Latest / The Smart Cookies podcast / Our Food Systems Are Unstable - It's About To Get Worse. With Prof. Tim Benton

Transcript

Our Food Systems Are Unstable - It's About To Get Worse. With Prof. Tim Benton · The Smart Cookies podcast

0:00
If food prices go up sharply, it does prompt
0:03
civil unrest, particularly in regimes that are
0:06
authoritarian or somewhat governments is unstable.
0:11
And so, you know, there's a famous saying that
0:15
was attributed to someone in the United States
0:18
in about 1880, 79, something like that, which
0:23
is every civilization is only nine meals away
0:26
from anarchy. And you can imagine a situation
0:30
where if something really bad happened and food
0:33
supply, the long complex embedded globally supply
0:38
chains, they broke down. What would people do
0:42
when they go to a supermarket and it's empty?
0:45
Tim Benton is a renowned expert on global food
0:48
security, agricultural sustainability and climate
0:51
change impacts. He focuses on how food systems
0:54
adapt to geopolitical and environmental. He's
0:59
also a professor emeritus of population ecology
1:01
at the University of Leeds. Professor Benton,
1:04
welcome to the program. Thank you. Lovely to
1:07
be here. Confession time. Until I stumbled onto
1:11
a couple of your talks, I never really asked
1:13
myself one of the most elementary questions a
1:16
human being can ask, which in hindsight is pretty
1:20
crazy to me now. That question is, where is the
1:23
food I eat coming from? Which just gets to show
1:27
you. how completely for granted we take the ridiculous
1:29
abundance we enjoy. Or maybe that's just me.
1:32
But I don't think it is, frankly. I can't be
1:34
the only ignoramus out there. Anyway, I live
1:36
in Japan. So kind of bothered by this question,
1:39
I put my Sherlock Holmes hat on and fished out
1:43
an official stat from a government website that
1:45
states that over 60 % of Japan's food supply
1:48
is imported. Which is kind of fine. No real surprises
1:52
there. Japan is an island, a mountainous one
1:54
at that, so it makes sense. However, since I'm
1:56
actually Slovenian by origin, so a national of
2:00
a country whose entire lore is about tenacious,
2:03
if slightly depressed, farmers. I mean, even
2:06
my mom, who's a city gal, inherited a tiny farm
2:08
with a couple of animals attached to it. So I
2:10
thought, well, here's a clear -cut case of how
2:12
the grub makes it onto my plate. Excuse me. But
2:16
you know what percentage of calories... that
2:17
people consume in Slovenia is imported, a whopping
2:20
80%. That's mad. I did not expect that. I mean,
2:25
if you drive around the country, all you see
2:27
is like rural land. I just do not understand
2:30
what the hell is going on here. What kind of
2:32
a weird giant Star Trek replicator is producing
2:36
all of this food that we eat every day? Yeah,
2:41
that's a good question. The real issue is that
2:48
since the Second World War, really, but particularly
2:51
since the 1980s, we've become embedded in a global
2:55
network of trade. And what that means is that
2:59
agricultural products are produced, they're shipped
3:03
out of the country, ingredients are shipped in,
3:05
other stuff is shipped in. And so there is this
3:10
kind of enormous global network of supply chains
3:13
that underpins almost everything. uh people eat
3:16
so just as an example uh you know if you go to
3:20
a supermarket and you buy a packet of food of
3:23
some description let's say a biscuit uh you know
3:28
some of the wheat might be the wheat flour might
3:30
be produced in the uk um if i'm talking about
3:33
the uk but uh some of the sugar will come from
3:36
overseas a lot of the ingredients like palm oil
3:39
will come from overseas a lot of the small ingredients
3:42
the flavors and of course chocolate if you've
3:44
got a chocolate biscuit and other things will
3:46
come from overseas packaging will come from overseas
3:48
and so on and so what almost every nation in
3:52
the world uh finds the position that almost every
3:55
nation in the world finds itself in is dependent
3:58
on producing food locally, exporting it or feeding
4:03
it to animals, exporting excess production, and
4:07
then bringing in things that you're not so good
4:09
at producing or growing in your country. And,
4:12
you know, 50, 60 years ago, there would have
4:16
been a lot more domestic production for domestic
4:18
consumption. Now, everything is about international
4:21
trade and international supply chains for almost
4:24
everything that everybody eats. other than a
4:27
piece of whole food like a steak or a piece of
4:30
cheese, which might be produced locally, or a
4:32
root vegetable. But most people eat food that
4:37
is processed and comes from supermarkets in some
4:39
form of packaging, and that relies on international
4:42
supply trade. And so whether you're Japan, whether
4:45
you're Slovenia, whether you're the UK, although
4:48
some of the calories are produced locally, actually
4:51
quite a lot relies on... being imported to make
4:55
the food that you might eat. 80%, that's a low
5:00
reliance on being self -sustainable, right? So
5:05
if anything goes wrong, we can only produce 20
5:07
% of our current calories, speaking of Slovenia,
5:11
right now. That sounds sinister. Well, in a calm
5:19
and stable world... which I guess 20 years ago
5:23
we kind of imagined the future to be, it wouldn't
5:26
be a problem. And most governments have been
5:27
quite happy to say, let's be liberal trade, open
5:32
borders to the flow of goods. We'll make a lot
5:36
of money out of being part of a kind of global
5:39
economic enterprise, a globalised economic enterprise.
5:43
But of course, as you say, if you're worried
5:46
about the future in terms of... war or chaos
5:50
of some description, what that would mean is
5:53
in the event of some severe crisis, local agriculture
5:57
would have to reconfigure very, very quickly
5:59
to provide more domestic production for domestic
6:02
consumption. And that would be an enormously
6:05
large challenge. But if push came to shove and
6:08
war came to all of our borders, then that's what
6:10
we'd have to do, as happened in the Second World
6:12
War, you know, the last big conniption. Another,
6:15
we're going to talk about geopolitics later on
6:18
again, but another startling thing is the pretty
6:21
insane diversity of food we enjoy. When I was
6:23
nine or 10 years old, I remember asking my grandpa
6:26
what he got for Christmas as a child growing
6:28
up as he did before the second world war. And
6:31
you know what he said? He said an orange, quite
6:34
literally one orange, which spoke not only to
6:37
the extremely modest kind of circumstances of
6:40
his upbringing, but also to the luxury of oranges
6:43
at that time. Fast forward to 2026 and you might
6:46
be located anywhere from, I don't know, Tokyo
6:48
to California. And I'll bet you're within 100
6:50
meters of a shop that sells like a two kilo bag
6:53
of oranges for around two bucks, whether it's
6:55
the season for oranges or not. How is that possible?
6:59
Well, it's possible, again, because of this globalized
7:02
network of production. So if we want oranges
7:05
at Christmas, we import them from the global
7:08
south where they're produced. And so there is
7:09
production all around the world, all around the
7:12
year. And then it comes down to the kind of market
7:15
to say people want to buy oranges at Christmas
7:18
time or they want to buy strawberries at Christmas
7:20
time. We will produce them in whichever country
7:23
is best suited at that time to produce them because
7:26
somebody will buy them. And so we are in that
7:28
situation that we kind of expect everything to
7:33
be available all of the time and supermarket
7:35
shelves always to be full of the same sort of
7:39
product produce. And what you can see on a kind
7:42
of global scale. is that over the last 50 or
7:46
60 years, almost everybody's diet around the
7:50
world has ended up eating more or less the same
7:53
sorts of things. Not necessarily the same items
7:56
of food processed in the same ways, but the same
7:59
sorts of foods that are produced with the same
8:02
sorts of ingredients. So wheat, rice, maize,
8:05
vegetable oil, soya, animal source protein, various
8:11
vegetable oils. palm oil and so on, sugar, you
8:16
know, those are the kind of bulk ingredients
8:18
that are produced everywhere in the world, plus
8:20
some very common fruit and vegetables like bananas
8:23
and apples and oranges that are just produced
8:28
wherever for global consumption all throughout
8:32
the year. So what you see if you looked at an
8:35
active map of global agriculture is that, you
8:38
know, wheat is produced in the north. In some
8:40
seasons, it's produced in the south. In other
8:42
seasons, those two act together to provide a
8:45
global supply of wheat. So there is always flour
8:47
available for processing into pasta or bread
8:51
or whatever it might be, biscuits. This just
8:55
crossed my mind. How much of all of this food
8:58
are we throwing away, by the way, every year?
9:00
Is there any stats going around? Yeah, it's quite
9:04
difficult to get to the root of, but there's
9:08
a fair amount of waste on farm from the various
9:15
production techniques and issues to do with kind
9:18
of local markets and so on. But the bulk of the
9:22
waste comes from retail to consumption. And the
9:27
global figures, you know, it's sometimes difficult
9:29
to talk about food because flour and potatoes
9:34
are very different things. I mean, with potatoes.
9:37
typically people would peel them and so you've
9:39
got waste from the skins uh you know you might
9:43
put a bag in your uh storage cupboard and then
9:46
find it's gone slimy a bit later but roughly
9:49
speaking somewhere around a quarter to a third
9:51
of production is lost or waste wasted throughout
9:55
the supply chain uh also i wanted to ask you
9:59
said that we're basically all eating um the same
10:02
foods now like eight foods probably the recipes
10:04
are changing according to like a culture or a
10:07
nation but the the ingredient the the foods are
10:10
staying the same are they also like worse in
10:12
quality now well it depends what it depends what
10:17
you call you call quality i was thinking about
10:19
devoid of nutrients since they have to be grown
10:22
so fast and i don't know it just seems like okay
10:25
this is not exactly empirical research but vegetables
10:29
from the supermarket seem to be more watery and
10:32
less tasty every year. Maybe that's just my cynicism
10:34
coming into action. No, there is a relationship
10:38
between the speed and the volume that you want
10:41
to harvest and the micronutrients and the things
10:47
like vitamins and so on. And there's also a relationship
10:50
between the way you grow things and what's in
10:53
them. So, for example, organic agriculture. tends
10:57
to open crops to more biting insects and pests
11:01
and so on. And that means that they increase
11:04
their phytonutrients to counter the insect attack.
11:09
And that means that the phytonutrient profile
11:13
of the food often has more bits and pieces which
11:18
might have a biological impact on humans and
11:21
certainly generations of selection. have led
11:25
to increased volumes and not necessarily increasing
11:29
the micronutrient levels changing the amount
11:34
of protein changing the amount of sugar so when
11:37
I was a boy I remember being given grapefruit
11:41
and it was so sour it made you wince these days
11:44
if you buy a grapefruit from the supermarket
11:45
it's quite sweet and that's because people like
11:47
sweet grapefruit they don't like sour grapefruit
11:49
and so sugar content of some fruit has increased
11:52
over the years just through artificial selection
11:57
to make it more market palatable so you are right
12:00
and the other thing to add in at this point is
12:03
that as climate change is happening and carbon
12:08
dioxide is going up in the atmosphere plants
12:10
are again changing the way that they grow and
12:14
as they change the way they grow and the speed
12:15
that they grow then they allocate different amounts
12:18
of nutrients to seeds versus stems and all the
12:21
rest of that and there is some evidence that
12:23
as carbon dioxide in the atmosphere goes up some
12:26
of the micronutrients and minerals like zinc
12:29
go down and so there is some evidence that the
12:35
nutritional quality of food is not as dense as
12:40
it used to be many years ago. A lot of denialists,
12:44
especially on social media, whenever there's
12:46
a post about climate change and how it's getting
12:48
worse, they're saying, oh, but CO2 is actually
12:50
good for the plants, which probably is true up
12:53
to a degree. And then once it gets too hot...
12:58
I imagine not anymore because the plants probably
13:01
just can't survive, right? Can you speak a bit
13:04
about that as well? Yeah, so all things being
13:07
equal, if you have exactly the same climate and
13:11
you increase the carbon dioxide, then that means
13:14
that the plant can photosynthesize better because
13:17
photosynthesis is effectively taking carbon dioxide
13:20
and converting it into sugar. And so if the carbon
13:23
dioxide is easier to get a hold of and it diffuses
13:25
through the... pores in the plant, then they'll
13:28
grow better. But the thing about climate change
13:30
is that it's not just changing the average temperature,
13:34
it's changing the variability of the temperature.
13:36
And as we've experienced in Europe this summer,
13:39
as it gets hot and dry, the plants close their
13:44
stomata, they close their pores, because otherwise
13:48
they lose too much water. And so even though
13:50
there's more carbon dioxide available for them
13:53
as a form of fertilizer, I guess, they can't
13:58
access it because they're all gagging for a drink
14:01
and lose too much moisture. So it's the variability
14:05
in the weather that interacts with the availability
14:09
of the carbon dioxide to say whether or not increasing
14:12
carbon dioxide is good or bad for plants. And
14:15
then, as I mentioned a few minutes ago, as the
14:19
carbon dioxide goes up, the way that the plant
14:21
allocates its resources to growth versus reproduction
14:23
of the seeds. or the roots or the stems or whatever's
14:27
harvested, it changes the nutrient profile. So
14:30
you might get bigger yields under all things
14:36
being equal climate change. So the temperature
14:38
goes up and the carbon dioxide goes up, but the
14:41
variability will constantly be knocking down
14:43
yields as we found this year across the Northern
14:46
Hemisphere. And the quality of the yield might
14:49
also decline because of the bad weather or because
14:52
of the carbon dioxide affecting the allocation
14:54
strategies of the plant. All right. So generally
14:58
speaking, from the 80s till now, we've had a
15:01
pretty smooth sail in terms of feeding an increasing
15:03
number of people. Right. However, recently, things
15:06
we've intimated have begun to get a bit darker.
15:10
I just read that now it's been the sixth year
15:13
in a row during which food insecurity has worsened.
15:17
Hundreds of millions of people across the globe.
15:19
You'll tell me if that's correct. Climate change
15:21
obviously being one of the biggest culprits,
15:23
of course. How vulnerable is our food system
15:27
right now? Well, that's a difficult question
15:29
to answer because it depends on how you get the
15:34
food, where it comes from and what the state
15:38
of the world is. So if everybody was agreeing
15:42
to a rules -based cooperative world that we imagined
15:49
the world would be like when I was a lad, you
15:52
know, with the United Nations and the World Trade
15:54
Organization and everybody being nice to each
15:57
other and no further wars in the world and all
16:01
the rest of that. We wouldn't be anywhere near
16:04
a crisis as it is. Sorry, despite climate change,
16:09
which is worsening, despite the wildfires we're
16:11
seeing like every year. crop failures and crops
16:15
diminishing and stuff like this. Yeah, because
16:17
we produce a huge amount of food, as we've already
16:21
talked about. If a quarter to a third of the
16:24
world's food is wasted, theoretically, if you
16:28
got rid of a quarter to a third of the world's
16:31
food, we'd still be able to cope. We'd just have
16:33
to waste less. So there isn't a production problem
16:38
around the world. There is a distribution problem.
16:41
I see. Because just when I was growing up, you
16:43
know, I'm 40 already. There was a lot of talk
16:46
of like, if the population increases at such
16:48
an alarming rate, they used to say, we're not
16:50
going to be able to feed all of these people.
16:52
And we're still, the numbers are still going
16:53
up. We're like at almost 9 billion now or something.
16:56
And it's projected to be in 10 billion soon.
16:59
So I was just wondering, like, you know, and
17:01
then we put climate change on top of that and
17:03
these regional conflicts that you talked about.
17:05
Again, I would caution against using the term
17:09
food. because it depends what you produce and
17:12
how you use it, how much there is to go around
17:16
effectively. So at the moment, across Europe,
17:20
for example, something like 40 % of grain production
17:23
goes to feed animals. And around the world, it's
17:28
not far off. So, you know, if we ate less meat,
17:32
we would be able to use that grain for human
17:35
feed. it would make a big difference to kind
17:40
of global production if there was some sort of
17:43
trade issue. But the real issue is that because
17:47
we are in this globally embedded network of supply
17:50
chains, if something happens, as we started off
17:54
this conversation talking about, if something
17:56
happens to the supply chains going into a country
17:59
or out of a country, then the whole world ends
18:02
up chasing supplies of food because... you know
18:08
market responses if you think you're not going
18:10
to get enough food prices go up you scrabble
18:13
around to get it prices go up on the global market
18:17
then the poorest get priced out etc and so it
18:20
really depends on the two things one is the production
18:24
and how we eat it but the second big thing is
18:30
the global nature of the market and if it is
18:35
Smooth, calm, cooperative. There's enough food
18:38
in the world shipped around for everybody to
18:41
get some. If the world starts fighting over food,
18:45
then prices go up and the issues become very,
18:48
very acute. A particularly scary thing for Europeans
18:53
are wildfires. I mentioned them already, which
18:56
when I was a lad, honestly, I'm thinking about
19:00
it right now. I don't remember them. Maybe they
19:03
happen once in a decade or something, but now
19:05
they're happening every summer, especially in
19:07
Southern Europe. And it seems like this is going
19:11
to go on because obviously climate change is
19:14
getting worse. What kind of an effect is this
19:16
going to have on European sustainability goals
19:21
in the food department? Well, most wildfires...
19:25
aren't happening in the kind of prime agricultural
19:28
production areas. Oh, because when we spoke about
19:31
oranges, you did say that in Southern Europe,
19:34
you grow a lot of this stuff. Yeah, but most
19:37
wildfires that have a kind of rapidly spreading
19:41
effect are either on scrubby moorland or treed
19:46
scrub, as opposed to wheat fields or whatever.
19:50
I mean, you do get fires on wheat field, obviously,
19:52
but... particularly at some times of the seasons
19:56
when it's dry and they can spread quite fast.
19:58
But the actual area that's affected is relatively
20:02
small when it comes to production. I think the
20:05
more dangerous thing from an agriculture perspective
20:10
is widespread drought and heat, which we've had
20:15
this summer, or very wet winter, spring, summers.
20:20
which we've also had in the last few years, 2024,
20:24
if I remember, was a wet spring and early summer
20:28
and affected harvest. So it's those sorts of
20:31
large scale weather patterns that affect a large
20:36
area of agricultural production that will affect
20:39
things. Individual crops like oranges or olives
20:42
or other things are going to be affected more
20:45
by. Things like wildfires, I guess. But from
20:50
a global production perspective and a food security
20:52
perspective, it is the major commodity crops
20:55
that the global market responds. So wheat, rice,
20:58
maize, barley, sugar, soy, etc., etc. Now, climate
21:03
change isn't the only crisis that's threatening
21:05
us. I heard you talk about planetary boundaries
21:07
before. As it stands today, we have already crossed
21:10
seven out of nine. And I think those are climate,
21:14
biosphere, land, nitrogen, phosphorus, novel
21:17
entities, and ocean acidification. That's scary
21:20
stuff. Not only that, but in January, the UN
21:23
has declared that the planet has entered a state
21:26
of water bankruptcy, which doesn't sound all
21:29
that pleasant either. And yet, when I go to the
21:32
supermarket, everything is still there and for
21:35
much of the same price. So I think it's really
21:37
hard for us humans to internalize these problems
21:41
as severe. when our daily lives are, at least
21:43
for now, basically the same? When do you think
21:47
we're going to start feeling it more acutely?
21:50
Well, I think we are now. In the sense of, if
21:55
you look back over the last decade, we've had
21:58
food price spikes caused by climate change. We've
22:01
had food price spike caused by COVID. We've had
22:06
continuing food inflation caused by the invasion
22:08
of Ukraine. We've got a shortfall in production
22:12
in Europe this year because of climate. We've
22:15
got the war in the Middle East blocking trade
22:18
routes. We've got the Panama Canal with reduced
22:22
flow. And all of these things together are adding
22:26
to food price inflation, which contributes to
22:29
the cost of living situation. So we're already
22:31
in that situation where climate interacting with
22:34
geopolitics. is upsetting supply chains and driving
22:39
up food prices. And that's only going to get
22:41
worse. I mean, I was speaking at an agricultural
22:44
conference last October, and there was a big
22:48
grain farmer who was, you know, talking about
22:52
his efficiency and how many thousands of hectares
22:56
he was managing. And it was really, really, really
22:58
good. And the future was about becoming more
23:00
intensive and more efficient. And then when he
23:03
was asked a question, he said, well, I've had
23:06
two bad years due to climate. So this year, meaning
23:10
the one we've just had, the summer we've just
23:12
had, has to be a good year. Otherwise, I have
23:15
severe cash flow problems. And so this year,
23:18
harvests are down three years in a row. Across
23:22
Europe, farmers are running into cash flow problems
23:25
because, you know, in the old days, a bad year
23:28
would be followed by a good year. Now bad years
23:30
are coming in runs of three, four, five. As those
23:34
sorts of things happen around the world, the
23:37
feast and famine that's always been the nature
23:40
of agricultural production, good years and bad
23:42
years, they're becoming more frequently bad years.
23:45
And so that will drive up food prices. And we
23:48
will start seeing over the long term, over years
23:52
and decades, that food which we grew up or I
23:57
grew up with expecting to be cheap and freely
23:59
available. is becoming less available and more
24:02
expensive. And, you know, it only takes this
24:06
year. Next year is going to be a difficult one
24:09
because of El Nino. You know, looking ahead,
24:12
you can see situations where the overturning
24:14
circulation in the North Atlantic declines, is
24:18
weakening now. And if it declines further, then
24:21
that will cause whole scale changes in the climate
24:24
around the world, like El Nino does. which will
24:27
lead to price difficulties and availability difficulties.
24:31
So I think we're at the start and we are feeling
24:35
the start of a more general food crisis, not
24:39
caused by any one event, but the coupling of
24:42
living in a more contested, more Trumpian -like
24:47
world, coupled with climate change impacts and
24:50
countries scrabbling around to control the market
24:53
rather than contribute to the market. for their
24:56
own power projection, we're at the start of a
24:59
change in the way that we have to interface with
25:03
global markets and supply chains and food and
25:08
its availability and price. Are any of the world
25:11
powers, I don't know, the US, European Union,
25:14
China, rising to this challenge at all at a level
25:18
of governmental policy? I think over the last
25:23
three or four years, it has gone up the agenda
25:25
greatly. I mean, Mark Carney said at Davos in
25:31
end of January that... That's the Canadian PM,
25:35
right? The Canadian PM. He said words to the
25:38
effect that the rules -based order has gone,
25:42
if it ever existed. We're now in a situation
25:45
where countries are using economic embeddedness.
25:49
for leverage, whether for coercive power projection,
25:53
economic power projection like the United States
25:56
is, or for other purposes. We're no longer in
26:00
a cooperative world. We're in a competitive world
26:02
where reliance on international supply chains
26:05
is a vulnerability. And lots of governments,
26:11
including the UK government, is now thinking
26:13
much more radically in terms of how do you ensure
26:17
food security. if global trade is contested or
26:20
interrupted by climate change. But that's still
26:23
quite a long way from actually actively building
26:27
resilient local agriculture and local supply
26:30
chains to cope with the potential issues ahead
26:35
because it's always easier to say, well, climate
26:39
change might play out over decades. We've got
26:41
plenty of time. We won't change things because
26:44
we're... quite happy as we are at the moment
26:47
and changing things will be expensive and there's
26:50
no fiscal headroom in any country and everybody's
26:53
worried about economic growth so we won't do
26:55
anything that's going to be expensive and we
26:57
just hope that the future is going to end up
26:59
better than the worst case scenarios are projecting
27:04
and we're doing that with climate change in general.
27:07
you know, backtracking on net zero and things
27:09
like that, because it's too disruptive and too
27:11
expensive to worry about now. And we're just
27:14
hoping that the future is not going to be as
27:15
bad as it could be. What would building resilient
27:20
food production systems look like if we actually
27:24
did do it? Well, over the last 20 years, more
27:28
or less everything that builds resilience has
27:31
been stripped out of this global food system
27:34
in the name of economy. So we've got just -in
27:37
-time food delivery systems. So for the UK, we
27:42
have three to five days fresh produce in the
27:45
country, and effectively it's brought into the
27:46
country at the speed it leaves the supermarket
27:48
shelves. And so if anything happened to trade,
27:51
we would very rapidly see shortfalls. So in order
27:58
to build resilience, you need to trade with allies
28:02
rather than potential foes. You need to increase
28:06
storage redundancy within the system. So you've
28:10
got local food stores. You need to increase domestic
28:13
production for domestic consumption in case trade
28:16
becomes difficult. You need to diversify logistics
28:19
and processing so you don't have single points
28:22
of failure or single ports of entry. You need
28:26
to encourage people to be flexible in their food
28:28
habits and not always demand. oranges at Christmas
28:31
or whatever it might be, strawberries at Christmas,
28:33
and so on. And you've got to build flexibility
28:37
into the system as a whole. So if something goes
28:40
wrong, as happened during COVID, you don't end
28:43
up throwing a lot of food away because you haven't
28:45
got anywhere to sell it. The rigidity of supply
28:48
chain. So all those things. If you imagine putting
28:52
them in place, public stocks of food, changing
28:55
local agriculture, making it more diversified,
28:58
growing more at home that you would normally
28:59
buy from overseas, all of those things will have
29:03
an impact on food price. And if countries start
29:06
doing this, trading preferentially with allies
29:10
or diversifying or whatever, it would have impacts
29:13
on the global market. difficult thing because
29:19
it makes the global market less flexible to disruptions
29:23
in turn. And so prices will go up again. So everything
29:26
that is really needed to build resilience has
29:30
at its heart, increasing prices. And that's in
29:35
the world in which we live, where, you know,
29:38
so many people in the population feel they're
29:41
getting poorer all the time. Anything that affects
29:43
prices is politically really difficult to cope
29:46
with. People are noting that there is a potential
29:50
problem, hoping that it doesn't become real,
29:53
but not doing very much about it because there
29:56
is very little political space for actually saying
29:58
we need to build resilience in our supply chains,
30:02
but your supermarkets will end up asking you
30:06
for 20 % more for the same basket of food. Leaving
30:11
these regional wars aside for now, I believe
30:17
the essence of the problem is that we're still
30:18
in the clutches of this perverse idea of infinite
30:21
growth, which you alluded to before, while refusing
30:24
to accept that we live on a finite planet. So
30:28
where do you think this is going with the business
30:31
as usual model? What are you imagining is going
30:34
to break or creak first? Well, the notion of
30:41
basically capitalism is that markets... we'll
30:46
be able to provide the solution. And as things
30:50
become more difficult, then market production
30:53
will switch to greater efficiency or using different
30:56
inputs or technological advancement or whatever.
31:00
So there's a great hope in markets that the solution
31:04
is out there. And if we put some money into research
31:07
or if we think of new ways of doing things that
31:11
make it more efficient, then we'll. reduce our
31:14
impact on the planet for the production of the
31:17
same amount of goods. Now, obviously, that doesn't
31:19
work if because the other part of capitalism
31:23
is that markets will always expand. So if you
31:26
produce more, you'll find ways to use it that
31:29
you can make a profit out of. So as we increasingly
31:32
become efficient, we also increasingly demand
31:36
more goods. And so the absolute impact of our
31:39
agricultural production or whatever it might
31:42
be. becomes greater. And we see that with climate
31:44
change, we're talking a lot about renewable energy,
31:48
etc. But as we increase renewable energy, we
31:51
increase also the supply of energy, and that
31:54
increases the demand for energy. So we keep the
31:56
oil fired and coal fired power stations open,
31:59
and the overall energy demand goes up or, you
32:02
know, especially driven by AI these days. So
32:04
our emissions go up, but we're making a lot of
32:07
money out of it at the same time. So as you say,
32:11
In the long term, it doesn't make sense that
32:14
you can continually forever extract a finite
32:18
resource or pollute a finite atmosphere or water.
32:23
And so things are likely to get more difficult
32:27
in the long run, simply from that sustainability
32:30
issue. But the other thing that is really important
32:34
in this space is that countries are competing
32:37
for economic growth. That's the world in which
32:40
we live. Every country is worried about its GDP
32:42
and losing competitive share to other countries.
32:46
And so we're all driving our economies as hard
32:49
as we possibly can. And the environmental costs
32:54
of increasing our pollution or increasing our
32:57
unsustainabilities are not levied at the time
33:00
that we're doing that. They're levied decades
33:04
ahead. And so we can make a profit today. And
33:08
in the long run, things are going to get worse.
33:10
And as things get worse, countries are going
33:12
to become more contesting for access to resources,
33:18
access to minerals, access to food. And so conflict
33:23
is likely to increase. So we're in a bit of a
33:25
vicious circle that we're driving the economy
33:26
hard, offsetting into the future that... costs
33:31
of that and as those costs are starting to accrue
33:34
international affairs is getting spikier and
33:36
more contested and wars and conflict and trade
33:41
wars etc are coming up and as trade wars come
33:43
up we say well where are we going to get our
33:45
goods from we've got to go and plunder that country
33:47
or we've got to go and expand our agriculture
33:49
in that country so that we can still access the
33:52
resources and we're in this vicious circle where
33:55
everything we do is making the future more difficult
33:58
rather than making this future more sustainable.
34:04
How did Gramsci say? The old world is dying and
34:07
the new world struggles to be born. Now is the
34:09
time of monsters, basically what you're describing.
34:11
Yes, indeed. Oh my God. Yikes, too close for
34:16
comfort. So in any case, this protectionism rather
34:21
than cooperation seems to be, like you said,
34:23
the name of the game these days, right? So if
34:26
there is a big I don't know, environmental crisis
34:29
that hits multiple bread baskets all at once.
34:33
Is it possible that these countries simply refuse
34:36
to export food anymore like they are doing now
34:39
and an actual famine sets in on a more global
34:42
level? Yeah, well, that's certainly possible.
34:47
I mean, the UK government's perspective, which
34:49
is not different from any others in the G20,
34:53
is effectively we are rich enough. that we will
34:57
always be able to afford food. And the corollary
35:00
of that is that if there is a shortfall in supply,
35:04
the rich nations will do everything possible
35:07
to ensure they get the supply, and the poor nations
35:10
end up getting priced out of the market. So you
35:13
could imagine a situation where 10 % of global
35:16
calories got displaced by climate change or war
35:21
or whatever, and global prices go up hugely.
35:25
And then what happens, the Global South are the
35:27
ones that will bear the brunt. I mean, there
35:30
will be cost of living implications in the North
35:33
and feed insecurity in the North, but it's the
35:36
Global South countries that don't have the economic
35:38
power, they don't have the political, geopolitical
35:40
power to be able to corner markets in the way
35:43
that the US or the UK or Europe can do. And so
35:47
the reality of the situation is, you know, with
35:53
Odessa, with Iran, Straits of Hormuz, Bab al
35:59
-Mandab, as I've talked about, Panama Canal drying
36:03
out, and global issues to do with harvests this
36:08
year, perhaps next year because of El Nino, then
36:11
we can probably expect global food prices to
36:15
increase and the ones that will suffer will be
36:18
the global south. And it's not that famines...
36:23
are a thing of the past. I mean, I grew up in
36:27
the 70s and 80s where there was a lot of famine
36:30
in Eastern and the Horn of Africa. It's not that
36:35
those are a thing of the past, but we've had
36:37
a few decades where globally we've cooperated
36:41
with the World Food Programme to increase international
36:45
aid. But in the last three or four years, international
36:48
aid is going down. The amount of money going
36:51
into the World Food Programme is going down.
36:53
If push comes to shove, wheat prices or whatever
36:57
increase because of some global issue. The less
37:01
money that the World Food Programme has will
37:05
have to buy less food and even less food because
37:08
the prices will be higher for that less money
37:10
to go. And so you can see a kind of crisis in
37:13
international food aid at the same time as a
37:16
crisis in food prices. that really might return
37:23
the era of famines that were very prevalent in
37:28
the second half of the last century. You said
37:31
that we're heading in a direction that's going
37:34
to be a bit more stark or maybe difficult for
37:38
us, that this age of abundance is slowly drawing
37:42
to a close. But I'm trying to force you. to give
37:48
me some numbers. If the present regional conflicts
37:51
keep ranging on, like it seems they will, the
37:53
war in Ukraine that we talked about and in Iran,
37:55
the Strait of Hormuz, coupled with the biggest
37:57
El Nino on record that's brewing as we speak,
38:00
can you give us a short -term prediction of where
38:03
we're heading in the next couple of years in
38:05
terms of food prices, let's say, or food production?
38:08
Well, the El Nino is unprecedented in its size.
38:13
So that means we don't have a... real historical
38:16
guidelines to be able to use as a yardstick.
38:22
And what El Niño does is it kind of rewires the
38:25
global climate. So some areas become hotter and
38:28
drier and some areas become cooler and wetter.
38:30
So it's not certain how that will work out this
38:33
year, but it's probably going to be quite, in
38:37
places, quite nasty. The issue is where are those
38:41
places and are they... large -scale food production
38:44
places. But if you think back to the invasion
38:47
of Ukraine and the blockade of the Odessa ports,
38:51
global food prices went up considerably then
38:54
simply because of a worry about a shortfall of
38:57
1 % or 2 % in global wheat markets and oilseed
39:02
and one or two other things. And that really
39:05
affected people in the global south and hundreds
39:08
of millions of people. on a global scale went
39:11
into acute food insecurity. So we can imagine
39:16
situations, and it's quite easy to imagine situations,
39:19
where global food insecurity doubles the extent
39:23
to which the international community would come
39:25
together. I think is also questionable at the
39:29
moment because of, you know, Trump dismantling
39:32
USAID and World Food Programme struggling and
39:35
so on. So we could be in a situation in the next
39:38
year or two where there is a really significant
39:41
problem affecting hundreds of millions of people.
39:44
But in a sense, it's not just the global south.
39:48
You know, we already have a food security situation
39:52
in Europe where, you know, 20... percent of the
39:56
population is struggling to provide sensible
40:00
nutritional meals every day for the families
40:03
and anything with food prices going up in the
40:07
cost of living crisis as energy prices are going
40:09
up they interact with each other more people
40:12
will be going hungry or eating lower quality
40:15
food and so we have a kind of nutritional and
40:18
food insecurity crisis wherever you look in the
40:20
world and looking ahead that's only going to
40:22
get worse You mentioned the Global South. Like
40:28
with climate justice, it seems the same as well.
40:31
The people least responsible for the situation
40:33
are going to have to shoulder the biggest costs,
40:38
right? Yeah, but as I say, it's not just the
40:41
Global South. It's also the economically marginalized
40:44
in all of our countries. A lot of the power in
40:50
the global economic system is held by a relatively
40:55
small portion of the population who are relatively
40:58
comfortable, well off, invested in the status
41:02
quo. And they're the ones in every country who
41:06
are the most immune to these things. And if you're
41:09
a poor working class person on the verge of employment
41:12
or with only one low paid job and you live in
41:15
Europe, you're not necessarily as bad off as
41:18
a starving person in Sudan, but you're still
41:21
in a situation where... you're very uncomfortable
41:23
and you're powerless in this situation. So it's
41:26
not just the rich countries are dumping on the
41:30
poor countries. It is the rich are dumping on
41:33
the poor, whether you're in a country, a rich
41:36
country or a poor country. Just curious, do you
41:38
perhaps know historically what kind of like food
41:42
prices, jumps, cost, severe civil unrest, or
41:46
even a revolution? Like, for example, the French
41:48
Revolution. Well, the French Revolution wasn't
41:52
caused by food prices, but it was the food price
41:56
crisis following bad harvest meant that the price
41:59
of the daily ration of bread went up to 40 %
42:03
of the wages or 50 % of the wages or something
42:06
like that. So historically, we know that there
42:09
is a relationship. And there was a paper published
42:12
in about 2012, which looked at the... relationship
42:18
between food prices and civil unrest. And there
42:20
have been several follow -on studies from that.
42:23
And if food prices go up sharply, it does prompt
42:27
civil unrest, particularly in regimes that are
42:30
authoritarian or somewhat governance is unstable.
42:36
And so, you know, there's a famous saying that
42:39
was attributed to someone in the United States.
42:44
1880 79 something like that um which is uh every
42:49
civilization is only nine meals away from anarchy
42:51
and you can imagine as a situation where if something
42:56
really bad happened and food supply the the long
42:59
complex embedded globally supply chains they
43:03
broke down what would people do when they go
43:07
to a supermarket and it's empty or coupled with
43:10
uh I don't know, a crash in the global internet
43:15
and you can't get hold of money from banks, etc.
43:18
You can imagine those sorts of situations would
43:20
very quickly lead to civil unrest. And, you know,
43:24
again, this is one of those things that has gone
43:27
up the political agenda because we are in a permanent
43:31
cost of living crisis at the moment and the economically
43:34
marginalised are increasingly disaffected. by
43:37
the situation where you kind of look around and
43:40
you see someone like Elon Musk, reputedly the
43:44
world's first trillionaire. You know, he's got
43:46
more money than the top 125 countries make in
43:51
a year. One person. And, you know, that issue
43:56
of who do you blame if you're economically marginalized
43:59
and you can't afford energy and you can't afford
44:02
food? Who do you blame? If it's somebody other,
44:06
another country, then you end up in a situation
44:08
where you get political polarisation and international
44:12
affairs issues. If you're blaming your government
44:14
or the rich or whatever, then you get civil unrest.
44:17
And so there is a kind of potency about the situation
44:21
where, you know, maybe 20 % of people can be
44:26
food and energy insecure and the country doesn't
44:29
have problems. But when it gets to 40 or 50%.
44:32
then you are in civil unrest or revolution -type
44:35
terms, depending on the government that you're
44:38
sitting under. Speaking of being nine meals away
44:43
from anarchy, I know it probably differs from
44:46
nation to nation, but generally speaking, do
44:48
countries have any sort of food reserves in case
44:51
of any catastrophic events? Well, every country
44:54
used to. Used to? That's not very reassuring.
45:00
The issue is that if you kind of offshore everything
45:03
to the market, the market's job is to supply
45:07
food at the rate it's sold effectively. So it
45:12
then becomes a market problem to shuffle the
45:14
food around and distribute it so you can keep
45:16
the supermarkets shelves full. So countries over
45:20
the last 40, 50 years have recognized that storing
45:25
food domestically is very expensive to do. And
45:29
so most countries have ended up reducing their
45:32
supply of publicly funded food. There are some
45:37
countries that still do it, China, for example,
45:39
but most kind of rely on market mechanisms. So
45:43
the kind of issue to do with how much is in store
45:47
in a wheat supply chain, the farmer who's got
45:50
some in his grain silo, the grain processors
45:52
who's got some in their silos, the manufacturers,
45:55
the flour. When you tot up everything, there's
45:58
quite a lot within a global supply chain. And
46:00
you just hope that if there's a problem in Europe,
46:03
then you can get it from Canada or India or whatever
46:07
instead. So, yeah, public food stores are generally
46:11
declined, although they're starting to come back
46:16
in this current era. What is interesting now
46:20
is that some governments are putting pressure
46:22
on people. to say store up food in your home
46:27
just in case there's a problem and there's been
46:31
quite a lot in the UK recently about how people
46:33
should be having tins of vegetables and stuff
46:38
in their store cupboard in case there is a problem
46:41
so putting the onus on individuals to store food
46:45
because it's cheaper from a government perspective
46:48
if I spend money and put it in a store cupboard
46:50
than if they spend money and put it in a big
46:52
warehouse just in case. That's a fantastic plan.
46:58
Just go buy some food and quit bugging us. It's
47:02
your problem now. Wow. What a novel approach.
47:07
By the way, this just hit me. Sorry for such
47:10
a patchwork of questions, but I'm truly not very
47:12
educated in this department. There was a lot
47:14
of talk, I remember a while back, about soil
47:17
quality diminishing, soil being depleted. I don't
47:21
know. On social media, I read somewhere that
47:24
there's only like 40 harvests left in a lot of
47:28
these breadbasket areas. Is that also an issue
47:31
on the horizon? Or has it been a bit sensationalized?
47:36
It is an issue, along with so many other things
47:39
like the overturning circulation, rewiring climate
47:43
or climate change itself or biodiversity loss.
47:46
The issue with kind of industrialized farming
47:51
that puts in synthetic nutrients like nitrogen
47:54
fertilizer, ammonia or urea or other things like
47:58
that is that it and plowing, it disturbs the
48:02
soil. It disturbs the microbiome, the microbes
48:08
that live in the soil. They get kind of weaned
48:10
onto just a very simple ecosystem. As the soil
48:17
is disturbed, carbon is lost from the soil. That
48:20
reduces the ability to hold water in a drought.
48:25
All of those things together means that you've
48:28
become kind of locked into... an industrialized
48:31
farming system that if you can't get a hold of
48:33
your synthetic nitrogen, there isn't any nitrogen
48:35
in the soil and you don't have carbon in the
48:37
soil that the microbes can use. And there's a
48:39
very depleted community of microbes. So it creates
48:43
a lack of resilience to change in the system.
48:48
And then the more friable soils, the more powdery
48:52
soils that come from lots and lots of plowing
48:54
and compaction by big tractors means that if
48:59
you have a a droughty summer like we've had and
49:04
wind comes up then there's also the potential
49:07
for dust bowl and erosion type effects and so
49:11
you can be in a situation where the amount of
49:14
soil declines as well as its fertility and in
49:19
the long run that's not a good thing but it's
49:21
happening in the long run over decades as opposed
49:24
to on a year by year basis and so Again, it's
49:28
one of those problems that gets pushed into the
49:30
future in the hope that we'll come up with a
49:32
technological solution to be able to cope with
49:35
that. But yes, soils in general are losing their
49:39
resilience, which is why we've got a big global
49:42
movement around regenerative agriculture, which
49:45
is to treat the soils better. And that is taking
49:49
off and people are changing. their behavior and
49:53
putting more carbon back into the soil and using
49:55
not less nitrogen fertilizer, but manure and
49:59
things like that to add carbon to the soil. But
50:02
that's a kind of slightly sticking plaster, finger
50:05
in the wind, hope for the future. But it's just
50:08
one of the challenges that will hit us in the
50:11
decades ahead. Regenerative farming is different
50:14
from organic farming, right? Yes. So there are
50:18
a lot of... terms that are used like sustainable
50:22
agriculture or sustainable intensification used
50:24
in different ways. But regenerative agriculture
50:26
is specifically about regenerating the soils.
50:31
And organic agriculture is a form of regenerative
50:35
agriculture, but you can do regenerative agriculture
50:37
without being organic. So, Professor, what can
50:42
we normal people do? Should we just become like
50:44
doom preppers and take Andy Burnham's lead and
50:47
buy a bunch of toilet paper and tin cans from
50:52
the nearest supermarket? Or should we learn to
50:55
grow food or, you know, like Mad Max style? Or,
50:58
I mean, as we've outlined in this conversation,
51:02
things are looking pretty grim. What do you reckon
51:07
is the best way forward for ordinary people?
51:09
Is it to protest or is it to try to accumulate
51:12
as much food as possible in our basements? And,
51:16
I don't know, have a little garden? Well, there
51:19
are lots of things that individuals can do. Changing
51:22
food choices, what you eat, your dietary composition
51:27
of animal to plant protein, etc. You can do things
51:31
for yourself. Fly less, drive less, eat less.
51:35
eat better but those work in terms of person
51:41
to person I've got a sustainable lifestyle put
51:45
some peer pressure on your colleagues and those
51:48
can act as the grounds for championing the issue
51:52
but the real the real need is for this to become
51:57
political because nothing will happen unless
52:00
politicians feel they're going to win votes to
52:04
do it. So we won't get people, you know, we won't
52:08
get a global wealth tax because power and incumbency
52:12
and the asymmetries in between the elite and
52:16
less elite people means that it just will not
52:20
happen until it becomes a vote winner, that politicians
52:25
are competing with each other to deal with these
52:27
issues into the long term. So it's not so much
52:30
about consumption choices. Although I wouldn't
52:33
argue that people shouldn't think deliberatively
52:38
about what they're doing and their impact on
52:42
the planet. But it's about making this a political
52:44
small party, not party political. But, you know,
52:48
until there are enough people saying political
52:51
class, we want you to think about changing the
52:55
economy. We want to have a well -being economy
52:58
instead of a gross economy. We want to have enough
53:03
money to be comfortable, but we don't want to
53:07
have the anxiety that will come from looking
53:10
decades ahead in a doomerist world. It's got
53:13
to become political because at the moment, the
53:15
politicians are just ignoring or running away
53:18
from these issues because it's become more popular
53:21
in the populist world in which we live, in the
53:24
polarised world in which we live. It's become
53:26
more popular for politicians to be anti -climate
53:29
change. to be anti these environmental issues
53:33
and to run away from the issues of a cooperative
53:40
world. And so we've got more conflict. So the
53:42
political space for change is very small unless
53:47
we as citizens tell our politicians that we want
53:51
it to be different. So ultimately, it's not about
53:54
individual consumer choices or those. those are
53:57
important in and of themselves. It's about making
54:00
this a vote winner. And until that happens, and
54:03
until that happens widespread, not just in one
54:06
or two countries, it's got to be across the world,
54:09
then change will not happen. It's outright bizarre
54:13
that as climate change is getting worse, it seems
54:16
to feature on the agenda. or on the ballot less
54:20
even in in like on the news cycle it seems to
54:23
be featured less even though we have more catastrophes
54:25
now you know like what happened the tragedy that
54:28
happened in nepal uh the biggest el nino on on
54:31
record the the wildfires in europe they're just
54:33
like kind of presented as individual unrelated
54:37
catastrophes and then within these articles climate
54:41
change is not even mentioned anymore it's just
54:43
another horrible thing happened and the same
54:45
is is um Same is true with politicians, I suppose.
54:50
I think it was much more present on these agendas
54:55
10 years ago when the world seemed a bit calmer
54:58
environmentally than now. So it's really bizarre.
55:02
Yeah, but the whole of Trump, as an example,
55:05
the whole of his base is about getting rid of
55:08
the green subsidies, drilling for oil, making
55:14
energy cheap. making everybody, you know, reshoring,
55:18
manufacturing, etc. It's all about making people
55:22
richer, faster, whatever the long term costs.
55:27
And he was voted in, not exceptionally with a
55:32
majority, but he was voted in because he spoke
55:35
to the populace about, we will make you richer.
55:39
And that's a very different situation to, we
55:42
will make your future better. in the long term
55:45
by dealing with climate change, but it will cost
55:47
now. And so that's why it's an issue. I mean,
55:51
just do the thought experiment. If you had an
55:53
hour doing a podcast with Donald Trump, what
55:56
would you say to him to convince him that climate
55:58
change was real? There's almost nothing that
56:01
you could say that will make him change because
56:03
he is and his cronies are getting richer by driving
56:09
the economy. are forward in the way that he's
56:12
driving the economy forward. And so it's not
56:14
about knowledge. It's not about understanding.
56:17
It's about the politics. And I think we in the
56:20
climate and the sustainability community have
56:23
shied away from recognizing the political side
56:27
of this in the hope that by providing lots of
56:31
reports and the IPCC, et cetera, the evidence
56:34
would mean that people will act in the right
56:36
way for humanity. If anything, that's a very
56:39
flawed argument because politics is not about
56:42
doing the right thing in the long term. Politics
56:45
is about getting reelected. And it's easier to
56:48
get reelected by saying, those nasty immigrants,
56:51
we won't give foreign aid. Those green subsidies,
56:54
they're just making you poorer. We're not doing
56:56
anything about that. Let's just go and drill
56:58
for some more oil somewhere and burn, baby, burn.
57:02
wrap everything in plastic because it's cheaper
57:04
to do that and we'll make more money and you'll
57:06
be richer because your wages will go up and your
57:09
costs will go down. And that in itself is an
57:13
absolute fantasy. I mean, under Trump, the cost
57:16
of living in America has gone up remarkably.
57:19
So it's a fantasy, but it's a fantasy that people
57:22
buy into and that's what politics is. All right,
57:27
so this conversation wasn't exactly like a fairy
57:30
tale. But despite that, I do want to ask you
57:34
personally, are you a doomist given the state
57:37
of things right now? Well, it depends on the
57:41
mood I'm in when I wake up. That's fair. We know
57:45
exactly what we need to do. But we're not doing
57:48
it. But we're not doing it. And so I despair
57:52
at the economic and political lock -ins. that
57:56
prevent us doing the right thing and you know
57:59
lord stern in the uk wrote his report 20 odd
58:03
years ago saying if we invest a little bit now
58:06
uh we'll be able to cope with climate change
58:08
and we're not investing what he said and so the
58:12
problems are getting bigger and as the problems
58:14
get bigger the costs go up and in a reduced fiscal
58:17
headroom no government's got any money because
58:20
we're all maxed out on debt etc etc um the impetus
58:24
to invest at all is going down. So the problems
58:28
are getting bigger. And so I just see humanity
58:31
as a whole, because of the political and economic
58:34
lock -ins, squandering this opportunity to make
58:37
the world a better place. And so what's going
58:40
to prompt us to change? I think having lived
58:43
in the world of politics for the last 10 years
58:45
or so, I can't see a way that we will change.
58:50
sufficiently rapidly to be able to cope with
58:52
things until the situation gets bad, that business
58:57
as usual is no longer possible. And so in that
58:59
sense, I guess I am a doomster because I think
59:03
things are going to get worse until we get to
59:06
the point where the system effectively creaks
59:08
and breaks and we say we've got to change direction,
59:13
we've got to front up on the costs. and accept
59:17
that this is going to be an economic and social
59:19
crisis to get through it, to make our world fit
59:22
for humanity for the next century. I asked this
59:26
of my previous guest, Professor David Kruger,
59:28
who's warning about the risks of AI. If he thinks
59:32
that some sort of more localized catastrophe
59:36
might prompt us to collectively start addressing
59:40
these issues on a more sustainable and reasonable
59:44
basis, do you think that's the case here as well?
59:46
That something really bad has to... Okay. No,
59:49
I mean, you yourself and I have already listed
59:54
a whole host of calamities that have happened
59:56
from Nepal, wildfires, Odessa, Ukraine, Iran,
1:00:04
COVID, biodiversity loss. You know, if we lose
1:00:08
the Amazon or the overturning circulation turns
1:00:10
off, they might be... sufficiently big. But El
1:00:13
Nino, you know, we're living through all of these
1:00:15
crises. And because we aren't thinking in the
1:00:19
right way, we're saying each one of these is
1:00:21
an individual crisis with individual causation.
1:00:24
And we'll live through it and get past it. And
1:00:26
let's just build back as fast as possible to
1:00:28
where we were beforehand, rather than let's acknowledge
1:00:31
that we are in a sequence of things that are
1:00:34
getting worse and more frequent. And that should
1:00:37
prompt us to change. But at the moment, we're
1:00:39
not at that point. Okay, because I am very stubborn,
1:00:42
I come from Eastern Europe, I'm trying to force
1:00:44
some sort of a hopeful note at the end of this
1:00:46
conversation. What do you think would prompt
1:00:48
us to change? Well, as I say, it's when business
1:00:53
as usual becomes untenable. So that might be
1:00:56
a general disruption of global supply chains.
1:01:00
Okay, so not like a localized catastrophe, but...
1:01:02
No, it couldn't be localized, because as we've
1:01:04
seen this week with Nepal... That's over there.
1:01:08
That's lots of people dying over there. But for
1:01:11
your average person, it's just all the famines
1:01:15
in Africa. They were the same when I was growing
1:01:17
up. That's people down there. It's got to be
1:01:19
something that impinges on us as individuals.
1:01:23
And it has to impinge in a sufficiently big way
1:01:25
that we say enough is enough. And COVID wasn't
1:01:30
enough. The food price spike following the invasion
1:01:33
of Ukraine wasn't enough. Iran isn't enough.
1:01:37
And all of these things are kind of adding together.
1:01:39
So it'll have to be something to really prompt
1:01:42
the political space to open up. It will have
1:01:44
to be something that will be bigger, unfortunately.
1:01:48
Such as, I listened to a recent interview of
1:01:50
yours. You said you're working a lot of geopolitical
1:01:52
scenarios. Well, you can imagine a situation.
1:01:57
Panama Canal's drying out. We have a summer like
1:02:01
we've had this year, or El Nino impacts. Putin
1:02:06
perhaps presses the wrong button or makes incursion
1:02:12
into Lithuania or other states. Europe then feels
1:02:16
under huge tension. A combination of circumstances
1:02:19
like that would effectively paralyze global supply.
1:02:23
And the consequences would be that people would
1:02:27
feel food insecure and worry about it. And that
1:02:31
might prompt, well, actually, our food security.
1:02:35
is really part of national security we can't
1:02:38
we have to change things that might prompt uh
1:02:41
that that sort of response that uh there is the
1:02:46
political space then for people for politicians
1:02:49
to say yes we've got to do things differently
1:02:51
for the future because the future is going to
1:02:53
be worse than it is today but but nothing short
1:02:57
of that sort of level of calamity i don't think
1:03:00
given the last 15 years of history and the things
1:03:02
that have happened in the last 15 years Right,
1:03:05
because I did read that due to particularly the
1:03:08
Iran war, some developed nations are trying to
1:03:13
electrify faster than they planned because they
1:03:16
don't want to be dependent on these like oil
1:03:17
shocks. So this is some sort of like analogous
1:03:21
situation that you outlined right now. Yeah,
1:03:23
kind of leapfrogging, you know, if they're developing
1:03:26
an energy system. Given where we are in the world
1:03:30
now and the fact that oil has been an important
1:03:33
geopolitical commodity, it makes sense to, as
1:03:37
energy systems and solar power and wind power,
1:03:41
et cetera, has advanced technologically hugely.
1:03:44
It makes sense to invest in those now. But the
1:03:47
challenges for us in developed nations is that
1:03:50
we've got infrastructures that we put in place
1:03:53
100 years ago, and those are really expensive
1:03:55
to change. It's different if you're putting in
1:03:58
a new system, like in many parts of the developing
1:04:00
world. But when you've invested for 100 years,
1:04:03
changing the system as a whole becomes really
1:04:06
expensive, which is the number where we are.
1:04:09
We're locked in to doing things slowly and incrementally
1:04:12
or not at all. And it will take a big change
1:04:15
to drive us further and faster and more expensively.
1:04:20
Professor Benton, a sobering conversation. Thank
1:04:22
you so much. Thanks very much. I won't say it's
1:04:25
been fun. Thank you so much for listening. There's
1:04:28
a gazillion podcasts out there, but you chose
1:04:30
this one. So I really appreciate your attention.
1:04:33
If you're feeling extra generous, you can always
1:04:35
hop on Patreon, find Smart Cookies Podcast on
1:04:38
there. and support me this is a one -person podcast
1:04:42
i do everything by my little old self so every
1:04:44
little bit helps i would be over the moon which
1:04:48
brings me to a set of absolute queens and kings
1:04:51
my existing patrons without you there would be
1:04:53
no smart cookies podcast so my eternal gratitude
1:04:57
goes To Mookie Puck. Oh my God, my phone is ringing.
1:05:32
The list is growing, which makes me super happy.
1:05:36
Thanks again, guys. You're the best.