Monday, May 24, 2010

Kunstlerism of the Week: Famine?

Location: Farmer's Market

In his latest post, James Howard Kunstler, fresh from a meeting of New Urbanists in Atlanta, takes aim not merely at the doomed sprawl that is Atlanta but also what Peak Oil will mean for all of us:

Among other things, the most forward-looking leaders in the New Urbanist movement now recognize that we have to reorganize the landscape for local food production, because industrial agriculture will be one of the prime victims of our oil predicament. The successful places in the future will be places that have a meaningful relationship with growing food close to home. The crisis in agriculture is looming right now -- with world grain reserves at their lowest level ever recorded in modern times -- and when it really does hit, the harvestmen of famine and death will be in the front ranks of it.

Kunstler puts his apocalyptic spin on this story, but he's right about the effect if not the magnitude. It's time to support your local grower, or become one yourself, while we have enough margin in energy markets to learn how to do so.

Read the rest of "Out of Darkness" for more information. And, to reference a post I made last week, step out of Plato's Cave into the light.

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