I’m personally quite worried about disruptions to the food supply chain severe enough to cause food shortages in e.g. the Bay Area in the next few months but not sure what to do with that worry other than to stock up more on non-perishables. Would very much appreciate seeing more people thinking and researching about this.
The shift of the supply chain from commercial food supply to residential is part of the problem, and is being highlighted right now with producers destroying milk and produce while food banks face severe shortages. These commercial supply chains aren’t easily converted to being direct to consumer, but the government should be purchasing and diverting these excesses to food banks. As individuals, we could all sign up for local CSA veggie boxes, which could contract with commercial suppliers to augment their produce to meet the increased demand. This would reduce collective demand on the direct consumer supply lines (ie: grocery stores). We could also purchase food in bulk from commercial suppliers, and coordinate with neighbors if a single bulk unit is too much to consume before it spoils.
The other part of the equation is a potential food shortage in the fall due to farmers being unable to get temporary migrant workers in the spring planting season and projecting that same difficulty for the fall harvest, so they’ve elected to further reduce their spring planting. Unfortunately, I think this has already happened across Europe and North America.
the government should be purchasing and diverting these excesses to food banks.
The various things I’ve seen about this claim that food banks aren’t processors (who take industrial-sized portions of foodstuffs and pack it into commercial or individual-sized portions), and so aren’t able to handle a 55-gallon drum of milk better than anyone else.
For things like milk, I’d expect that’d pose a problem. But for things like fresh produce, food banks can handle industrial-sized portions of these, or at least I’ve seen it handled at my local food bank, and my local food bank probably isn’t unique in this.
I’m personally quite worried about disruptions to the food supply chain severe enough to cause food shortages in e.g. the Bay Area in the next few months but not sure what to do with that worry other than to stock up more on non-perishables. Would very much appreciate seeing more people thinking and researching about this.
The shift of the supply chain from commercial food supply to residential is part of the problem, and is being highlighted right now with producers destroying milk and produce while food banks face severe shortages. These commercial supply chains aren’t easily converted to being direct to consumer, but the government should be purchasing and diverting these excesses to food banks. As individuals, we could all sign up for local CSA veggie boxes, which could contract with commercial suppliers to augment their produce to meet the increased demand. This would reduce collective demand on the direct consumer supply lines (ie: grocery stores). We could also purchase food in bulk from commercial suppliers, and coordinate with neighbors if a single bulk unit is too much to consume before it spoils.
The other part of the equation is a potential food shortage in the fall due to farmers being unable to get temporary migrant workers in the spring planting season and projecting that same difficulty for the fall harvest, so they’ve elected to further reduce their spring planting. Unfortunately, I think this has already happened across Europe and North America.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/world/article-abrupt-shortage-of-seasonal-farm-workers-threatens-to-create-food/
As individuals, we could all plant subsistence gardens right now to help reduce the collective demand for food in the fall.
The various things I’ve seen about this claim that food banks aren’t processors (who take industrial-sized portions of foodstuffs and pack it into commercial or individual-sized portions), and so aren’t able to handle a 55-gallon drum of milk better than anyone else.
For things like milk, I’d expect that’d pose a problem. But for things like fresh produce, food banks can handle industrial-sized portions of these, or at least I’ve seen it handled at my local food bank, and my local food bank probably isn’t unique in this.