Farm Subsidies

[RandBlade]

Both Europe and America (and other major nations) spend vast sums subsidising farmers. Part of it is legacy, part of it is that changing it is very difficult politically ... US Presidential candidates pander to Iowa, the French have a veto over changes in the EU. While the right-wing parties that are typically the most anti-redistribution get often get a large amount of support from the rural voters. However disregarding the realpolitik of how difficult/impossible it is to change, is subsidising farmers the right thing to do?

I don't think so.

I am against redistribution except when absolutely necessary. For the poorest in society I accept that welfare is a necessity. With the sometimes (not always) possible exceptions of very new science and technology related industries, long-term nationally important projects (eg energy generation like new nuclear plants) or national defence I do not ever see a reason to support private corporations. Even in those three examples support is better placed as structured loans to be repaid, not corporate welfarism. Any private company that can't cope without support should be allowed to fail and let other companies fill its gap. If it is an efficient use of land, investment and manpower then farmers should be able to survive without welfare. If not, let them go bust and either others can take over the farm or we can buy from elsewhere.

In an ideal world where it was up to me I would eliminate all farm subsidies. Probably not overnight as farmers expect and rely upon some support right now, but a structured phase-out. The government should not be in the role of picking and choosing businesses to support.

[Steely Glint]

I'd actually argue that farmers come under the aegis of 'long term nationally important projects'. Buying all your food from abroad can be a strategic liability. More than one foe has sort to defeat England by cutting her off from overseas trade.

[RandBlade]

I'd argue that might have been true once and is certainly part of the reason why these legacy projects exist from around WWII. However I don't believe in this day and age we will ever be able to face a situation whereby we can't use the planes or seas. Who's going to be able to successfully achieve such a blockade against us in this nuclear age and why? Bearing in mind we already get much of our produce from overseas even with these subsidies.

[Hazir]

I'd actually argue that farmers come under the aegis of 'long term nationally important projects'. Buying all your food from abroad can be a strategic liability. More than one foe has sort to defeat England by cutting her off from overseas trade.

Ditto. My parents lived through the winter of 1945 in Holland (not The Netherlands, the actual Holland) and people were very hungry and dying like flies, because the Germans cut off food supplies. I am not so optimistic about the real nature of the international arena that I think that could never happen again.

[RandBlade]

Since our subsidies aren't nation-based but continent-based anyway some enemy foe have to achieve a blockade against our entire continent to be able to blockade the Netherlands again. Were it to be 1945 redux then the current system wouldn't necessarily help anyway as the CAP means that the Netherlands might say import its stock from Portugal anyway not keep it local. If France, Germany and the UK were to declare war on the BeNeLux nations and totally blockade you, then the CAP wouldn't help - so the threat must come from outside and be blockading the entire continent. Same as if the US were to have another Civil War, would keeping Iowan potatoes feed New Yorkers if they were blockaded by surrounding states in-between?

So who is going to be able to provide such an existential threat to the entire continent of Europe and successfully blockade us from the rest of the world? Remembering that our continent has not one but two nuclear-armed nations. Same with the USA.

And even eliminating the corporate subsidies to farms doesn't mean that every farm will vanish overnight. If no farms could survive without support (especially considering the air miles cost for moving fresh produce) then we must be well and truly inefficient in our agriculture.

[Loki]

Clearly the reason the Netherlands lost so quickly to the Germans was because food supplies were cut off...And Britain had to worry about food supplies due to its tiny navy...

[Being]

One thing that stands out about the web site below is that it doesn't capture tarriffs that act as subsidies such as the case with sugar in the US.

Farm Subsidy Database/

[Flixy]

Clearly the reason the Netherlands lost so quickly to the Germans was because food supplies were cut off...And Britain had to worry about food supplies due to its tiny navy...

Quicky? :O We held out for four days! That's way longer than the Germans thought

Also Hazir is referring to the hunger winter at the end of the war, when half of the country was liberated after Market Garden. I think his point was more aotu how bad hunger is that a nation should prepare against it, than an example of where farming subsidies could have helped, since you know, half of the country was occupied by the Germans, half hosted the Americans/British/Canadians/Poles, and most of it bombed to bits.

[Loki]

Quicky? :O We held out for four days! That's way longer than the Germans thought

Also Hazir is referring to the hunger winter at the end of the war, when half of the country was liberated after Market Garden. I think his point was more aotu how bad hunger is that a nation should prepare against it, than an example of where farming subsidies could have helped, since you know, half of the country was occupied by the Germans, half hosted the Americans/British/Canadians/Poles, and most of it bombed to bits.

Ignoring the fact that a German occupation would have stolen/destroyed your food regardless of how much you were growing before the War started.

There are ways to protect against hunger without being self-sufficient in grown food (i.e. have warehouses full of food that doesn't perish very quickly). The Chinese learned this trick 2-3k years ago. And let's be honest here: if the Netherlands is under occupation more than 6 months in today's world, chances are half the world has been nuked already.

[RandBlade]

Exactly, its simply a case of being realistic about will or won't happen. The idea that the EU will be occupied without a nuclear winter is fanciful.

[Loki]

I'd also like to point out that existential threats don't appear out of the blue. It would take decades for some country to become sufficiently powerful and sufficiently aggressive to try to conquer the EU. That would give more than enough time to increase food production.

[RandBlade]

With such a nation having to find a solution to the UK and France's nuclear arsenal. The USA and USSR never managed that so decades might be an underestimate.

[Hazir]

I'd also like to point out that existential threats don't appear out of the blue. It would take decades for some country to become sufficiently powerful and sufficiently aggressive to try to conquer the EU. That would give more than enough time to increase food production.

You seem awfully certain the EU will survive the next 5 years.

[Loki]

You think without the EU there will suddenly be a major war (not of a Greek/Turkish variety)?

[RandBlade]

You seem awfully certain the EU will survive the next 5 years.

If it doesn't then the CAP is irrelevant anyway just as American subsidies are irrelevant to localised security in the event of a breakup of the USA.

[Loki]

The American subsidies are even more absurd, since the US is one of the biggest exporters of food in the world.

[Hazir]

You think without the EU there will suddenly be a major war (not of a Greek/Turkish variety)?

You don't need a major war to disturb supplies.

[Loki]

Right. So without a war, major European countries will both stop selling food to you and enact a blockade?

[Steely Glint]

The prospect of war was of course one example, far more likely is a some kind of disaster elsewhere in the world - natural, economic, political - which means that imports of food from abroad are no longer available.

With such a nation having to find a solution to the UK and France's nuclear arsenal. The USA and USSR never managed that so decades might be an underestimate.

The interceptor system around Moscow may well be capable of dealing with an attack by a British or French ballastic missile submarine, assuming the thing is even operational and will work as intended, which it probably doesn't.

[Loki]

The market for food is a global one. Why would a reduction in global supplies lead to shortages? What would happen is sharp increases in the price of food, and those increases would be just as sharp whether you're self-sufficient in food production or not.

I'd also like to know just what kind of a disaster would lead to this sudden and massive decrease in global food supplies (especially when you take into account how much food gets burned in the US, EU, and Japan just to keep food prices high).

[Steely Glint]

Super volcano, astroid impact, a major war involving third parties e.g. US vs China, infectious disease outbreak etc etc

[Loki]

For most of those, no amount of food production will help you stave off the consequences. And the rest, you could see coming well in advance. Again, anything that cuts global food production will lead to increases in food prices for everyone, whether you're self-sufficient in food or not (unless you're in North Korea I guess).

[Steely Glint]

There's a difference between suffering consequences and simply ceasing to exist as a nation.

[RandBlade]

I'm not sure how I see subsidising one part of the world to be able to import food from them assists rather than import it from somewhere else potentially just as close and more efficient really helps with any of those?

If Mount Vesuvius and/or Mount Etna erupts are we more secure because we've spent decades subsidising and then importing from Italian farms now destroyed by the volcano, rather than say import from Norwegian farmers?
If Mount St. Helens erupts then are those in Manhattan more secure because they've spent decades subsidising and then importing from Washington State farms now destroyed by the volcano, rather than say Quebec or Ontario (both of which their state shares a border with)?

[Loki]

Remind me why you wouldn't be able to buy food on the global market.

[RandBlade]

Remember too that that we consume far more than we need to already and the world produces already far more than we need too. In whatever extreme doomsday scenarios you can think of, if we were to implement WWII-style rationing then we'd need to consume far less food than we do now.

[Loki]

I'd also like to see a lefty like Steely justify allowing the rest of the world to go hungry (assuming a global catastrophe) while Britain maintains its eating habits.

[Steely Glint]

Remind me why you wouldn't be able to buy food on the global market.

Super volcano, astroid impact: would damage the ecosystem & climate enough to have a serious impact on global food production, countries currently exporting food would horde whatever the can produce to feed their own populations. A time of rationing all round, no room to export food to distant shores. For example, an eruption of the yellowstone caldera would likely wipe out ~20% of the world's food production at a stroke, not taking into account the damage caused to production globally by, e.g. dust clouds.

a major war involving third parties e.g. US vs China: because there probably wouldn't *be* a global market after they got done smashing the hell out of each other.

infectious disease outbreak: would necessitate a quarentine. So no importing food for you.

[Steely Glint]

I'd also like to see a lefty like Steely justify allowing the rest of the world to go hungry (assuming a global catastrophe) while Britain maintains its eating habits.

I'd like to see you justify Britain having to change its eating habits just to stop a bunch of foreigners going hungry.

[Loki]

I like your cute assumption that in a war between the US and China, Britain will be left standing.