Shortage?! Famine?! Not Likely, But...

 

Whenever I complain about the high prices of food, I'm told to keep quiet as the worst is yet to come. Shortage and even Famine are next.

I already notice shortage, but not of essentials. We still got plenty of bread, milk, eggs, fish, veggies; yet... being a country  based on import, we should worry. Covid and Ukraine are not without global consequences. It is well-known that epidemics and war disrupt both the production and  distribution of food, through damage to production means and transportation routes.

Of course, there are always the usual causes such as population growth and natural calamities ( drought, flooding, cold weather, etc..). We cannot control natural causes,  but we could prevent shortage and famine by trying to prevent war,  fighting epidemics, and especially giving high priority to local production of food.

Our government does little  to encourage local agriculture and industry. It appears, so far, to have supported the importers in their making big money - buying cheap, selling expensive.

I always  check the labels on products - and it makes me sad. Most of them are imported. It's more profitable for the big firms (like our Elite coffee firm) to import  stuff rather than  produce it locally. However, it's not only the cost that matters, but also the food security. There's no such security if the country depends on outer sources. It is a well-known fact, and yet highly ignored.

Anyway, let's hope for no shortage, for sane prices  ,and for increase in local production of food .

Zero Tolerance

 

It seems China's handling Covid rather well. The key to that, lies, I suppose. in its people's discipline.

We all know that without discipline nothing good and lasting can be achieved ; not in schools, not in the army, not at work...nowhere. 

The disciplined population, helps China successfully practice the strategy of zero tolerance towards the virus. 

This strategy includes: mass testing, quarantine, surveillance, localized lock-downs, and more.  A sporadic outbreak is immediately dealt with lock-down to prevent further spreading of the virus. China' s trying to achieve zero infection while elsewhere, in the Western world, people are getting used  'to live with the virus', vaccines and boosters. 

(The Chinese are not too confident about the effectiveness of the vaccines to prevent infection. They believe, as we do, vaccinated people might still contract covid, but perhaps won't have to go to hospital).

The zero tolerance policy is also part of the Chinese narrative to claim superiority of their system (political, medical, social etc...) over the West. They would like us to believe through the pandemic that China could "conquer" the West with no tanks, rockets, or the nuke - but with a tiny virus. 

After all, the virus started its 'activity' in one of China's towns, Wuhan, and according to one of the theories - in the town's laboratory - specialized in coronas, and which belongs to the Wuhan Institute of Virology.  The lab,  a 40 minutes drive from the Huan Market where the first infection was spotted,  could have been engaged in a possible testing of a biological weapon . So who  knows?!