I also am concerned about surrendering our own food production capacity, but I am even more concerned about its being decimated by endless residential and commercial development.

You can change endangered species laws or create preserves.  But each square mile of earth lost to paved concrete development is land that is subtracted from our food production capacity for a very long time.

I hope that sense comes before it is too late, too.  The problem is a hundred times bigger than that created by protecting species, however.

Hi Mark,

Food shipped thousands of mile to our tables is a temporary model, based on low cost fuel.

This will change over the next decade as the cost of shipping trumps any advantage to the lower cost labor of third world producers, at least for the United States.

The globalization model only works with ample supplies of dirt cheap fuel.

Yeah, and ultimately, the world population will outrun the food supply. We’re almost there now. Peak fresh water is here, and it’s world wide, not just local.

As food supply issues, and food prices become unaffordable for most people, you’ll see environmental concerns take a fast back seat.

Both the above posts well said and I can't add to them. Urban spread has consumed the most of the farmland. Fuel is a significant factor of food production and transportation of it.

Climate shift, while not yet headline news, is also affecting food production in parts of the world.

(~Pinch-hitting for H8Cloz~)

A temporary fix would be a broad popular conversion to nudism, so that some of the land now used for clothing production can be used for food production.

When farming became agri-buisness the end started.

The slow food movement, real organic farming and ideas like these, will help bring back farming. Which in turn will help the enviroment.

Growing hemp for clothing, fuel and food ( medicine, too !) is a possibility ...

Cheaper than cotton or wheat ! And it does not take nearly the water cotton co-ops. do.

--virgil

A temporary fix would be a broad popular conversion to nudism,

That's the kind of forward-looking thinking we need in this country.  I would like to subscribe to your newsletter.

We are consuming much more food than is being produced,

I somehow doubt that. 

But there are *LOTS* of reasons to encourage local, organically-grown food.

.

fined and sued for possibly disrupting a Kangaroo Rat habitat

Habitat destruction is not a minor thing, and it's to protect the habitat and not the rats--and the case you reference was blatant.

People always want to talk about climate change and you can see one example right here in the lack of fog in the winter.   I grew up in the country where we were surrounded by oil derreks, pumping units, alfalfa and cotton.  The fog was so think you couldn't see your hand in front of your face for days on end.  One particular time in about 1961 we  had 30 days where the fog only lifted a bit around noon and closed right back in.

That area is now the industrial areas along Rosedale highway and the Walmart complex.  As AD mentioned above they've paved over our farmlands all around the city and we lost the moisture from all the irrigation.  The canal at Fruitvale Avenue used to have water in it but I haven't seen that in years. 

Our area climate has drastically changed and when I hear "Fog Alert " on TV I shake my head..they don't know what real local fog is like.  You can still see some of the trees along the riparian watercourse even though there's no water these days.  I suppose they'll all die out eventually and if not, there will be houses where trees and reeds used to flourish.

At least you can still drive in the Shafter Wasco area and see food grown but hurry ,   Bakersfield is creeping out to Shafter and you or your kids may miss it.

How true, nancy. A lot of people think I'm spinning a tall tale when I say drivers had to roll down the window, stick their heads out to see the line on the road in order to get around at 10 or 15 mph. Traffic was not like it is now, so accidents were relatively rare. And there was no such thing as a school fog delay.

I'm all for supporting local growers - hence why I tend to purchase more produce from the farmer's markets (of course, it's cheap compared to the grocery store).  At the same time, I also enjoy having a variety of food products available from around the world.  That olive oil from Sicily does make a difference in certain things that I cook, as does the imported canned tomatoes and other ingredients.

Well, as much as I hate to admit that I used a blatantly liberal and environmentalist source to get some of the info I presented, I have to be honest. The June issue of National Goegraphic has a great article on the world food supply problem, and according to them, we ARE eating more than we grow right now, not in the future.

The references to losing farmland to development are key in that the future of American farming spoken of by donmason will not come to pass if all the good land(like much of it here in Bako)has been paved and built upon. There is also the problem of environemtalists fighting the use of lands in teh future. These people are not going to just go away, we are going to have to run them off.

Habitat, schmabitat. It was about a RAT habitat. I don't see that as a serious issue and nobody will ever show me an argument that will make me change my view on that. I DID go look at the fields in question back when all this was going on. They were weed infested wastes that a man, who immigrated here LEGALLY, sought to use to improve the lot of HUMANS. The rats of the world can ALL die and the world would be a better place for it.

NANCY I REMEMBER WHEN I LIVED IN BAKERSFIELD I WOULD GO OUT IN THE WINTER TURN AROUND AND WONDER WHERE THE HOUSE WAS,IT WAS THE SAME AT MY UNCLES HOUSE.FOOD WE USE TO GO OUT TO ARVIN AND PICK OUR OWN FOOD,THE PEAS AND GREEN BEANS