The growing cost of growing wheat

[jpak]

http://www.union-bulletin.com/main.asp?SectionID=1&SubSectionID=1&ArticleID=28443

Nobody's called it a ``perfect storm,' yet.

But between rocketing costs for fuel and fertilizer, low prices for their crop, increased shipping surcharges and worries over whether this will be another dry winter, local wheat farmers say the future is looking pretty grim these days.

``I'm not sure anyone is aware of it, but energy prices are quickly making the continuation of wheat farming questionable unless something begins to change soon,' said Walla Walla County farmer Nat Webb.

Over a relatively short period of time, fuel prices have tripled and the cost of fertilizer has doubled, Webb and others said.

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and a related story...

Fertilizer Costs Soar; Farmers Face Tough Decisions

http://farmweek.ilfb.org/viewdocument.asp?did=8379&drvid=105&r=0.81831&r=0.6571924&r=0.7861597

Farmers this fall will have to scrutinize their fertilizer purchases like never before due to recent price hikes that have pushed the cost of anhydrous ammonia to new highs.

Illinois Farm Bureau senior economist Mike Doherty said the cost of anhydrous ammonia already had increased by an estimated 25 percent this year. And that was prior to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

Now with the disruption of natural gas extraction and processing in the Gulf of Mexico due to hurricane damage, anhydrous ammonia prices are pushing $450 to $500-plus per ton across the Midwest, according at a fertilizer industry representative.  Prior to 2005, the largest spring price quote for anhydrous ammonia (dating back to 1960) was $399 per ton in April 2001, USDA reported.

<not much more>

[phantom power]

1. The gospel of Max

A reading from the Book of Max, Chapter 1:

My life fades. The vision dims. All that remains are memories. I remember a time of chaos. Ruined dreams. This wasted land. But most of all, I remember the Road Warrior. The man we called 'Max'.

To understand who he was, you have to go back to another time. When the world was powered by the black fuel. And the desert sprouted great cities of pipe and steel. Gone now, swept away. For reasons long forgotten, two mighty warrior tribes went to war and touched off a blaze which engulfed them all. Without fuel they were nothing. They built a house of straw. The thundering machines sputtered and stopped. Their leaders talked and talked and talked. But nothing could stem the avalanche. Their world crumbled. The cities exploded. A whirlwind of looting, a firestorm of fear. Men began to feed on men.

On the roads it was a white line nightmare. Only those mobile enough to scavenge, brutal enough to pillage would survive. The gangs took over the highways, ready to wage war for a tank of juice. And in this maelstrom of decay, ordinary men were battered and smashed.

Here ends the reading.

[dcfirefighter]

2. excellent

I'm gonna build a biodiesel road warrior machine from an old mercedes.

On the bright side, less fertilizer means less estuarine eutrophication and associated algae blooms and dead spots.

Switch to green manure and similar sutainable agriculture methods, and gee wizz, they require a little more labor. But higher prices will pay for that as well.

[phantom power]

4. I assume this is the "big break" for organic agriculture.

Although I don't know if any agricultural technique will help with the other problem that article mentioned:

But the biggest worry for farmers, Grant said, is ``the moisture is gone.'

Two successive dry winters have left soil moisture levels extremely low. In northern Walla Walla County, where Tompkins farms, ``we have the lowest soil moisture samples I've ever seen.

``What we're seeding into right now, researchers would say there's not enough (moisture) to grow...so if we don't get decent rains this winter, we're in trouble,' Tompkins said.

And we road warriors should stick with the V8-interceptor. With cop-suspension! Blower addon optional...

[dcfirefighter]

5. Don't have time to find link

but I recently read a study comparing imputs v. outputs of various agricultural practices, sustainable green manure, sustainable manure, and conventional. Outputs were similar in 'wet' years, they strongly favored sustainable methods in dry years.

A living soil with lots of carbonaceous humus stores water much better than the sterile soils resulting from pesticide use.

Apparently the zulu? triple dig (three spade depths ~3') their soils, and incorporate manure. This allows the soil to store water from the short rainy season for the long dry growing season.

[phantom power]

6. So... Do you think the ag-industry will adopt organic/sustainable?

Stories like this point out the big rub: It doesn't really matter if I know about organic agriculture. It matters if the farmers know about it (and use it).

Spending time on this forum, you get the impression that there are solutions to our problems out there, but the people who really matter aren't aware of them.

When I think about trying to make a real difference, this is the problem I always come back to. Is there a way for me to increase awareness with the people who really make the operational decisions? Would anybody listen to me? I'm just some guy who spends lots of time on the internet.

[midnight armadillo]

7. A book recommendation

"The One Straw Revolution". All about sustainable farming with yields that exceed that of industrialized chemical farming. We eat fossil fuels...a situation that cannot continue forever. Intergrated pest management can slash the use of pesticides by a large amount, but doesn't solve the fertilizer issue.

[jpak]

3. All this was forseen in mid '80's

The University of New Hampshire's Complex Systems Research Center did a study on the impact of oil and gas depletion on the US Economy...

Gever, Kaufmann, Skole & Vorosmarty (1986) Beyond Oil: The Threat to Food and Fuel in the Coming Decades.

They concluded that at some point in time (~2020), the US would have to choose between allocating NG to either farm production or fuel use.

A mutually exclusive dilemma - and not a pretty picture...

[amandabeech]

8. I have read that we are importing more and more nitrogen fertilizer

from countries that have plenty of natural gas to make it with, like Trinidad and Tobago, Russia and various places in the Middle East.

It is easier to import liquid and solid fertilizer than it is to import liquid natural gas to process in our fertilizer plants, many of which have already been closed.

Whether we really want to depend on some of these countries for our food is another question.

In my opinion, we should get rid of these huge feeding operations and go to much smaller or farm-based operations so that we can recycle the composted manure or tankage back into our soils without carting it all over the country. That not only recycles nitrogen, but also phosphorus and potassium. Our supply of phosphorus should only last another 70 years or so. Then we'll have to import it from such countries as Morocco, Jordan or China. That is if we have a way to fuel the ships.

I also favor crop rotation and cover crops.

There are also methods that can remove ammonia from waste streams like city sewers, and technologies like thermal depolymerization (TDP) which may be able to extract fertilizer components from various types of organic waste in addition to the oil or gas that may also be produced.