Let them eat dollars

[Howard]

Please refer to the article below.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/food-security-covid19-trudeau-1.5520492?fbclid=IwAR04BoiLwzhywwKHpoRS1mhlfB0UNP-9x22GBLRUhSAxOR3kPToUosXk_Vs

Canada's PM Justin Trudeau announced his plan to help food banks by throwing money at them. It would have worked if the cause of the problem was that people needed money to buy food, but the real problem is food shortage. For the past three weeks, there was always an item that I had to find a substitue, like buying brown rice instead of basmati rice, or have to go without because the store is out, like eggs.

The situation reminds me of the moments before the French revolution when farmers couldn't produce enough wheat to feed the population. Bread, because of the shortage of the flour, was too expensive for the common man. Marie-Antoinette, though well-meaning, did not recognise the nature of the problem and proclaimed 'Let them eat cake', unaware that you need flour for cakes. I find Trudeau's stance similar to Marie-Antoinette by offering a solution that won't solve the problem. We're running out of food faster than we run out of money. Finding food abroad, more particularly in climates that allows food to be grown worldwide would be, imo, more sensitive. On the other hand, my provincial governement is trying to find a long term strategy to produce more localy as not to be independant on trade. Nothing on the short-term though.

Are you starting to experience food shortages in your part of the world?

Is your governement doing anything about it?

What solutions would you like to see?

[Guest]

2 minutes ago, Howard said:

Please refer to the article below.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/food-security-covid19-trudeau-1.5520492?fbclid=IwAR04BoiLwzhywwKHpoRS1mhlfB0UNP-9x22GBLRUhSAxOR3kPToUosXk_Vs

Canada's PM Justin Trudeau announced his plan to help food banks by throwing money at them. It would have worked if the cause of the problem was that people needed money to buy food, but the real problem is food shortage. For the past three weeks, there was always an item that I had to find a substitue, like buying brown rice instead of basmati rice, or have to go without because the store is out, like eggs.

The situation reminds me of the moments before the French revolution when farmers couldn't produce enough wheat to feed the population. Bread, because of the shortage of the flour, was too expensive for the common man. Marie-Antoinette, though well-meaning, did not recognise the nature of the problem and proclaimed 'Let them eat cake', unaware that you need flour for cakes. I find Trudeau's stance similar to Marie-Antoinette by offering a solution that won't solve the problem. We're running out of food faster than we run out of money. Finding food abroad, more particularly in climates that allows food to be grown worldwide would be, imo, more sensitive. On the other hand, my provincial governement is trying to find a long term strategy to produce more localy as not to be independant on trade. Nothing on the short-term though.

Are you starting to experience food shortages in your part of the world?

Is your governement doing anything about it?

What solutions would you like to see?

Problem is, every country is running short, so there isn't any food to find abroad... the U.S. stores are limiting their trucks cause the warehouses are just out of stock. But, food banks do need money - they can still buy some food, just not all of it. But, if you're starving, you don't care if you have to eat the food no one else wanted, it's food. 

 

Here, there is no flour on the shelves. No TP. No canned food mostly. No meats. No eggs. Pasta and sauce are hit or miss. So, people are going to have to get creative with proteins and stuff. Of course, there are also limited legumes so ... really creative I guess. 

[weird elf]

Which is weird, because where the heck does all the food go? Into someone's pantry, where it (most likely) spoils. It's not like everyone is suddenly eating 10 times as much.

 

Over here, stores are limiting certain items. Apart from TP at Aldi, everything is available. We had a phase with barely any pasta / rice / canned stuff, but now that everyone's got their basements stuffed with food they don't need, all of that is back in stock.

 

The problem I see is uninformed people needing to make informed decisions. As long as that isn't working, other solutions (like stores limiting purchases of certain items) are needed.

[Dreamer23]

I don't think we do really have a supply shortage though.

As you mentioned, it's not like people are eating ten times as much as before.

There was a wave at the beginning when people stocked up, but that's just a temporary shift in demand with no long-term impact.

At that time, grocers made statements about prioritizing reshelving "essentials", which is likely why you didn't see basmati rice in the shelves (since brown or white types would be the ones considered essential)

We could run into shortages if the food production sector runs into major staff shortages, but so far that hasn't happened and since that's a problem you can throw money at, I doubt it will.

Oh, and yes, parts of shelves were and are pretty empty around here, but they are doing a great job backfilling now

 

On a sidenote: It is also very unlikely that Marie Antoinette ever said "Qu’ils mangent de la brioche" -> That's just something that was popular to attribute to nobility (she wasn't the only one) in the middle ages to make them look like they didn't care for or understand the common people

[Howard]

The Pacific Northwest is warmer than my province. We are still weeks away from planting and months from a first harvest. As the article points out, most of Canada's food shortage is not just due to clerks not being able to replenish the shelves fast enough but : ''Power said various problems caused by the pandemic — border closures restricting the movement of foreign farm workers, transportation and import bottlenecks, panic hoarding at grocery stores — can all contribute "massively" to higher prices or food shortages.''

[Scottthespy]

You found brown rice but not basmati? I had the exact opposite problem, I wanted the brown rice!

 

I'm also in Canada, so facing several of the same problems, complicated by certain dietary restrictions. I've taken to buying a lot of dry, frozen, and canned things because they last forever, so I'm not contributing to spoilage. Part of my plan is...well, wild food. The snow is, sort of kind of starting to think about melting, which means that the initial growth of what counts as 'spring' here will be in a few weeks. At that point, I can utilize both the internet and my several books on wild food to collect from my nearby parks, fields, and wooded areas. Much of western Canada is part of the Boreal Forest, a biome with one of the highest bio-diversities in the world and with a relatively low number of outright poisonous things. Several edible trees and bushes have also become popular as ornamental trees lately...there's five or six wild cherry trees on my street, a Saskatoon berry bush at the nearby dog park, rose hips practically everywhere, a man made pond just overflowing with cat tails, and in my own backyard I've got a trio of juniper trees. I figure even if its not strictly necessary, being able to supplement my non-perishables with fresh wild foods will make sure there's that much more to go around for others, and maybe help keep me healthy with a lack of fresh produce in stores.

 

I'm also looking at this as an excuse to break out my granny's old depression era recipe books. Time to make every scrap of food stretch as far as it can!

[Rynn]

At my home we're getting around the problem of empty shelves by going to the supermarket early in the morning. I don't think there's an actual shortage of food in the Netherlands. Just people hoarding.

 

Also the thread title reminds of Aurora's song, the chorus is 'you cannot eat money oh no'.

Spoiler

 

 

[Dreamer23]

1 hour ago, Howard said:

The Pacific Northwest is warmer than my province. We are still weeks away from planting and months from a first harvest. As the article points out, most of Canada's food shortage is not just due to clerks not being able to replenish the shelves fast enough but : ''Power said various problems caused by the pandemic — border closures restricting the movement of foreign farm workers, transportation and import bottlenecks, panic hoarding at grocery stores — can all contribute "massively" to higher prices or food shortages.''

"border closures restricting the movement of foreign farm workers" -> Government is unlikely to restrict work in the food production sector, so as this gets worse, it seems very likely that lots of people losing their jobs right now will be moving to that sector. I wouldn't be surprised about a "Yeah you might catch the virus here, but at least it's a job" mentality being adopted in this sector (I'm not saying it's good, just saying it'd be likely to happen before we get to any shortages)

--> That will absolutely lead to higher prices (as local workers are more expensive than migrant workers), but the overall supply wouldn't be impacted.

 

"transportation and import bottlenecks" -> Those are actually two very different issues. (Domestic) Transportation is an interesting one, agreed. Unlike people in the food production sector, you can't just throw people at the transportation problem, as people will need training for that to happen. But again, I'd expect they'll start speeding up some of that training and start recruiting from the now unemployed population.

Import bottlenecks will shift what type of food is available, sure, but wouldn't lead to a shortage for Canada, given that it is a net food-exporting country. I see lots of soy, port, wheat, and pulses in your future! ;D

 

"panic hoarding" -> That's shifting the demand curve, not increasing it (to a significant amount)

 

Given the focus of Elaine Power's work in the past, it's not unusual for her to over-dramatize it to drive her point.

However, her statements are generally far more about price increases rather than shortages (which is a very important issue - just a different one. There's no question that this pandemic will hit those that are already out of jobs or likely to lose their jobs the hardest. Increasing prices on top of that certainly don't help the matter.)

[MoraDollie]

Unless your country actually prioritizes helping its disenfranchised individuals and communities, you are never going to have enough funding for these types of "communiy help" type projects, organizations, and servies. America, specifically, for example sees being poor basically as some kind of "morale failing" and "it's your own fault" when in reality sociological studies show this is false majority of the time. A lot of people end up poor/around (or below) the poverty line due to unfortunate life circumstances that they had close to no actual hand in. I remember getting in an argument with my parents about this and my parents said something like "Oh but they have a house over their head because of the government and are smooching off that!" to which I responded with "Ma, do you understand how terrifying this is? Government housing is shit. There's no guarantees it will be a safe home. There's no guarantees maintence problems will be fixed in a timely manner. No one with a genuine heart and soul wants to "mooch off the government" because of how low quality it is."

[Howard]

I am all for helping the less fortunate. I can see ways the money will help the food bank, like paying rents and employees. What I find distateful is the government's lack of introspection of the problem. How will more money for the foodbank provide for truckers to bring food to the food banks? How will more money for the foodbank help imports of food that Canada is so reliant upon, more particularly for the food banks?

Like I mentionned, the provincial gorvenment is looking into long term solution, but throwing money at a problem will not necessarly fix it. One must look what the problem truely is to provide adequate solutions. This lack of oversight makes me think of monarchies of old. Then again, maybe I shouldn't be surprised of such action from a second generation aristocrat.

[weird elf]

5 minutes ago, Howard said:

throwing money at a problem will not necessarly fix it

Try telling capitalism that. And politicians. In this system, most of the time, throwing money at a problem WILL fix it, but only because it's disproportionate amounts of money being thrown at something. This problem is too big for that, so - as you say - other solutions need to be found.