Popcorn

1996 brings yet another bumper grain harvest

One of the greatest achievements in human history slowly but steadily unfolded in the latter months of the past year. Week by week in the crop fields, and month by month with the issuance of each new government report, the dimensions of the record grain production underway became ever more apparent. By year-end 1996, grain harvest records were smashed throughout the world: the greatest rice crop in history — 376 million metric tons (milled basis); the greatest coarse grain (mostly corn) crop in history — 885 million metric tons; and the second greatest wheat crop in history — 579 million metric tons, just 8 MMT behind the 1990 record.1

Altogether, the world’s grain harvests totaled to more than 1.84 billion metric tons, the first time that the world’s harvests ever had exceeded 1.8 billion MT. (The previous grain harvest record was 1.786 MMT, set in 1992.)

And yet, despite this extraordinary achievement, nearly all the media produced a barrage of headlines about hunger, starvation and famine — if not this very year then almost certainly in the immediate future! The general public was treated to a bewildering array of statistics concerning the alleged extent of world hunger: 800 million persons was one of the lowest figures advanced, two billion or more — some 35 percent of the world’s population — was at the high end of the range.

Paradoxically, at the very height of the great northern hemisphere grain harvests, a World Food Convention was hastily convened in Rome to discuss the supposedly dire state of world grain supplies. The assembled delegates collectively spent millions to attend, and dined lavishly on the finest foods the world had to offer, all the while pondering the alleged starvation threat facing mankind.

Professional doomsayer Lester Brown of the Worldwatch Institute, weighed in with his latest famine horror story: China’s burgeoning population and its insatiable demands for grain would soon starve the world.

Although Brown has predicted worldwide famines and starvation nearly every year for the past three decades, the media treated his latest pronouncement with undue respect and ballyhooed it throughout the world. Apparently, when it comes to population vs. food production scare-mongering, one may cry wolf indefinitely.

With the facts of the world’s harvests going ignored and unreported, and the media and population control groups instead spreading an apocalyptic tale of famine relentlessly stalking mankind, the world’s citizens understandably have become concerned about the adequacy of world grain stockpiles.

Relax, everyone. The good news is that the bad news about world food production is not only wrong, but is demonstrably fraudulent! Despite the hype to the contrary, the world’s farmers have been doing very well indeed. The prospects for even greater increments in future food production remain excellent.