Jim Rogers calls a next bubble in food again

[doom&gloom]

Re: Jim Rodgers calls the next bubble - Food

I think Goldman's chartpalooza, page 9, blows you all to shreds yet again.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/75862303/Goldman-100-Charts-2

and since you have lost track, my thesis was NOT to buy farmland for escalating values, though I believe it will do better in keeping up with inflation than many other things. it was primarily build around peak oil liquid fuels allocation and rising food demand.

[c1ue]

Re: Jim Rodgers calls the next bubble - Food

I think Goldman's chartpalooza, page 9, blows you all to shreds yet again.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/75862303/Goldman-100-Charts-2

and since you have lost track, my thesis was NOT to buy farmland for escalating values, though I believe it will do better in keeping up with inflation than many other things. it was primarily build around peak oil liquid fuels allocation and rising food demand.

Ah, China's deficit due to food: ONE BILLION DOLLARS!



China's trade surplus with the United States in 2010: +$273 billion.

And how exactly is rising food demand the issue when corn used for ethanol outweighs corn imports to china by let's see... 116 million tons vs. 3 millions tons, 10 or 15 upside, ... carry the fraction = 773% to 3866%?

[Starving Steve]

Re: Jim Rodgers calls the next bubble - Food

Has anyone noticed in your local grocery store how small the bottles are getting? Like, this is really getting serious: knic-knac bottles of almost everything. Twelve months ago the knic-knac bottles were here and there in the grocery store, but this year (2011) the knic-knac bottles are everywhere throughout the store. Everything has been down-sized by about one-third or even one-half--- either that, or I am becoming bigger and fatter.

So, what's next? Maybe in the next quantitative-easing of monetary policy, a series of thimble bottles will be introduced, and we might go through the same transition stages, once-again in food stores: at first, here and there, and then surprise=== everywhere!

One has to wonder if this revolution (this new era thinking) in bottling/ packaging/ canning is being factored into the CPI (inflation) calculations "prepared" by the governments of the world?

The bright-side of this "new era": we are all going to lose weight.

[Prazak]

Re: Jim Rodgers calls the next bubble - Food

Has anyone noticed in your local grocery store how small the bottles are getting? Like, this is really getting serious: knic-knac bottles of almost everything. Twelve months ago the knic-knac bottles were here and there in the grocery store, but this year (2011) the knic-knac bottles are everywhere throughout the store. Everything has been down-sized by about one-third or even one-half--- either that, or I am becoming bigger and fatter.

Yes indeed. We returned to the U.S. this year to discover that the packaging had shrunk dramatically on one of the few drugs I still allow myself to abuse (Double Stuff Oreos).

[doom&gloom]

Re: Jim Rodgers calls the next bubble - Food

trends my good man, trends... follow the trends... when your bias filter comes down of course!

[Verrocchio]

Re: Jim Rodgers calls the next bubble - Food

Smaller packages of food products, but constant or slightly higher price stickers have been widely observed. No doubt, these are attempts to deceive shoppers by hiding food inflation. In addition, some of the downshift in package sizes is due to a trend toward smaller households.

[c1ue]

Re: Jim Rodgers calls the next bubble - Food

trends my good man, trends... follow the trends... when your bias filter comes down of course!

The data show you are wrong: it isn't China demand but ethanol demand which is increasing demand, and the ethanol demand is entirely subsidy driven.

The trends show that food prices aren't in any way exceptional compared to energy (a major input), commodities, and so forth.

And yet you still think there is something magical about food.

I've yet to see it.

Smaller packages of food products, but constant or slightly higher price stickers have been widely observed. No doubt, these are attempts to deceive shoppers by hiding food inflation. In addition, some of the downshift in package sizes is due to a trend toward smaller households.

Indeed - in a real sense, MTBE is exactly a smaller 'package' of 1 gallon of gasoline.

The MPG effect of 10% ethanol should theoretically be about 3%:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_density

Type MJ/kg MJ/L

Gasoline (petrol)[11]

46.4

34.2

Gasohol E10 (10% ethanol 90% gasoline by volume)

43.54

33.18

[doom&gloom]

Re: Jim Rodgers calls the next bubble - Food

WHEN did I ever say there was anything magical about it? There you go again spinning my position.

I think you have become SO lost in grasping at straws you forget WHY I happen to support farming as a good business to be in nowadays. So let me repeat:

1) growing world population (IIRC about 75 million more per year)
2) increasing demand for meat products (3 - 7 grain inputs per 1 meat output) so increasing grain demand
3) decreasing advances in yields per science inputs (down to less than 1%/yr growth in yield now due to genomics etc.)
4) priority of fuel allocation in peak oil (starving people bring down governments)
5) shrinking arable land available for crop conversion (we have used up most of th good stuff, and marginal stuff is falling out of use due to input costs)
6) shrinking water tables in heavily groundpumped farmlands (Ogalalla Aquafier as example)
7) as throughout time, it is a "necessity" and part of the FEW (food, energy, water)
8) food is now being used for fuel (as ridiculous as we all think that is) so fuel is food -- food is fuel
9) changing or erratic weather patterns affecting harvests reduce world outputs of grains on a somewhat regular basis
10) Fiat currency is under duress, and a failure of fiat at some point means real wealth will be held in "real things"
11) ag has become a investing "class" unto itself with prices pushed up by more speculation

[Starving Steve]

Re: Jim Rodgers calls the next bubble - Food

When I think of preservation or the relatively new philosophy of preservation-ism, I think of preserving gigantic old sequoias or old redwoods, maybe old cedar trees. When I think of preservation, I think of preserving trees that are so big that cars might drive through them--- and the tree wouldn't even care because it is so big around. ( There is/are actually one or more such trees with highway tunnels through them in northern California. )

Where I differ from the preservationists is that not everything should be preserved........ I don't give a damn about a rare and endangered field mouse in San Francisco, although others around me, such as Nancy Pelosi in the U.S. Congress, really do. In fact, Nancy Pelosi has made a political issue about preservation of "the rare and endangered SF field mouse,". But I don't give one damn about a rare worm, nor a rare spider, nor a rare weed, not even a rare flea nor a field mouse of any type.

A neighbour of mine in East Sooke, British Columbia asked me if I might support the preservationist philosophy, and he was astounded when I told him that I really could not. I went on and explained that I would preserve the old and giant trees in our community, but I would be glad to see the rest of the worthless swamp trees and garbage trees chopped down. I explained that getting rid of the junk trees would make the forest brighter, more beautiful, not to mention forest property more valuable and more available for people.

Needless to say (he being a member of the Sierra Club and other environmental groups) both he and I parted ways after my remarks...... But that is really this rift in conservation and urban development policy: What should be preserved in the environment, and why? The question is especially relevant now, when land costs and housing costs are exorbitant.

I post these remarks in reply to Zoog above and his picture of that beautiful old redwood tree having been sawed apart, early in the 20th Century. Above that photo is a picture of a weed, supposedly a replacement tree. Zoog's point about preservation is well-taken. But if it were up to me, I would plan to build affordable homes around that ancient redwood (or sequoia) tree, and maybe build a highway tunnel through the old tree. The rest of the junk trees and weeds around the area would be removed, and with my blessing.

[Verrocchio]

Re: Jim Rodgers calls the next bubble - Food

When I think of preservation or the relatively new philosophy of preservation-ism, I think of preserving gigantic old sequoias or old redwoods, maybe old cedar trees. When I think of preservation, I think of preserving trees that are so big that cars might drive through them--- and the tree wouldn't even care because it is so big around. ( There is/are actually one or more such trees with highway tunnels through them in northern California. )

Where I differ from the preservationists is that not everything should be preserved........ I don't give a damn about a rare and endangered field mouse in San Francisco, although others around me, such as Nancy Pelosi in the U.S. Congress, really do. In fact, Nancy Pelosi has made a political issue about preservation of "the rare and endangered SF field mouse,". But I don't give one damn about a rare worm, nor a rare spider, nor a rare weed, not even a rare flea nor a field mouse of any type.

A neighbour of mine in East Sooke, British Columbia asked me if I might support the preservationist philosophy, and he was astounded when I told him that I really could not. I went on and explained that I would preserve the old and giant trees in our community, but I would be glad to see the rest of the worthless swamp trees and garbage trees chopped down. I explained that getting rid of the junk trees would make the forest brighter, more beautiful, not to mention forest property more valuable and more available for people.

Needless to say (he being a member of the Sierra Club and other environmental groups) both he and I parted ways after my remarks...... But that is really this rift in conservation and urban development policy: What should be preserved in the environment, and why? The question is especially relevant now, when land costs and housing costs are exorbitant.

I post these remarks in reply to Zoog above and his picture of that beautiful old redwood tree having been sawed apart, early in the 20th Century. Above that photo is a picture of a weed, supposedly a replacement tree. Zoog's point about preservation is well-taken. But if it were up to me, I would plan to build affordable homes around that ancient redwood (or sequoia) tree, and maybe build a highway tunnel through the old tree. The rest of the junk trees and weeds around the area would be removed, and with my blessing.

So, you appreciate the large, striking flora but don't understand or are indifferent to how the rest of the environment is antecedent.

[Verrocchio]

Re: Jim Rodgers calls the next bubble - Food

really? Ok, prove it.

A lot of dirt covers the earth, although seemingly not as much as most people think. Is the concept of Peak Soil Fertility waiting to be discovered?

[Starving Steve]

Re: Jim Rodgers calls the next bubble - Food

So, you appreciate the large, striking flora but don't understand or are indifferent to how the rest of the environment is antecedent.

The rest of the environment is brush. That brush and scrub (matarral or maleza in Spanish) provides fuel for forest fires, especially during the annual summer and early fall five-month drought on the West Coast. The "rest of the environment", as you put it, needs to be managed by mankind, not just in mediterranean climates, but everywhere and in all environments.

I think one of the reasons why the number of trees is increasing in the world is that mankind is planting trees in urban areas and on farmland. For example, one of the things that I did with the help of school children in San Jose, Cal. was to plant 127 oaks and redwoods in their school's playground open-space. Not all of those little trees will survive, but those that do will add to the new urban forest of the Santa Clara Valley and make the valley more beautiful.

If you can imagine all of the little residential lots in urban areas, imagine that home-owners on those lots beautify their property by planting trees. This is what is happening everywhere. And on farms and grazing-land, farmers and ranchers are planting wind-breaks..... It's land management, worldwide.

[Starving Steve]

Re: Jim Rodgers calls the next bubble - Food

A lot of dirt covers the earth, although seemingly not as much as most people think. Is the concept of Peak Soil Fertility waiting to be discovered?

Oh my [g]od, you've been brainwashed by the Sierra Club again! There is no Peak Soil Fertility that mankind needs to worry about, at least not for thousands of years.

Imagine, what can be grown in crops in the deserts. Imagine that the religious (bastards) in the Middle-East are killed-off or sent to labour camps where they belong, and people with common-sense and education come to govern the Middle-East.

Imagine the Nile River diverted into the Libyan Desert. Imagine the Nile River diverted to Israel and Palestine. Imagine the Nile diverted to Saudi-Arabia through the Negev Desert.......... Imagine what could be grown with the astronomic volume water that now is still being dumped into the Mediterranean Sea.

And don't give me this "soil salinization" stuff from the eco-bunch, because if you have enough water, you can flush the salts away into saline sumps. For example, here in California, the Imperial Valley is farmed, and the salts in the soil are flushed into the Salton Sea.

There is farming throughout the San Joaquin Valley of California, and salts there are being flushed into similar salt-sumps.

I expect nothing less than this in the Middle-East, and there is far more fresh water available for farming there than there is, or ever was, in the western U.S.

Here are some facts:

Nile River average discharge into the Mediterranean Sea: 300,000,000 cubic metres per day. Dumped into the sea!
Colorado River average flow before entering the Mojave Desert (above the Grand Canyon): 43,200,000 cubic metres per day.

In other words, there is 7 times more water volume in the Nile River than there is in the Colorado River, and the Colorado River volume was measured before it entered the Mojave Desert, whereas the Nile River volume was measured at the mouth of the river as it discharged into the Mediterranean Sea.