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"China Stockpiling Food Supplies For The Coming
Famine While The US Faces Massive Food Shortages"
by Epic Economist
"China is massively stockpiling food supplies ahead of the coming global famine. Bloomberg says that Chinese authorities are in panic mode, and so far this year, they have snapped up more than half of the world’s grain supplies. At the same time, the U.S. is struggling to find alternative suppliers on the global market, and consumers are still experiencing shortages of a wide range of everyday necessities while prices continue to reach stratospheric new highs. Even more worryingly, a new report says that America’s food system could collapse like the 2008 banks, and the scenario for the next months looks absolutely terrifying right now.
The Chinese government’s massive food panic buying spree, which started in January, hasn’t slowed in recent months, and now the U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that China owns 69% of the world's corn reserves, 60% of its rice, and 51% of its wheat. Even though the country claims it’s only doing that to ensure it has enough food on hand to feed its large population – something the country has struggled with historically – the data indicates otherwise.
James O'Brien, head of the US State Department's Office of Sanctions Coordination, informed that 40 percent of grain shipment from Ukraine in April has gone to China alone. Similarly, Gordon Chang also pointed out that many developed nations that never faced difficulties to ensure international supplies before will be "struggling with each other to ensure their food supply."
While the Eastern nation continues to seize a larger share of food products from international suppliers, the U.S. is left scrambling to find alternative solutions, and new data shows that it is falling behind. For example, China just made the largest corn purchase since May 2021 last month, totaling 1.084 million tons, a 50% rise from a year ago. That number of corn imports dwarfs those of the United States, which were estimated at a mere 57.8 million tonnes.
The U.S. is now experiencing extensive corn shortages, and consumers are already being impacted. Arizona farmer Jon Post is warning that the entire U.S. food supply chain is being affected given that corn is used in the production of fertilizers, animal feed, and a series of food staples we buy and consume regularly. “Prices will rise from 10-20% this year, and we expect the corn shortage to continue throughout 2023,” the farmer forecasts.
In the meantime, shoppers are still seeing empty shelves and prolonged shortages of everyday necessities. From tomatoes to tampons, product stockouts in grocery stores are threatening to upend the holiday season as Americans scramble to prepare before things get worse.
Even more concerningly, a recent report by The Guardian warns that America’s failing food system could collapse as the banks did in 2008.“The food industry is becoming tightly coupled to the financial sector, increasing what scientists call the “network density” of the system, making it more susceptible to cascading failure,” George Monbiot, the author of the article, says.
The scarcity of supplies we’re witnessing is being caused by internal and external shocks to our fragile food system. If it collapses like the 2008 bank crisis, where are we going to shop? If beef becomes the next baby formula, are you confident you’ll have enough or that you’ll be able to find it in stores?
With all things considered, it is clear that conditions are set to deteriorate even further. Throughout history, food shortages have triggered popular unrest. They served as a contributing factor to uprisings that brought down entire societies. And as we face food uncertainties due to factors such as our deteriorating relations with other major economic superpowers, the risk of disaster is real, and the consequences are going to be catastrophic for all of us."
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