Southern Africa now if things continue on course they'll be starving in 10 years.The Ukraine
has the capacity to produce more wheat than almost all the other countries in the world combined if they can get their act together.All that said its is not up to the USA to feed everyone
else,its should be our gov't goal to make sure our citizens have the best and most healthy food we can supply to our citizens.Not supply our enemies and their armies and factory workers all over the world with cheap food just so a few farmers and Multinational companies can make a lot of money.

Wow! Traditional really hit it on the head...
Many smart thinkers on here.

Bob, you are in wheat country and I'm in corn, soy country so our expertise differs but we are on the same level nonetheless. My step mother was born and raised around Fessenden ND by the way and held land there. Her son how owns it. I was in that area a few times. Nice country and nice people. The R Deere I have was bought new in Fessenden and could possibly be the last new R sold out of that dealership. There, that makes this tractor related.

One good example of what modern genetics can do in wheat comes from an old farmer we used to harvest for in Oklahoma. He never bought new seed with new genetics. He just kept back seed year after year. His yields were at the level of the yields 70 years ago and the smut was so bad the elevator didn't want to take it. The rest of the farmers around there had good wheat for that area and they had no smut because they kept updating genetics.

Here in Iowa it's the same way. Our corn and soybeans yield better year after year partly because they are genetically modified to fight off the insects that like to feed on these plants. When these insects pierce the plant to suck the juice they open a pathway for disease to enter the plant. The disease hurts the plant more than the juice sucking hurts it.


As far as herbicide resistant plants goes, I don't see that as much of a yield booster in itself because cultivation can be used to control the weeds instead of herbicides. I don't know of anyone in this area who wants to go back to cultivating the crops for weeds though.

Before GMO's came to be our corn yield here in my neck of the woods had crept up to the 150 bushel per acre range. Now it's 200 up to 250. Part of that yield increase can be attributed to genetics but as lot of it is from the GMO side. The guys who plant non-GMO corn can say their yields were just as good as GMO on a certain year and I believe them but maybe the next year the root worms are bad in the corn because of extended diapause and a mild winter. Then the corn is a tangled mess and the yield goes way down. The evidence comes the next year with thick volunteer corn in the soybeans. They probably don't have much of a corn borer problem because they are riding on the coattails of the farms who do plant GMO. In fact, the non-BT corn farmers are helping the GMO farmers by planting a host crop that helps reduce GMO resistance.

Before BT corn we had corn borer moths by the millions splattering our windshields this time of year. Now we see very few moths because BT corn has taken care of the corn borer problem. Yes, there is claim BT corn pollen kills butterflies. Whether it's true or not is debatable. Expensive and dangerous insecticide spray is the only way to control them if BT corn is not planted and it's a fact that insecticide sprayed to kill corn borers does poison those butterflies for sure along with every other beneficial insect.

I mentioned extended diapause of root worms. Diapause means sleep. Extended diapause means extended sleep. In the past, if corn and soybeans were rotated year after year the corn rootworm larvae in the soil would hatch the next year in the soybeans but die because they had no host plant. They can't live on soy. Now the eggs and larvae have adapted and can winter over two years and come back to haunt in the next corn crop following the beans. GMO corn takes care of this problem. Yes an insecticide can be applied when the corn is planted but it's extra expense and bother. And who wants to handle hundreds maybe thousands of pounds of poison insecticide?

In soybeans we have a nematode problem in this area but nematode resistant beans has slowed the problem way down. Without this resistance the yields can easily be cut in half or more. There is no control over these nematodes besides planting GMO beans. One year when nematodes had just started invading this country I saved money by not planting nematode resistant beans. In the fall I lost yield and money big time. I saved five dollars per acre on the seed but lost 40 dollars per acre in yield. That's good incentive to 'go modern' with the seed.

So in the end, GMO's actually save the environment by mostly eliminating the need to apply or spray poison on our crops. By planting non-GMO crops the only money we save is in the seed. The other expenses are the same or greater.

Yes there are idiots out there who think we can go back to that type of farming what woild they do when the
store would not have very much food to sell and only a few days a year they just dont have a clue where their
food comes from they think its magic and then cuss the farmer who feeds them.

Please define a corn boar.

Do just a little research on your whole roundup in your cereal I dare ya and see what the truth actually is . I know your marketing scheme is to play on people?s false fears but you will soon find out and anybody who wants to spend the time it?s all bull

(quoted from post at 08:36:04 08/17/18) "By contrast, wheat production has lagged behind, and the crop?s profitability has recently dropped. That?s problematic because researchers estimate that the world will need to grow 60 percent more wheat by 2050 to feed its booming population."

For you "haters", do you think this can be accomplished by going back "to the old ways" of farming?

I certainly don't pretend to have a solution, and just think, this only covers ONE "staple crop"!
Source

Click to expand...

Sure it can be accomplished without roundup and GMO's.

1: Stop turning crops into fuel. Use that land to grow wheat. We really don't eat much corn or beans. We normally process that through animals to eat.

2: Take all the land that use to be farmed in the US and now sits idle and put it back into production.

3: Stop pretending that the US farmers feeds the world.

4: Take lands in other countries and put that into production. Hundreds of millions of acres sit all over the world and are not being used.

Doomsday reports sells news. Everything is great reports doesn't sell news. So let one self proclaimed expert make a claim and it's news.

Now here is the funny part. Prior to the 80's the Soviet Union that included east Europe and the Ukraine imported tons of wheat each year. Don't know how long they been doing this but as of last year the Ukraine was exporting it.

Even funnier when the US farmers growing corn and beans that no one eats anyways claiming to feed the world.

And you wonder why, when in an age that most folks have a smart phone and can fact check stuff in a heartbeat, that no one trust farmers anymore. "We feed the world"! Fact check? No you don't. And now I'm suppose to believe anything else you say? Sorry it don't work that way. And them city folks? They ain't so trusting. They fact check a lot of stuff. And once they catch you making false statements they are not likely to trust you again.


Rick

That would be a corn borer.

You're trying to convince people who'd throw women and children out of the lifeboat so they could get to the bank.

Randy If it was YOU in that boat with MY Mother-in-law you would have a different opinion. Al

Some estimates are 70-80 % of US corn production is done with RR or GMO seeds. Be doubtful that many farmers are going to change production methods based on the good ole days of farming. If they are getting 200 bu corn with today's genetics they cannot afford to go backwards to the 1960's and get 130 bu corn at today's input production costs.The market can determine of lot of production decisions of farmers. If wheat should happen not to be in surplus as it is and the price goes up, you could see farmers shift corn-soy production acres to wheat. Don't see a problem with meeting demand in 2050. Some other countries will also start producing more wheat if price goes up or it is needed worldwide.

(quoted from post at 13:37:30 08/17/18) That would be a corn borer.

Click to expand...

Corn borer larvae bore into the shank that holds the ear on and lives inside the shank hollowing it out weakening the shank to the point where the ear falls off on the ground and is lost.

Mine too. I probably would have walked over her to get to it. But she's gone now and I feel much better.

Hungry people start angry mobs - certainly dont want that. Not good for a civil society.

But, unrestricted population growth is not great either. It is just the easiest form of ?economics?. Very simple and straight forward.

We control the ?population? of cattle, chickens, plants and manufactured goods to maintain desired levels. Should humans be included - beats me. You need a licence to own a dog - anyone can have a kid.

Instead of worrying about feeding a future population, perhaps we need to decide if we need that population 1st.

Let the red and blue snowflakes argue it out, lol.

Just for interests sake.....consider the world in the year 1900. Most of the arable farmland was cleared and it fed less than a billion people. Today, we have roughly the same acreage of arable land....more has been cleared and drained of course, but roads cities etc. have taken over once arable land. Today, that similar land base feeds around 8 billion people, none of whom would be starving if politics were not involved. That extra production is coming from technology applied to crop production in the last 100 years...gmos and pesticides included...and we are living 10 to 20 years longer.
Ben

This thing.

Bingo, Traditional. I may be off base, but wouldn't lower yield with higher demand lead to higher prices as well? Maybe this would lead to more people becoming self sufficient with gardens, etc.

What am I selling? You fellows sell more more people on organics than I ever could that's for sure.You're definitely not tuned into what most American consumers are into these days.
So you get stuck with only the people that want cheap that's why the chemical guys get $3.50 for corn and the organic guys get $10.If you're happy with that, go for it.

One of the things a lot of you dreamers are failing to recolonize is that during/after the 80's farm crisis a lot of land came out of production and has never gone back into production. Lot of that land still sits idle today. Still a lot of land other places that isn't being used at all or is being under used. We are far from having a world food crisis. If we were even close the government would ban bio fuels to start with.

Rick

Yes, sort of like my governor that wants every conception to result in a child. However he is unwilling to discuss or propose funding to deal with the problems of all these children that are born with life long drug related health issues or abusive parents or killer boyfriends. Our state ranks #1 for children killed by abusive parents. If we place such a high value on protecting the life of the unborn, then are we as a society are obligated to spend the budget necessary protect them, when they actually living children ages 2 and 3 and 4? Is a balanced budget more important than these children's lives?

The vast majority of the land that went out of production was
very marginal land and wouldn't contribute reliably with good
crops. If it did it would be in production.

(quoted from post at 19:16:45 08/17/18) The vast majority of the land that went out of production was
very marginal land and wouldn't contribute reliably with good
crops. If it did it would be in production.

Click to expand...

Jon, not true. When a lot of farms went under in the 80's the owners put it in CRP and it's sense grown into brush and weed choked fields. You'd be shocked at some of the production some of these guys are getting out of so called marginal soils. Over here in the Battle Lake/Henning area some guys are bumping 230 BPA corn and 60-70 BPA beans. And not all of it is under irrigation either. Some pretty sandy soil here. This is land that the BTO's over in the valley scoffed at in the 70's are not worth farming. Ain't much sitting idle in the Valley but some is idle even there.

Rick

There is little or no crp around me. But up in Nw My where my
cousin lives there is some. He planted around 80 acres into it
again this year. The field that he planted can produce bumper
crops, but so frequently floods out that they only harvest a
crop. 5-7 out of 10 years. It has always been hard to get
consistent crops there. So even if it went back into production a
consistent harvest is not in the books. Hard to stay in farming
if you can't stay profitable. This is the type of land that I've
seen go into the set aside programs. That may be different around
you, but it still wouldn't be enough acres to compensate for
world wide organic farming.

Now if you want to talk about available acres, think about the
former Soviet union, there is enough arable land there not in use
to really affect worlwide food levels. The problem for them is
they have neither the infrastructure to farm it nor the people to
do the work. When they get that in place the US. will really be
in trouble. Or the world could feed itself organically, at least
for a while.

It bores into the ear, hence its a corn borer not male hog

So your saying if there really was a world food crisis, the government would solve it. Now that is funny.

The vast majority of people are not against the use of fertilizers, Roundup, Atrazine, GMOs, manure, herbicides, pesticides, and other ag chemicals when they are used responsibly. Let me repeat: WHEN THEY ARE USED RESPONSIBLY. The problem is that too many ag chemicals are now showing up in too many places where they should not be. They are showing up in: food; drinking water; rivers; lakes; neighbor's yards; etc, where their side effects are now causing harm to the public and to the environment.

Until ag chemicals started showing up it the wrong places, most people either believed they were good or they didn't care one way or the other about them. If we can find ways to keep ag chemicals in their place and to clean them up when they do escape, much of the opposition will eventually go away.

Tires, spray paint, aluminum beverage cans, plastic water bottles, leaded gasoline, and lead paint were all good things too, until tires were being dumped irresponsibly, graffiti appeared on public and private buildings, and empty cans and bottles littered the streets, road ditches, parks and drifted into peoples yards, smog blocked out the sun, and lead harmed our children. Eventually public outcry became so strong that there was no way to avoid taking steps to control the harmful side effects of these products. The producers who adapted their products to the new regulations survived and those who refused went out of business.

Many of the ag chemicals that are causing problems have been around for forty, fifty, sixty years. We have two and three generations of farmers who can't imagine ever going without them or that there is a need to change their operations to keep ag chemicals from causing harm to other people.

So far, too many response from some farmers and ag companies seems to come across as:
There's no way I can farm and control the spread of ag chemicals;
If I can't find a way to do it, it's impossible that any one else could either;
The public should just live with the side effects of ag chemicals;
Even though I'm the only one benefiting from ag chemicals, the taxpayers and the public should be the ones that have to pay for their cleanup;
The public can't survive without my product, you will buy what I produce and you will like it;
I'm irreplaceable, no other farmer can replace me, my landlord would never rent to someone else;
The problems don't exist;
The two 20 acre golf courses in the county are the only ones causing all the problems;
There is salmonella in your salad, chicken, ice cream and hamburger? Give us several months to find the source and maybe we will recall whatever has not been eaten by then;
There will always be enough hack politicians to protect the industry from regulations;
Regulations intended to protect small farmers don't make it easier for BTOs, investor groups and foreign corporations to move in. When that happened in the dairy industry it was just a fluke;
Your kids are being harmed? Well your kids probably were not going to amount to anything anyway, so no harm done;

Those probably is not what farmers and ag companies mean to say at all, but too often it does come across that way.

Despite appearances or perceptions, there is still a lot of good will between the public and farmers. Farmers do get a lot of break that home owners and other businesses don't:
Property tax breaks;
Farm equipment can block traffic on public roads in ways that no other industry is allowed.
Rural roads are heavily subsidized by urban ares, local and county taxes don't come close to paying for: $1,000s per mile annual maintenance and snow removal costs, half million dollar bridges, half million dollars per mile to rebuild gravel roads, etc.;
Farms and ag companies get by with employing a higher percentage of illegal aliens than any other industry;

Why put those breaks and public good will in jeopardy by refusing to control ag chemicals?

Good point on the bio fuels! We really do have excess food to burn.

Nearly 40 percent of our 2016 corn production goes into ethanol, about the same 40 percent as is fed to US livestock, the last 20 percent is exported. Earlier this year when the government wanted to reduce ethanol production corn producers insisted we needs ethanol to keep corn prices from falling more.