Search the archive.

Before rushing to kit out your climate prepper bunker, you might want to take a look at the new study by University of Colorado climate change policy researcher Roger Pielke that confirms what the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change found in August 2021, namely that the worst-case climate scenario is increasingly unlikely, and that while our future will be warmer, it will not be catastrophically so.

These dire predictions were based on calculations derived from a scenario of the future in which fossil fuel and agricultural emissions over the course of this century would boost atmospheric carbon dioxide to nearly 1,400 parts per million (ppm) by 2100. The current level of atmospheric carbon dioxide is just under 420 ppm, and that is up from the pre-industrial level of about 280 ppm. Largely as a result of this increase in atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases, global average temperature has risen to around 1.1°C above the pre-industrial level.

Cattle, as large ruminants, hold an iconic position in many climate and sustainability discussions. The FAO estimated cattle numbers at 1.511 billion head in 2019 (FAOSTAT, 2020) and Fig. 7 shows global cattle numbers versus beef production for some of the major cattle producing countries and regions of the world. The United States is the largest single beef-producing country followed by Brazil. These two countries, along with Europe, collectively produced approximately 50% of the world's beef in 2020. However, this number does not reflect the distribution of global cattle populations. Brazil is the country with the largest number of cattle at 215 million head, with India coming in second at 193 million head. It should be noted that these figures are only for cattle. It does not include the world buffalo stocks of 204 million animals, of which 110 million head live in India. Likewise, Pakistan has almost the same number of buffalo (40 million) as cattle (48 million) totaling 88 million head. Likewise, beef production numbers are usually referring to cattle. If buffalo meat and edible offal from both are included in the production numbers, the values for India and Pakistan more than double from 0.9 and 1.1, to 2.9 and 2.4 MMt, respectively. Africa collectively is home to 361 million cattle, 24% of the global population, and 3.5 million buffalo located mainly in Egypt. In Africa, the agricultural sector is the largest sector of the domestic economy, and livestock are a crucial component of that sector and account for more than 70% of African agricultural GHG emissions. Ethiopia has 63 million cattle, the most of any African country, followed by Sudan and Chad each at 31 million head, Tanzania with 28 million head, Kenya and Nigeria each with 21 million head, Uganda with 16 million head, and Niger, South Sudan, South Africa, Mali and Burkina Faso each with 10–15 million head. Over 250 million cattle live outside of the top beef producing countries and the African continent, reflecting the fact that cattle are found throughout the world, in almost all climatic zones, with the exception of high elevations. They live in more than 200 countries around the world, and they have been bred for adaptations to heat, cold, humidity, extreme diet, water scarcity, mountainous terrain, dry environments, and for general hardiness. Cattle also produce milk, and in 2019, the world production of fresh cow milk was almost 715 MMt, of which 90 MMt was produced in India, and 36 MMt was produced in Africa. As with meat, a lot of milk is also produced by buffalo in India, 92 MMt according to the FAO, making India the largest dairy country, producing an estimated 21% (188 MMt) of the world’s 883 MMt of milk from all species in 2019. The highest cattle densities are found in India, the East African highlands (particularly in Ethiopia), Northern Europe and in South America (Fig. 8). Only 7% of beef (2% cattle population) is produced in intensive systems. Likewise, approximately 88% of milk production occurs within mixed crop and livestock systems, with only 12% being produced in intensive systems (Gerber et al., 2015). The majority of beef, 59% (63% cattle population), is produced in mixed crop and livestock systems, with the remaining 34% of total beef (35% cattle population) being produced on grazing systems. This later group can be further divided into intensive grazing systems that are found in tropical and temperate zones where high-quality grasslands and fodder production can support larger numbers of highly productive animals. These systems are mostly focused on food production, based on individual landownership, and supply about 20% of global beef production. The second category represents pastoral livestock systems that have developed in harsh environments, such as dry lands and cold areas, and which account for less than 15% of total beef production, but which support the livelihoods of 200 million households. These are driven by low animal productivity across large areas of arid lands, feed scarcity, and animals with low productive potential that are often used by smallholder farmers for other services such as draft power, manure and to manage household risk. It should be noted emissions attributable to animals used for draft power are typically excluded from the calculation of meat and milk emission estimates for that species (Gerber et al., 2013). These authors note the efficiency improvements based solely on saleable ASF products that result in herd size reductions could harm traditional farm household livelihoods due to the loss of the non-food goods and services provided by livestock. The developing world currently contributes 75% of global GHG emissions from ruminants and 56% of emissions from monogastrics (Herrero et al., 2013). There is a wide gap in emission intensities that exist on a global and regional scale (Fig. 9), and considerable variation between producers. It has been found that the environmental impact of producing the same product can vary by 50-fold (Poore and Nemecek, 2018). It is estimated that the potential for mitigating livestock emissions – CH4 in particular – by applying the practices of the top 10th percentile of producers with the lowest emission intensities in a given system, region and agro-ecological zone is between 30 and 35% (FAO, 2018). Chang et al. (2021) reported that 88–91% of the livestock CH4 emissions come from enteric fermentation by ruminants (i.e. cattle, sheep, goats, and buffaloes). They predicted that if there are no improvements in CH4 emissions per kg protein, then global livestock CH4 emissions will increase by 51–54% from 2012 to 2050. They estimated that improving production efficiencies in 10 countries (Brazil, China, India, Iran, Madagascar, Morocco, Niger, South Africa, Tanzania, Turkey) where a large increase in livestock production is projected and the current CH4 emissions per kg protein are high could contribute 60–65% of the global reduction in livestock emissions by 2050 (compared to a baseline where emission intensities are held constant in the future). They further found that efforts to improve production efficiency have a much greater potential for GHG mitigating effects than would demand-side efforts to promote balanced, healthy, and environmentally sustainable diets.

The IUCN has estimated that 0.8 percent of the 112,432 plant, animal, and insect species within its data have gone extinct since 1500. That’s a rate of fewer than two species lost every year, for an annual extinction rate of 0.001 percent.14

The huge increase in biodiversity during the last 100 million years massively outweighs the species lost in past mass extinctions. The number of genera, a measure of biodiversity more powerful than species count alone, has nearly tripled over the course of this time period.15 After each of these past five mass extinctions, the biodiversity in the fossil record dips between 15 to 20 percent, but each extinction is followed by much larger growth.16

Estimates of global biodiversity trends vary depending on their data and mathematical model. The most apocalyptic models gather extensive press coverage, even when based on controversial data (for example, ‘biological annihilation’5, which described trend estimates based largely on expert opinion; or ‘insect Armageddon’, which is based on data disputed by the original collectors6). However, even analyses of the best available data reach conflicting conclusions. An analysis of a global dataset of abundance time series of vertebrates estimated that, on average, vertebrate populations have declined by more than 50% since 1970 (Living Planet Index2 (LPI)); however, other global analyses found that the mean population size7,8 and species richness9,10 have remained stable over similar timeframes. Explanations for the discrepancies have been proposed8,11,12,13, but not resolved.

One crucial consideration is that summary indices may be easily misinterpreted. Calculating the geometric mean across populations is the most common and straightforward approach, but is strongly influenced by extremes. To illustrate, imagine an ecosystem in which one population declined by 99%. Even if a second population increased 50-fold or 393 populations increased by 1% (that is, a large net increase), a geometric mean would show a catastrophic 50% decline. Thus, a geometric mean decline of 50% could arise from substantial, widespread loss that is occurring across many populations (we term this the ‘catastrophic declines’ hypothesis) or from a few extremely declining populations (we term this the ‘clustered declines’ hypothesis). Both scenarios involve important conservation issues, but suggest vastly different underlying problems and require different mitigation strategies14, thus distinguishing between them is of real-world importance.

Our world is much more resilient than it was even a generation ago, especially with regard to food. The food shock of 2022 is not a good-news story. The news is bad. But our “bad” is less bad than ever before.

Russia and Ukraine are massive growers of grain, especially wheat. Russia produces about 10 percent of the planet’s wheat; Ukraine about 4 percent. Some of that production is consumed at home, but after their domestic use, Russia and Ukraine together provide about one-quarter of all the planet’s wheat exports. They are important exporters of corn and barley as well, and of cooking oils, especially sunflower oil. Now the Russian invasion has closed the ports through which Ukraine’s wheat moved to world markets. Insurance costs have jumped for all shipping in the Black Sea. Spring crops will probably go unplanted in Ukraine; Russian crops face sanctions and embargo. Russia and its ally Belarus also are—or were—important exporters of the fertilizer that other food-raising countries use to grow their own crops.

Figure 4 shows levels of PCB and DDT in skipjack tuna liver. Measurements are from the Pacific, Indian, and Southwest Atlantic oceans and do not cover the North Atlantic. There can be no such thing as locally limited environmental contamination. Convection through the water and air that make up the global ecosphere and interactions due to the movements of animal species such as migratory birds and fish that move with sea currents have the effect of disseminating contamination, so that environmental destruction spreads throughout the ecosphere. This may initially involve contamination at low concentration, but chemical compounding with other substances and reactions with various chemical elements lead to the secondary development of toxicity and bio-accumulation in a ‘domino effect’ of environmental destruction. Environmental contamination can no longer be a distant concern but is casting an unmistakeable shadow on the lives of modern humans. Environmental hormones have a multiple presence in our lives, not only in synthetic preservatives, colorants, and flavorings, herbicides and agricultural chemicals, but also for instance in dioxins emitted through waste incineration, and these substances have left residues in the bodies of nearly every human being.

The threat from environmental hormones highlighted by Colborn was that, mediated through the interaction between living organisms that takes place in the food chain, contaminants would undergo bio-accumulation and collect in high concentrations in the bodies of modern humans. This would mean damage to DNA, which is a ‘blueprint for preservation of the species.’ The contamination of animal wombs with environmental hormones amounts to the contamination of the global ecosphere, which is the amniotic fluid of all life on earth, in other words contamination of Gaia. This is because contamination of any one group of individuals, such as waterfowl, poses a danger to all living organisms, all intelligent life forms with a nervous system dependent on water and carbons. Waterfowl contamination leads ultimately to ‘Gaia contamination’, or contamination of the whole of the global ecosphere, which threatens human survival.

As a doctor, I am concerned about eroding protections for those most affected by dangerous pesticide exposures—the workers who apply them,” said Representative Yadira Caraveo (D-Colorado) during last Thursday’s session to discuss, amend, and vote on the House Agriculture Committee’s first draft of the 2024 Farm Bill.

Despite those objections, Caraveo was one of four Democrats on the committee who joined Republicans in moving the bill forward, complete with several controversial provisions that would make it harder for states to regulate pesticides and hamper individuals’ ability to seek compensation for harm caused by the chemicals.

IF HACKERS WANTED to debilitate American society, they would have trouble taking down the entire power grid or financial system, but they could do serious damage to the companies that make and deliver Americans’ food.

The US food and agriculture sector lacks the resources, expertise, and government support to protect itself and its products from a rapidly expanding range of cybersecurity threats, according to lawmakers, policy experts, and former government officials. These shortfalls leave gaps that foreign government operatives or cybercriminals could exploit to remotely disable farming equipment, contaminate fertilizer, cripple milk supplies, and kill chickens.

Lack of summer rain forced Nebraska farmer Kevin Fulton to go underground to find water for his crops. Not a perfect solution: the Ogallala Aquifer, where Fulton tapped in, has pumping restrictions in some areas, just not where Fulton is located. That’s because the aquifer is running dry.

As drought extends its deadly fingers from California to the eastern side of the Mississippi River — a vast stretch of the continent that produces most of America’s food, including three-quarters of its beef cattle and 70% of its vegetables, fruits and nuts — farmers and ranchers are facing a double whammy. They have to go farther to find water and higher fuel costs are forcing them to pay more to pump whatever isn’t coming from the sky. That predicament is still better than what’s happened to the land that’s not irrigated, Fulton says.

Specialty Crops: Drought, Labor Shortages, Strong Dollar Among Headwinds

Specialty crop growers and processors face a multitude of headwinds in 2023. Costs of water, labor, fertilizer and other inputs are rising while a strong U.S. dollar and weakening global economy drag on the U.S.’s ability to sell products abroad.

For many, 2022 was a year of change and transition. As we all thankfully watched the worst of the pandemic pass, new challenges arose, especially in farm country, as post-pandemic changes in consumer behavior, global supply chains, and monetary policy caused major shifts in the economy.

It was a year of transition for me personally, as I joined the American Farm Bureau as Executive Vice President. A priority for me once onboard was to get out and meet our members, so I traveled the country doing just that. I’m grateful to have been warmly welcomed into the Farm Bureau family and look forward to advocating for solutions in 2023.

Monster Subsidies That Are Unnecessary, But Seemingly Unstoppable

Cato's Lincicome pointed out that Australia and New Zealand both largely eliminated agricultural supports years ago and remain major producers. Their farmers learned to adapt and innovate in response to the market.

If a new farm bill can’t pass this year, it is expected that another one-year extension will be passed. Grassley said farmers would receive protection but not adequate protection. Getting beyond an extension of the same-old would be up to a new Congress, and as of now it is anybody’s guess who will be in charge.

It’s not as if the existing hang-ups are going anywhere. Fights over food stamps in the House stalled the last farm bill by two years. House Speaker Mike Johnson walks on egg shells in his caucus room as he is accused of caving in to Democrats on spending. The same sticking points will be as sticky in 2025.

The Farm Bill, renegotiated and passed every five years, designates hundreds of billions of dollars in public funds to food and agriculture programs. It’s a key shaper of our food system — and, as agriculture accounts for 15-25% of global emissions, it also has a big impact on our climate.

But corporations have hijacked federal food policy to pay for their dirty and expensive practices, masquerading them as “green” solutions.

Even if Democrats protect IRA funding, “climate-smart” agriculture so far appears to mean pouring federal money into often dubious technological solutions designed to sustain the dominant productivist approach of maximizing yields.7 This is in keeping with the IRA’s broader political-economic bent, which favors incentivizing the private sector to innovate and invest in decarbonizing technologies. Daniela Gabor has criticized this approach as “derisking” for business at the expense of public investment. In agricultural policy, however, derisking is nothing new. Since the 1920s, federal provision of subsidies and specialized credit facilities have underwritten farmers’ continued uptake of productivity-enhancing technologies by reducing uncertainties related to outlays for new capital investments.8 The IRA is already playing into a familiar agricultural policy script.

There were benefits to this approach in the past, but we now face a climate crisis that demands a fundamental reassessment of agricultural policy. This is a profoundly structural question. The existing policy instruments appear ill-suited for climate goals because they were made by a political coalition oriented toward the ever increasing production of commodity crops and meat. Rather than continue this pattern, today’s rural agenda should be broadened, and it should rechannel a portion of agricultural subsidies toward a reduction of crop acreage in favor of reforestation.

Although it seems like everyone in D.C. is buzzing about a “climate farm bill,” some of the most impactful changes, including crop diversification and shifting diets from meat toward plants, are barely on the negotiating table.

For the past decade, Emma Jagoz has been stewarding and expanding a thriving organic farm that now spans 25 acres near Frederick, Maryland. At Moon Valley Farm, she grows a wide variety of vegetables that end up in CSA boxes and restaurant kitchens in Maryland, Washington, D.C., and Virginia year-round.

H.R. 1631, co-led by Congresswoman Deborah Ross (NC-02), ensures free public access to technical standards incorporated into law or regulations while protecting the copyrights of the private entities that develop and update these standards. This bill strikes the right balance of ensuring that technical standard organizations (SDOs) maintain copyright protections for the compilation of technical codes and provide accessibility for the public. Under this bill, those who invest in code development will still be able to sell their materials in certain formats so long as they are simultaneously providing public access to the information for free.

“Standards in federal rules and regulations matter, and never more so than when they are at the crossroads of streamlining public access or blocking it," said Rep. Issa. “The Pro Codes Act harmonizes the need to make our standards accessible with safeguarding the copyrights of those who create these regulations. My thanks to Rep. Ross for her work in our success in the Judiciary Committee.”

As the 118th Congress convenes this month in D.C., many pundits and advocates have little faith that much will get done with the GOP taking control of the House and Democrats maintaining their hold of the Senate.

But historically, we have reason to be optimistic: United States lawmakers have passed more legislation when the government is divided between the two parties. Our leaders can — and must — work across the aisle to bring down the cost of health care through patent reform, an area where our elected representatives can find common ground and deliver for the common good.

Senators who have raised bipartisan outcry over the demise of newsrooms at the hands of Big Tech companies are rallying to protect journalism from the potentially fatal blow of artificial intelligence.

They’re hoping to ensure that news organizations receive full compensation when algorithms are trained using news articles — and are urging colleagues to act before the twilight of human-generated news sets in.

DO AI COMPANIES need to pay for the training data that powers their generative AI systems? The question is hotly contested in Silicon Valley and in a wave of lawsuits levied against tech behemoths like Meta, Google, and OpenAI. In Washington, DC, though, there seems to be a growing consensus that the tech giants need to cough up.

Today, at a Senate hearing on AI’s impact on journalism, lawmakers from both sides of the aisle agreed that OpenAI and others should pay media outlets for using their work in AI projects. “It’s not only morally right,” said Richard Blumenthal, the Democrat who chairs the Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology, and the Law that held the hearing. “It’s legally required.”