With the beginning of 2019, another round of climatic anomalies began in the world, to which we began to draw the attention of our readers from the very spring. And we did this not because in winter everything was normal with the weather, but because in the spring the farmers sow and plow, in the summer the bees pollinate the plants, and in the fall the harvest begins with summing up.
As we warned back in the spring, the results of these training sessions were extremely disappointing. The well-known climate resource strangesounds.org, together with us watching the cataclysms, provides today a press review on the food topic. One or another article from this list, one way or another, someone will catch the eye and the person will know, for example, that it was abnormally hot in Australia and the export of wheat there decreased. However, only a very few people see the big picture - for example, we and our readers, while the rest are jumping around the full refrigerator, being confident that it will always be this way. But as strangesounds.org shows, that time is over and a completely different food age begins.
cnbc.com: In the first eight months of 2019, pigs in China have halved due to a devastating outbreak of African swine fever, and are likely to decline by 55% by the end of the year, analysts say Rabobank.
According to a report from Rabobank, the rate of decline in livestock is likely to slow in the coming months due to the decline in farm numbers and the Chinese government's response to swine disease in the world's largest pork consumer. However, Rabobank believes that if a vaccine against the disease is not found, the trend will continue for the next three to five years.
Rabobank's report says it expects China's pork production to decline 10-15% in 2020, in addition to a 25% drop in 2019.
Meanwhile, in Vietnam, the world's sixth largest pork producer, 25% of the country's total pig population could be lost to African swine fever by the end of the year. According to the bank, 18% of pigs have died there since February.
psuvanguard.com: The recent outbreak of African swine fever threatens pig production in several European and Asian countries. China, Bulgaria and Romania were hit hardest. Experts regard the situation in Bulgaria as “very alarming”.
Experts predict that due to the fact that Bulgaria was unable to contain the spread of the disease, the country could lose its entire industry of pig production. According to Reuters, this will mean the loss of over 60,000 pigs and financial losses of up to two billion leva, or $ 1.5 billion.
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According to the Pig Health Information Center, Bulgaria declared a state of emergency over the African swine fever outbreak, when 130,000 pigs were culled in two weeks.
Experts believe that the disease migrated from China to Russia and Belarus, where it first affected small farms, and then spread globally and the disease has now affected at least 10 EU member states.
cnbc.com: India has banned onion exports after excessive rainfall almost completely cut off crops, pushing prices soaring. Several media reports say prices for onions - a common ingredient in Indian cuisine - have doubled since July.
The government's export ban went into effect Sunday and will remain in effect "until further notice," according to government notice.
India is one of the world's leading onion exporters. During the 2018 calendar year, the country sold 2.2 billion kilograms of onions, according to official trade data, worth about $ 514.3 million. However, as current data show, since the beginning of the year, onion exports amounted to no more than 0.16% of the country's total exports.
thehindubusinessline.com: Because of the raging rain that has flooded India during the summer, Indian farmers fear a sharp decline in the yield of peanuts, soybeans, cotton, sesame and other crops used for oil production. The fields are either flooded with water, or waterlogged, which makes it impossible to harvest, and meanwhile, the seeds in moisture conditions begin to devour the fungus.
bloomberg.com: Vegetable prices in India, as well as virtually all spices traditionally used in local cooking, rose more than 200% in September after flooding from heavy monsoon rains that damaged crops and cut supplies. This prompted the government to ban exports and put an end to rising prices, but outraged farmers took to the streets and therefore the Indian government has so far limited itself to only banning the export of onions.
reuters.com: Production of wheat, Australia's most abundant and most profitable crop, has been falling for three years. The reason for this is the drought, which has hit Australia for the third year in a row.
And the forecasts of meteorologists are disappointing: the Bureau of Meteorology said that the probability of average precipitation in the period from September 30 to December 1 is only 25%, while the probability of a very hot period is 80%.
From June to September 2019, Australia's ranking among the top wheat suppliers fell to 7th from the position of the third largest exporter in 2016/17, when production reached a record 35.1 million tons, but after the forecast of forecasters, analysts predict a drop in the harvest another 10%.
bloomberg.com: Wildfires, smoke and drought are wreaking havoc on Indonesia's agriculture, damaging almost everything from oil palm plantations to rubber trees and paddy fields.
For example, severe wildfires in Sumatra and Borneo could restrict supplies of palm oil and rubber, while a longer than usual dry season in Java has led to the disappearance of part of the country's rice crop, which is a staple food for 270 million people.
At the same time, Indonesia is the world's largest producer of palm oil and the second largest supplier of rubber.
sacramento.cbslocal.com: California is renowned for its citrus crops, which power the state's economy in excess of $ 7 billion a year. However, after the citrus greening disease that appeared in the United States destroyed many plantations in Florida, it spread to other states and has now reached California.
Over the past 14 years, Florida's orange and grapefruit production has declined by more than 75%, and now California is waiting for the same.
sciencemag.org: Late last week, the Colombian Agricultural Institute (ICA) in Bogotá confirmed that four plantations in northern Colombia have been quarantined over suspected contamination with Fusarium wilt, a fungus that kills banana trees by clogging up their vascular system.
Previously, this disease was spread only in Asia, destroying entire banana plantations, but at the end of the last century it reached South America and now, despite the measures taken, has appeared in the United States and adjacent countries.
Neighboring Ecuador is the world's largest banana exporter. Colombia, Costa Rica and Guatemala are also major producers, so if an outbreak occurs, it will zero their exports and raise the price of bananas worldwide.
cbsnews.com: A rare October heatwave in the southeastern United States and the Midwest set temperature records in 164 cities, but farmers were hit hardest.
To see the effect, CBS News sent a drone flying over corn fields, after which they spoke with one of the local farmers. His name is Stanley Gruber and he said:
"For the first time in 50 years, I won't make a cent from my corn crop."
PS In order to save both our and your time, we no longer continue the review, that is, we do not remember the spring frosts that destroyed vineyards in France, the hail in Germany and Italy, which killed orchards with fruit, the Mississippi flood, which disrupted the crops and other misfortunes. But the general picture is clear: prices for food in the winter of this year will jump twice, and by spring for some products (for example, onions), the price will rise three or more times.
We don't even know what will happen in 2020 - a real famine will probably begin. Although the Third World War may start earlier, so famine will still be a very good development of events.