Posted on 01/15/2010 9:21:42 AM PST by FromLori
Jim Rogers is sounding the alarm -- buy agricultural commodities ahead of the riots. The financial crisis has cut off investment in agriculture, with many farmers unable to get loans for fertilizer according to Mr. Rogers. Of course, this means agricultural commodities will make a killing:
CNBC: "Sometimes in the next few years we're going to have very serious shortages of food everywhere in the world and prices are going to go through the roof."
Cotton and coffee are good buys because they are very distressed, while sugar, despite the fact that it has gone up a lot, is still down 70 percent from its all-time high, according to Rogers.
"I don't think that the problems of the world are behind us yet," he said.
Starting at 1:30 in the video:
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
The banks are not hoarding cash they are loaning it all to government. Buying bonds. Then borrowing more from the federal reserve at .25% and buying bonds at 3%.
There is a wild man in charge and this is the safest bet they could find.
ping
related
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/gardening/features/6809275.html
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2428855/posts
I posted it because of the food aspect and have posted some additional links about price hikes coming you might want to look at.
P4L
Interesting story. Jim Rogers usually has good insight. Another good reason to have your own garden and to can your own food!
This article also indicates concern.
A government report shows the nation's farmers planted the fewest winter wheat acres this season since 1913.
The Agriculture Department reported Tuesday that the total acres of winter wheat for 2010 is 37.1 million acres, down 14 percent nationwide from last year.
The agency blames poor weather, low prices and the late row crop harvest for the decrease
I am just saying it’s not the banks, its the government; the consequences are the same though.
Farmers' shifting production from very heavily subsidized wheat planting to crops demanded by the marketplace should be a cause for celebration, not whining.
I can attest that this is true. Hubby does marketing for Monsanto — the farmers can’t buy if there are no loans. We don’t eat, if they can’t buy and plant. Even if they plant and can’t buy fertilizer and pest control (which is an astronomical cost), the yields will be far less and there will be less to go around.
not whining, just sharing info.
Also the government no longer has stores of surplus grains. All such were emptied a couple years ago and are not being built back up. Though you will find a good number of Freepers that agree with that decision I for one say that it was a bad one. Just like the Strategic Reserves that the government keeps for a number of (in case of war commodities such as the Strategic Petroleum Reserve)food is just as important if not more so.
I will plant my first garden next year to start to learn how to do it-figure there is a learning curve. I guess I will need to stock up on fertilizer and some sort of chemicals to preserve the crop. It would be the ultimate in irony for me to plant a garden, have a crisis happen, and then have the harvest wiped out by a disease or insects.
“The banks are not hoarding cash they are loaning it all to government. Buying bonds. Then borrowing more from the federal reserve at .25% and buying bonds at 3%.”
You got that right. Exactly what the Feds want to happen—and then Obama bitches about them making profits.
All of that is true, but its not the banks. The banks know they will be punished further if they don’t cought it up and buy more bonds. They know this government will do what it can to put them “fat cat bankers” out of business, they minimize risk, in their view, by buying government debt.
The government knows that they need to sell more bonds in order to spend more debt. The fed loans it to the banks at .25% and they buy bonds at 3%, giving the government mo’ money. Government is wasting it and stealing it.
The result is the same, of course. No loans.
Everything is being crashed, on purpose.
ping
My frustration was not with you, but rather New York financial pundits who pretend to be experts on farming.
The banks are not hoarding cash they are loaning it all to government. Buying bonds. Then borrowing more from the federal reserve at .25% and buying bonds at 3%.
There is a wild man in charge and this is the safest bet they could find.
Ding!
I grew my first garden last year, trying to learn too. I live in the Colorado Rockies so have very rocky and poor soil. I have been composting leaves, pine needles and kitchen scraps to build up the soil in the garden areas. Your state agricultural extension office can probably recommend crops that will do well in your area and let you know about common pests to be prepared for.
What crops are farmers shifting to?
What crops are farmers shifting to?
Plus they know they can always be punished by the Dems if they don’t buy the bonds.
The Democrats can use whatever crises comes from their policies to get even more power for themselves.
The California Human-caused water shortage won’t help either. I have predicted for the last year that the government will look for a food “crisis” that they can exploit to take over food growing and distribution.
Translation: Jimmy, a guy who began his career working for George Soros, starts an Ag ETF in 2007 that is down 24%. What’s he gonna say “Please by my Ag Fund?” or “Food Fight!”. I doubt he is planting a garden in Singapore. (He gets extra credit for naming his daughters Happy and Baby Bee).
Or starving marauders.
This cant help either.
Never use leaves from walnut trees because they may contain a chemical that inhibits plant growth. Just a tip...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/2428924/posts?page=38#38
Just ask to be added to the ping list if you like. This is where I got lots of good advise for my garden.
I thought Mr. Rogers had passed.
Food shortages are common in all communist countries. You’d better get used to the idea.
ping
Matt - New Jersey is the Garden State. Good luck with your gardening adventure but don’t do what I did with my first garden: I like zucchini so much I planted 40 plants. Big mistake!
We had zucchini still hanging around in the freezer twelve years later! If I never see or taste another piece of zucchini bread it will be too soon.
LOL
Good reason to dehydrate. It lasts for 20 years or more. (If stored properly)
But farmers have moved away from intensive tillage and don't really need the wheat stubble to maintain soil tilth on their better ground. With the input cost of nitrogen drifting so high, many farmer have dropped wheat from the rotation and have gone to a corn-beans two year rotation, allowing the nitrogen carry-over from the bean crop to reduce the anhydrous ammonia required to fertilize the corn crop.
On the other hand, to the extent that taking wheat out a rotation creates a sort of vacuum in the marketplace, you can expect that vacuum to be filled by the planting of wheat on more marginal ground less suitable for soybeans and corn (which is how the marketplace should work).
You need a hot-water-bath canner for fruit and a pressure canner for vegetables and meat. Get a copy of the Ball Blue Book and plenty of jars.
Start a compost heap NOW - I don't throw so much as a cherry stem in the trash any more, it all goes in the bin. I got a really nice one at Lowe's for $50.
Raised beds (Lowe's again for landscape timbers, drill holes in the corners and hammer spikes or rebar through) will protect your garden from flooding.
I live on a third of an acre and bought almost no produce last summer, though I was a slacker about putting any up for the winter.
Or starving marauders.
They SAY you shouldn't put meat in a compost bin, but exceptions can be made. A little extra compost starter should help.
Exactly. Fertilizer has been at all time highs for the last several yrs along with seed and chems not far behind. This yr I’m planning to use poultry house cleanings instead of fertilizer. While less precise then chem fertilizer its worlds cheaper...and better for the soil in the long run. I’m also not going to buy GM or hybrid seed still under patent. While yields won’t be as good at least I’ll keep more of my $$$. his way I *might* be able to pay my taxes.
Jim Rogers is a one dimensional commodities bull. He’s been pitching sugar and coffee as an investment for the past 2 years on Fox’s Bulls and Bears.
The USDA just estimated the 2009/2010 corn and soybean crops and are expecting a surprisingly big crop. Corn prices plunged 13% in 2 days because it looks like we’ll have lots of supply. With corn prices falling, some farmers will plant more soy and wheat, which will bring those prices down as well. By the way, we grow so much excess corn in U.S., we burn 1/3 of the total crop in our cars in the form of ethanol.
Unlike oil, agriculture is a renewable resource that as we apply technology and capital, we get more and more production.
I understand and sympathize. You may find it much harder to fertilize without chemicals, but I think you’ll see what you do become a work to be very proud of. It all depends, of course, on your acreage. Large farms can’t do it, but it certainly pays to use it as much as possible.
I just suffered through paying my taxes, so it’s tough everywhere, but my only investment is the clothes I wear and the car I drive to and from work. When I tote up what a farmer puts into just showing up for work each day, I faint. ;-) Okay, I don’t faint, but my head starts to feel like it’s going to explode.
There are also a lot of well armed LEOs on the block. normally a comfort, but if they haven't prepared.....
Maybe we can all go to Haiti—and they can all come here. That’ll work!
Gardening ping?
Quite of few of my neighbors and I have gone to mostly a wheat-soybean rotation. Corn is too expensive to plant, fertilizer is way high let alone seed corn, for the price. I couldn’t plant wheat this fall because of the weather. I couldn’t get the beans off till November a lot of guys were in the same situation around here.
I no-till.
That might be good except for this:
Ug99 Fungus Threatens Wheat Crop
The Ug99 fungus, called stem rust, could wipe out more than 80% of the world’s wheat as it spreads from Africa, scientists fear. The race is on to breed resistant plants before it reaches the U.S.
The spores arrived from Kenya on dried, infected leaves ensconced in layers of envelopes.
Working inside a bio-secure greenhouse outfitted with motion detectors and surveillance cameras, government scientists at the Cereal Disease Laboratory in St. Paul, Minn., suspended the fungal spores in a light mineral oil and sprayed them onto thousands of healthy wheat plants. After two weeks, the stalks were covered with deadly reddish blisters characteristic of the scourge known as Ug99.Nearly all the plants were goners.
Crop scientists fear the Ug99 fungus could wipe out more than 80% of worldwide wheat crops as it spreads from eastern Africa. It has already jumped the Red Sea and traveled as far as Iran. Experts say it is poised to enter the breadbasket of northern India and Pakistan, and the wind will inevitably carry it to Russia, China and even North America — if it doesn’t hitch a ride with people first.
“It’s a time bomb,” said Jim Peterson, a professor of wheat breeding and genetics at Oregon State University in Corvallis. “It moves in the air, it can move in clothing on an airplane. We know it’s going to be here. It’s a matter of how long it’s going to take.”
http://jutiagroup.com/2009/07/24/ug99-fungus-threatens-wheat-crop/
Google “wheat crop failure 2009” and you will see problems in Afghanistan, Argentina, Austrailia, and the list goes on and on.
2009 wheat situation may not be a pretty picture
http://southwestfarmpress.com/grains/wheat-price-0305/
We live in the mountains of WV and use grass clippings(try to limit weeds) and scraps to compost with and fertilizer as needed. Our soil is a clay mix and not that good, it takes time to build it up. You may want to get the book, “The Encyclopedia of Country Living” It is a good resource for many things.
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