Plan B 4.0 Chapter 3 Summary

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It is an unfortunate (and even more unsettling, outright deniable) scenario in today's standards, but the earth is facing the inevitable conclusion that is global warming (also known as climate change by today's standards). Rapid temperatures fluctuations, including the atmosphere and the ocean's temperature, are increasing slowly but surely and are affecting weather patterns all across the continents. Levels of carbon dioxide in the air is expanding due to factories and other harmful emissions, and is magnifying the green house effect by trapping more and more heat inside the atmosphere. Although they are symptoms now, they need to be addressed before they become more than just symptoms. Otherwise, we will be dealing with a environmental crisis the world has never seen before. 

I read an chapter from Lester Brown's Plan B 4.0 and he iterates some of these concerns time and time again. "This warming is caused by the accumulation of heat-trapping 'greenhouse' gases and other pollutants in the atmosphere." (Brown 57). A disadvantageous effect of growing population and rapid industrialization. Another one of these negatives is also the melting of the polar ice caps. "Ice is melting so fast that even climate scientists are scrambling to keep up with the shrinkage of ice sheets and glaciers." (Brown 61). Although we have been causing the harmful effects of global warming, we have been doing some methods in order to rectify them. Take CFC's for example; They were used in a wide variety of products from fire extinguisher and refrigerator coolant to aerosol cans and exhaust from funnel stacks, and they depleted the precious Ozone layer that protects us. They were thankfully banned (at least in the United States) in 1978, and the Ozone layer ever since then started to regenerate.

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Another extensional crisis that can be caused by climate change is lower food yields and harvests. "If all the earth's mountain glaciers melted, they would raise sea level... but it is the summer ice melt from these glaciers that sustains so many of the world's rivers during the dry season." (Brown 66). Even though we as a species have hunger and famine as a huge detriment as of now, it would be even more catastrophic if we were to continue the trend of climate change. "Agriculture in the Central Asian counties of Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and  Uzbekistan depends heavily on snowmelt from the Hindu Kush, Pamir and Tien Shan mountain ranges for irrigation water." (Brown 67). As climate change increases the temperature of our environment, natural irrigation will soon slowly come to a stop, soil erosion would possibly be more probable, and newer and more costly farming techniques would have to be developed. Hopefully more efforts to spread awareness and information comes to fruition, otherwise humanity as a species can see a bleak future for itself sometime soon.

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Plan B Chapter 2 Summary

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Top soil is an absolute need when it comes to the survivability of our species. However, humanity has unfortunately over stepped its bounds due to over-harvesting, massive cultivation efforts, and desertification due to the removal of certain flora and fauna. Countries that were once dependent on their own crops are now begging to be apart of the WHO food program due to severe soil erosion. Because of these endeavors, we have found ourselves in a dangerous crisis that needs to be addressed as soon as possible.

I read a chapter from Lester Brown's Plan B 4.0 and he describes the erosion crisis: "the thin layer of topsoil that covers the planet's land surface is the foundation of civilization... But sometime within the last century, as human and livestock populations expanded, soil erosion began to exceed new soil formations over large areas" (Brown 32). Regrettably, this is not a new occurrence. "A similar situation exists in Mongolia, where over he last 20 years three fourths of the wheatland has been abandoned and wheat yields have fallen by one fourth, shrinking the harvest by four fifths." (Brown 33).  Brown details many scenarios where the effects of soil erosion are felt in some countries and also around the world. Many countries are foregoing natural preservation of resources by tapping into them way too many times at an alarming rate. Aquifers are now drying up much faster than they were anticipated, and desertification is becoming more rampant, leaving countries completely dependent on importing crucial resources for their people.

Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/68/Desertification_map.png

Although they are eye-opening in some cases, it seems as if he is continuously adding more examples when the audience already gets the point of the discussion: The increase of the world's population is now at a level where it can possibly exceed the world's sustainability for that increase, and soil erosion is making it a hell of a lot worse. "China's desertification may be the worst in the world" (Brown 37). "Nigeria, Africa's most populous country, is losing 351,000 hectares of rangeland and cropland to desertification." (Brown 36.) I absolutely agree that there needs to be an outcry for these sort of situations, but monotonously dragging the point onward leads to brown's argument somewhat being missed.

Source: http://oceanworld.tamu.edu/resources/environment-book/Images/water-hole-cattle.jpg

Plan B Preface and Chapter One Summary

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Ever since mankind has existed and stopped their nomadic ways of life, they looked towards more conventional methods of gathering food. Slowly but surely they increased the size of their population through various farming techniques, knowledge of rich and fertile soil, and animal husbandry.

Fast forward to the 21st century, and you'll see quite a different story. I read the preface and chapter one of Lester Brown's Plan B 4.0, and he explains how our food uses and out climatic footprint are becoming more and more problematic. "With business as usual, I see a combination of the projected growth in population, the planned diversion of grain to produce fuel for cars, spreading shortages of irrigation water, and other trends combining to push the number of hungry people to 1.2 billion or more by 2015." (Brown 4). He continues describing the food scarcity problem: "The question, at least for now, is not will the world grain harvest continue to expand, but will it expand fast enough to keep pace with steadily growing demand." (Brown 9). I agree with Brown on these two points. The encroaching problem of food scarcity is almost at an all time high, and its a difficult situation to address in its entirety. There are many countries that cannot support their growing populations and it's becoming increasing grueling to not only themselves, but to other countries as well. Those countries that are in the crisis of a food scarcity problem may panic and decide to focus solely on their own locally produced product. Meanwhile in developed countries, they are producing more amounts of ethanol (a combination of corn and gasoline) which also increases their agricultural prices. Food responsibility and climate stabilization is an absolute necessity to decrease the trend of scarcity and protect our future.

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However, when it comes to falling political power regarding countries, Brown uses a poor example for describing them. "States fail when national governments lose control of part or all of their territory... conflicts can easily spread to neighboring countries, as when the genocide in Rwanda spilled over into the Democratic Republic of the Congo." (Brown 18). He also describes how failing states provide possible radical breeding grounds. "Failing states can also provide possible training grounds for international terrorist groups, as in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan, or as a base for pirates, as in Somalia. (Brown 19). I feel that these two explanations are a bit melodramatic. These countries have been in a developmental ecosystem for quite some time now, and I don't believe that because of that early development, it leads to producing terrorists and mass genocides. Food scarcity is indeed a problem, but directly correlating that to solicitations of drugs and production of violence is outright irrelevant. I believe that Brown loses focus on his main point, and that hurts his overall vision he is trying to produce.

Source: http://www.foreignaffairs.com/files/imagecache/800x/images/Mazzar_Failed_1.jpg

Food Inc.

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After watching Food Inc. for the second time, it really amazes me how much of a hold corporations have on local farmers and producers. Instead of revolutionizing or innovating ideas of how to fix current problems with the agricultural industry, these corporations effortlessly find ways to continue the same dying business model in order to receive a better financial quarter.

Take for instance the farmer who was being sued by Monsanto for allegations of using their patented soy bean crop. By all means I know that Monsanto doesn't have an absolute pristine reputation for their company (I.E. Agent Orange after effects), but by Food Inc. showcasing their financial bullying, their public relations department must have been doing damage control. I felt disgusted that an agricultural farmer would be shown as an example for legal repercussions if any other farmer would follow their own ways of planting or saving seeds. By damaging potential ideas through the justice system, effectiveness and efficiency of the agricultural industry would slowly but surely decline, no matter how many band-aids you put on it.

Another example is the amount of contamination that our food comes into contact with. When Upton Sinclair wrote The Jungle in 1906, it changed the way America did food inspections. However, Food Inc. reinforces the fact that these corporations are protected in the legal system since the potential to shut down slaughterhouses that were deemed unsafe by the government was nullified in court. I was in shock; how could something that is considered to be rule number one of preparing and maintaining food be disregarded? Thankfully after a brief search, the Food Safety Modernization Act was passed in 2011, giving back these powers to the FDA.

Source:http://bioprepwatch.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/FDA.jpg