In article ,
"David Hare-Scott" wrote:

Billy wrote:
Sci Am, April 2010

Breaking the Growth Habit
by Bill McKibben

For the past quarter of a century, despite the rapid spread of
massive-scale agribusiness farming, pesticides and genetically
engineered crops, the amount of grain per person has been dropping.

I assume this means the amount of grain per farm worker working to produce
it, is that right?

I had imagined that the productivity by this measure climbed very rapidly in
the early 20th century and then the rate slowed down with little surges as
bigger and more automated combine harvesters, irrigation gear, better
strains of grain etc were introduced. So I expected that in the last
quarter century it would have levelled off like a diminishing returns curve,
I didn't expect it to start going down.

Does the author provide any references to where and how this statistic is
measured? Does this just relate to the absurdity of the USA corn belt or is
it global? What are his reasons for the decline?

Have you got the book?

David
Unfortunatly, no. It came out in April and I am #24 on the waiting list.

Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet by Bill McKibben, Apr 13,
2010
http://www.amazon.com/Eaarth-Making-...805090568/ref=
sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1282538531&sr=1-1
I'm in the middle of a movie (Vitus). I'll get back soon.
But the answer is humus.
--
- Billy
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the
merger of state and corporate power." - Benito Mussolini.
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/7/2/maude
http://english.aljazeera.net/video/m...515308172.html