Please do not reply to this Newsletter. You will likely get a response from a machine, not Nancy! For feedback on the Newsletter or to correspond with Nancy, click here instead.

Food Shortages

Food shortages are having an impact around the world, the latest a rise in the price of rice. Rice is a staple in many Third World countries.

Jump in Rice Price Fuels Fears of Unrest
March 27, 2008
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/d6f1cd74-fc29-11dc-9229-000077b07658.html?nclick_check=1

Rice prices jumped 30 per cent to an all-time high on Thursday, raising fears of fresh outbreaks of social unrest across Asia where the grain is a staple food for more than 2.5bn people. The increase came after Egypt, a leading exporter, imposed a formal ban on selling rice abroad to keep local prices down, and the Philippines announced plans for a major purchase of the grain in the international market to boost supplies. Global rice stocks are at their lowest since 1976. While prices of wheat, corn and other agricultural commodities have surged since late 2006, the increase in rice prices only started in January. Rice is also a staple in Africa, particularly for small countries such as Cameroon, Burkina Faso and Senegal that have already suffered social unrest because of high food prices.

Food shortages started showing up in the year 2000, with shortages noted in some 77 countries that year.

By 2000 shortages were in evidence worldwide in Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, Argentina, Armenia, Austria, Australia, Bolivia, Brazil, Bulgaria, Burundi, Cambodia, Canada, China, Croatia, Cuba, Cyprus, Ethiopia, France, Georgia, Ghana, Greece, Guyana, Hondurus, India, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Italy, Jamaica, Jordan, Kazakstan, Kenya, Korea, Laos, Liberia, Madagascar, Mexico, Moldova, Mongolia, Morocco, Mozambique, Nepal, Pakistan, Palestine, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Romania, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Slovakia, South Africa, Sudan, Syria, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Thailand, Uganda, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Uruguay, Uzbekistan, Vietnam, Yugoslavia.

But food shortages did not hit the news at that time, except in local reports. This was because supplies were being depleted, thus keeping the reality of food shortages from the public eye. But the UN revealed the reality of the situation. Note the mention of food stocks falling in this 2002 article.

World Can't Cope with Famine Says UN
October 28, 2002
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/storydisplay.cfm

Global warming is helping to cause an unprecedented series of famines that is pushing the world beyond its ability to cope, says the United Nations. Food stocks are falling well below critical levels and prices are soaring.

The Zetas had warned from the start of ZetaTalk that crop failure with resulting food shortages would strike as the hour of the pole shift approached. They pointed to the weather, with alternating drought and deluge and temperature swings, as the cause. Indeed, the weather has followed their predictions since 1995, with the Zeta prediction on crop shortages following in turn.

ZetaTalk Prediction 7/15/1995: Going into the cataclysms the weather will become unpredictable, with torrential rainstorms where not expected, and droughts likewise where not expected. Extremes of temperature will be experienced. Unusually warm winters, where the trees and shrubs will start to bud, thinking spring, and then be subjected to frost. Similarly, frosts will come late in the spring, almost into summer, killing the buds which have already put forth their tender shoots. Where today the world balances these situations, shipping produce around the world, during the years coming close to the time of the reappearance of Planet X all parts of the world will experience extremes.

Earlier it was possible to deny food shortages existed because grain stocks were maintained by many countries. In step with their 1995 prediction on crop failures because of weather irregularities, the Zetas also predicted that supplies would become depleted.

ZetaTalk Prediction 7/15/1995: At first, stores put up against such times will be tapped. After a bit, these stores will run down, and governments will get nervous. Helping handouts, from countries better off to those in desperation, will stop. Friction on these matters will fray at already frayed nerves.

A point to note in the March 27, 2008 article about rice shortages is the mention of supplies being depleted - "global rice stocks at their lowest." These and other grain stocks are essentially depleted now, so crop shortages can no longer be denied.

High Food Prices May Force Aid Rationing
February 24, 2008
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/451604c4-e30b-11dc-803f-0000779fd2ac.html

The United Nation's agency responsible for relieving hunger is drawing up plans to ration food aid in response to the spiralling cost of agricultural commodities. The World Food Programme is holding crisis talks to decide what aid to halt if new donations do not arrive in the short term. WFP officials hope the cuts can be avoided, but warned that the agency's budget requirements were rising by several million dollars a week because of climbing food prices. The WFP crisis talks come as the body sees the emergence of a "new area of hunger" in developing countries where even middle-class, urban people are being "priced out of the food market" because of rising food prices. The warning suggests that the price jump in agricultural commodities - such as wheat, corn, rice and soyabeans - is having a wider impact than thought, hitting countries that have previously largely escaped hunger. In response to increasing food prices, Egypt has widened its food rationing system for the first time in two decades while Pakistan has reintroduced a ration card system that was abandoned in the mid-1980s. Countries such as China and Russia are imposing price controls while others, such as Argentina and Vietnam, are enforcing foreign sales taxes or export bans. Importing countries are lowering their tariffs.

With food stocks depleted, government handouts to those administering soup lines are also being cutting back.

Food Bank Pantries Shrink Amid Economic Woes, Surplus Shortage
March 27, 2008
http://www.al.com/news/birminghamnews/index.ssf?

Those who operate soup kitchens and feed the needy say they are struggling to keep up with the rising demand for meals as the amount of donated food declines and food costs rise. The supply of donated food from area food banks - big warehouses that are instrumental in stocking pantries at churches and soup kitchens - is shrinking as farm surplus commodities, given to the food banks by the federal government, decrease. Officials with America's Second Harvest, the nation's food bank network, attribute the food shortage mainly to a steep decline in government surpluses, or bonuses, that provide inventory for the food banks.

And prices, reflecting supply and demand, are now rising astronomically!

10 More Years Of Expensive Food: Says UN
March 26, 2008
http://bimchat.wordpress.com/2008/03/26/

As of December 2007, 37 countries faced food crises and 20 had imposed some sort of price controls. Foods costs worldwide spiked 23% from 2006 to 2007, according to the UN food organization. Grain went up by 42%, oils 50% and dairy 80%.

Food Stamps

As the US economy declines, food stamp recipients are on the increase.

As Jobs Vanish, Food Stamp Use Is at Record Pace
March 31, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/31/us/31foodstamps.html?

Driven by a painful mix of layoffs and rising food and fuel prices, the number of Americans receiving food stamps is projected to reach 28 million in the coming year, the highest level since the aid program began in the 1960s. The number of recipients, who must have near-poverty incomes to qualify for benefits averaging $100 a month per family member, has fluctuated over the years along with economic conditions, eligibility rules, enlistment drives and natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina, which led to a spike in the South. But recent rises in many states appear to be resulting mainly from the economic slowdown as well as inflation in prices of basic goods that leave more families feeling pinched. Citing expected growth in unemployment, the Congressional Budget Office this month projected a continued increase in the monthly number of recipients in the next fiscal year. One example is Michigan, where one in eight residents now receives food stamps. Average family incomes among the bottom fifth of the population have been stagnant or have declined in recent years at levels around $15,500, said Jared Bernstein, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute in Washington.

The Independent, a UK newspaper, likened the increase in food stamp use to the economy, declaring that the "Great Depression" had arrived again.

USA 2008: The Great Depression
April 1, 2008
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/

Food stamps are the symbol of poverty in the US. In the era of the credit crunch, a record 28 million Americans are now relying on them to survive - a sure sign the world's richest country faces economic crisis. We knew things were bad on Wall Street, but on Main Street it may be worse. Startling official statistics show that as a new economic recession stalks the United States, a record number of Americans will shortly be depending on food stamps just to feed themselves and their families. Housing foreclosures, accelerating jobs losses and fast-rising prices all add to the squeeze. As a barometer of the country's economic health, food stamp usage may not be perfect, but can certainly tell a story. Michigan has been in its own mini-recession for years as its collapsing industrial base, particularly in the car industry, has cast more and more out of work. Now, one in eight residents of the state is on food stamps, double the level in 2000. But the trend is not restricted to the rust-belt regions. Forty states are reporting increases in applications for the stamps. At least six states, including Florida, Arizona and Maryland, have had a 10 per cent increase in the past year. In Rhode Island, the segment of the population on food stamps has risen by 18 per cent in two years.

The Zetas had long stated that the world's economy would not only be in a recession in the years going into the pole shift, but in a depression. Despite denials, this is now the term increasingly used.

ZetaTalk Analysis 7/20/2002: During the coming depression, which is in fact in place but denied by the media and powers that be, one should look to the past Great Depression as an example of things to come. Banks were insolvent, but allowed to operate, not called in. Homeowners and businesses were insolvent, unable to pay, but not called to term, allowed to continue. The reasoning was that there was no one to buy these insolvent entities, so why discontinue their operations! Thus, those insolvent entities were allowed to continue, and gradually came back into solvency, and thus business was reestablished. During the coming crash, this will repeat itself, but with a difference. There will be no re-solvency, no new health, but the shift, instead.

Food Riots

The rising price of rice, worldwide, has sparked foot riots in some countries. Rice is unique in that it is a staple for half the world's population - the poorest half.

Rice Jumps as Africa Joins Race for Supplies
April 4, 2008
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/

Rice prices rose more than 10 per cent on Friday to a fresh all-time high as African countries joined south-east Asian importers in the race to head off social unrest by securing supplies from the handful of exporters still selling the grain in the international market. The rise in prices - 50 per cent in two weeks - threatens upheaval and has resulted in riots and soldiers overseeing supplies in some emerging countries, where the grain is a staple food for about 3bn people. India's trade minister, said the government would crack down on hoarding of essential commodities to keep a lid on food prices.

 

City Dwellers Priced Out of the Market
April 4, 2008
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/

Yeshi Degefu stopped eating meat about a year ago. Vegetables followed soon and, more recently, chickpeas and lentils. Today, Mrs Yeshi, 50, of Addis Ababa, queues for subsidised wheat, the only food she can still afford. Mrs Yeshi is caught up in a food crisis that is hitting the urban population rather than the rural poor, the group that has in the past faced the greatest threat of hunger. This time, the problem is not a shortage of food but its price. Urban populations are more likely to protest, triggering riots which in Africa have already hit Burkina Faso and Senegal.

Per the Zetas, riots are occurring because a new class of people is being distressed - the formerly well fed.

ZetaTalk Explanation 4/5/2008: Acute food shortages are in the news, as are the rising prices that accompany shortages. We have predicted that in the years leading into the pole shift that crop shortages would occur, worldwide. Where this became evident in the year 2000, as documented by Nancy in her Shortage TOPIC within Troubled Times, these shortages did not make major headlines because stocks of grain and other staples were on hand. Now, the stocks are depleted, or nearly so. Where the price of wheat, corn, and soybeans has been rising in step with shortfalls, riots did not occur until shortages and price increases for rice occurred. Rice is a staple for half the world's population, primarily the poorest half, and thus this shortage is touching desperation. Rice was one of the cheapest foods for this populace, and now must be replaced by more expensive items or starvation looms.

The reaction of various governments to their starving populace is varied. Some are buying what stocks of rice they can secure and forcing price controls among the merchants distributing these stocks. Others are merely reacting to riots with traditional riot control. The poor in many of these countries have always suffered at near starvation levels, with little sympathy from the authorities who expect the starving to fade away quietly and not make a fuss. Malnutrition affects such a populace before birth, creating mental retardation and a poor start in life for the newborn. Malnutrition among the young stunts growth, particularly growth of the brain, exacerbating mental retardation. Thus deprived of an ability to earn a good living except by manual labor, which their stunted bodies can scarcely enable, those affected by chronic starvation hardly notice when their poor diet is diminished further.

It is the reasonably well fed who are being heard from during the recent food riots. Those who are not retarded or stunted, and have been able to enjoy a varied diet previously. The first reaction to rising food prices is to carve expensive treats from the menu. The second reaction is to alter the daily fare to emphasize inexpensive staples - a diet more dull but affordable. When inexpensive staples like rice rise or double in price these households must trim other expenses from their budget - less travel, clothing, and entertainment. In many cases, the household moves from being economically viable and in the black to running in the red, running into debt. Arguments ensue, and demands that the government do something about the situation is part of the argument. Tempers are at the trigger point, so that some trivial argument at the food market can spark a riot. This class of citizen - the formerly well fed - does not slide quietly or quickly into the stance of their chronically starved neighbors. They know about the underclass, the chronically underfed, but have never imagined themselves forced into these straits. In horror, they see themselves unable to afford enough food for good health, despite cutting back all budgetary items possible, so panic is just under the surface and explodes into hysteria with every rise in food prices.

What are governments to do when a formerly quiet portion of the populace becomes noisy and hysterical? Price controls are one avenue, but even with price controls the shortages will continue and increase due to the worsening weather extremes we have so long predicted. In the US, soup kitchens are threatened as the US government cuts back on handouts of surplus food items. There are no surplus items, or they are fast disappearing. New rules are likely to be instituted everywhere. Those who are obese will be encouraged to diet, perhaps given only vitamin pills and minimum protein such as a few boiled eggs per day. Grains fed to cattle will be diverted to human consumption. All idle fields will be put into production. And of course price control instituted to prevent panic among those who can no longer afford to buy food. But in those countries where such measures cannot be instituted because there simply is not enough food to go around, riot control will be used. Those who ignored their chronically underfed neighbors, the underclass they took for granted were always beneath them, will now join them, a type of karma, so to speak.

Global Cooling

What's this? 2008 will see the globe's temperatures set back to 1998 levels?

Global Warming 'Dips this Year'
April 4, 2008
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7329799.stm

Global temperatures will drop slightly this year due to the cooling effect of the La Nina current in the Pacific, UN meteorologists have said. The World Meteorological Organization's secretary-general, Michel Jarraud, told the BBC it was likely that La Nina would continue into the summer. This would mean global temperatures have not risen since 1998, prompting some to question climate change theory. But experts say we are still clearly in a long-term warming trend - and they forecast a new record high temperature within five years. The WMO points out that the decade from 1998 to 2007 was the warmest on record. Since the beginning of the 20th Century, the global average surface temperature has risen by 0.74C. La Nina and El Nino are two great natural Pacific currents whose effects are so huge they resonate round the world. El Nino warms the planet when it happens; La Nina cools it. This year, the Pacific is in the grip of a powerful La Nina. It has contributed to torrential rains in Australia and to some of the coldest temperatures in memory in snow-bound parts of China. Mr Jarraud told the BBC that the effect was likely to continue into the summer, depressing temperatures globally by a fraction of a degree. This would mean that temperatures have not risen globally since 1998 when El Nino warmed the world. A minority of scientists question whether this means global warming has peaked and argue the Earth has proved more resilient to greenhouse gases than predicted.

Global Warming has always been disputed, as the many links from this page (below) attest.

A group of scientist forming SEPP are claiming that the Earth is not getting warmer as claimed, and by late 2001 the Consensus on cause had deteriorated. NASA records from satellites and Balloon Data show a Cooling Trend resulting in a Shrinking Atmosphere and enlarging Ozone Hole, but NASA equates this to Trapped Heat a Snow Cover is reduced. The Riddle remains unsolved, while the Pace of Change and Warming Trend per NOAA are on the uptick and Wildlife adjust. There is debate over the role of CO2, the Sun's Influence, or Human Induced factors. A major flaw in the Computer Model used was discovered, casting doubt on the projections, and the IPCC also disagrees. Evidence of Past Swings and Rapid Swings in the climate, based on Ice Core samples, is ignored. If Ozone destruction is the cause, odd that Shuttle Damage is allowed to continue and a Bush Retreat on Kyoto! Other scientists see the Sun as the Cause, as Neptune's Moon, Triton, is also warming. Another theory points to the heating oceans associated with each El Nino being caused by underwater Volcanism along the Ocean Floor. The globe is in fact heating up from the Core of the Earth, the Ocean Warming. The Debate continues. What is clear is that there is an increased El Nino Frequency, the Hottest Year on record, increased Nighttime Heat, Thinning Ozone layers, melting Polar Ice and Mountain Ice. The potential impact on society brings a UN Warning and Climate Change dangers. Spy Satellite photos are helpful.

If El Nino is pointed to as the culprit in Global Warming, then human activity is not the cause. El Nino has been increasing for the past few hundred years, regularly.

OPEC/EE/ U.S. Department Of Energy
October 27, 1997

At the University of Houston, Texas, Dr. Wellington studies the El Nino phenomenon. In particular the effect of global warming and El Nino. "I suspect that global warming is exacerbating the El Nino phenomenon, but we all know now there is a link." says Wellington. Data from his research shows that since 1970 El Ninos have been occurring every 2.2 years, up from every 3.4 around 1870, every 4.5 year around 1750, and every six years in the late 1600's. The data was obtained from coral growth rings from the Galapagos Islands, where the coral are particularly sensitive to water temperature from El Nino.

El Nino, at its base, is caused by underwater volcanic activity in Indonesia!

According to Dr. Charles Pyke, El Nino specialist, increased volcanic activity (on land as well as on ocean floor) is characteristic of an El Nino year.

This fits the Zeta's description of what is causing the heating up of the planet under the influence of the approaching Planet X.

ZetaTalk Explanation 6/15/1996: In an effort to avoid admitting that the cataclysms are approaching, the establishment throws out alternative explanations. The weather is blamed on global warming, the greenhouse effect, which in and of itself might be an explanation that would hold if weather were the only symptom. It is the heat from the core of the earth and the increased earthquake and volcanic activity that boggles these attempts at alternative explanations. In no way would the public accept a statement that warmer air is heating up the core of the Earth. Heat rises, and cold air drops, and for the core of the Earth to heat up under an influence from the surface, the surface would have to be warmer than the core, which clearly is not the case.

You received this Newsletter because you subscribed to the ZetaTalk Newsletter service. If undesired, you can quickly Unsubscribe.