The bet on food

We know about climate change’s undeniable reality. We assume it can lead to a civilization collapse. Yet, we still fail to come up with the required precautions. At the time of deciding to rescue entire industries from the economic consequences of a historical pandemic, it is of the essence to ask ourselves how to move our chips.

Dilemmas

For the last century, we have been operating mostly under economic growth conditions. In the West, this prosperity has been a tide raising most boats, positively affecting human life longevity and life quality.

The use of energy in the form of fossil fuels (coal, oil and gas) powered this economic growth, driving the industrial and technological revolution that followed.

Today, the negative externalities of our system such as biosphere destruction and climate change are pressing us to reconsider the way we operate an economic system based on growth. It represents a complex challenge for multiple reasons. First, growth has been powered by fossil energy, the use of which is embedded in every corner of our living environment. Secondly, growth is an essential feature of the current system — leaving us vulnerable to economic contractions that expose society to violent tensions. Last but not least, the majority of humanity needs more economic growth to reach an acceptable standard of living. We are caught between the prospect of social tensions due to economic contraction and the imperative to transit to a sustainable system to avoid a long-term ecological catastrophe.

To solve this dilemma, politicians are putting forward so-called “Green Deals” — decoupling economic growth from the use of earth resources, powered by a carbon-free, renewable source of energy while driving economic prosperity along the way. Keep growing but sustainably by doing “More from Less” as Andrew McAffe puts it. However, can we really reorganize resources and energy flows in time and at the required scale to bend the curve of climate change and biosphere destruction? This seems to be a very hard enterprise. As Vaclav Smil (the most diligent expert on the topic of energy and the author of “Growth”) explains, a fast decoupling of the resources and the economic output is not realistic according to the first law of ecology “Everything is connected to everything else ‘’. Therefore, everything has an ecological cost. Smil points out that we have been successful in relative dematerialization of things at a unit level but we have been very bad at absolute dematerialization and decarbonization at the global level. Electric cars are a good example of these trade-offs dictated by the rules of ecology: energy is needed in the form of electricity instead of fuel and we still need raw materials to produce batteries, just different ones than for a diesel engine.

Against (our) nature

“The real problem of humanity is the following: we have paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions, and god-like technology” (Edward O. Wilson).

God-like technologies: For the last centuries, we have been progressively turning from religion to science to explain the world through the scientific method. As Descartes wrote, we like to think of ourselves as “masters and possessors of Nature”. We envision more science and more technology as the only way out, as a natural path for humanity.

Medieval institutions: The individuals running our organizational structures are generally incentivized to pursue the status quo, keeping power in a few hands and holding to it at the top. They generally discount long-term consequences to prioritize short-term wins to maintain their position. This makes existing social structures extremely hard to reform.

Paleolithic emotions: As humans, our differential advantages lie in our capacity for mass-cooperation. It successfully led us to the top of the food chain. However, we hardly feel empathy for individuals and nations to which we are distant from. In that regard, collectively acting to prevent a threat to the future unborn generations of strangers seems impossible for us.

A bet

In the 17th century, the French polymath Blaise Pascal proposed a bet to all the skeptics of God’s existence: if God doesn’t exist, the ones who believe and the ones who don’t believe won’t lose anything or at least not much. However, if God exists, the believer will get paradise in heaven and the non-believer will rot in hell for eternity. Any rational person should, therefore, bet on its existence… Framing the problem as such seems unfair since it is constructed for the sole purpose of the demonstration. However, this approach has the merit to guide a rational choice in a situation of uncertainty where crucial outcomes are at stake.

Let’s try to clarify alternatives and costs in our case. Let’s first assume that we can escape the same development pattern of bacteria (one of the most ancient and basic life forms on Earth) in a resources-limited environment: population develops exponentially until it reaches a plateau and, due to lack of nutrients, declines to extinction. If we are not doomed as bacteria are, the outcome of a civilization collapse is not an acceptable outcome. Therefore, any rational person should anticipate and act to avoidance. Since we don’t yet know if it is possible to decouple our footprint from economic prosperity fast enough to avoid catastrophe, we should rationally and collectively bet on a “back-up”, especially if it has no to very limited costs to implement.

Brilliant entrepreneurs are hedging our bets as if they have already accepted our failure on Earth. They are racing for space conquest: escape a single planet or displace the negative externalities of our production in space. In both of these cases, the amount of energy required and the prospect of any reachable habitable environment with the currently understood law of physics makes this strategy questionable. In particular in view of the few decisive decades left to reverse our impact on Earth’s capacity. Discounting the power of innovation is also wrong since paradigm-changing breakthroughs in physics with revolutionary applications are always possible. However, counting on them in the short term seems reckless at best and foolish at worst.

Food

For most of our past as a species, we have been focusing solely on food: hunting/gathering or producing it. Accessibility to food remains the primary concern for billions of people on Earth, every single day. In a less hospitable climate with a growing world population, betting on a resilient food system is a survival strategy and therefore a necessary bet, a true “back-up”.

The good news is that we can implement it today without any further technological breakthroughs. We know how to produce food with agro-ecological methods such as agroforestry that are stocking carbon in the soil while regenerating biodiversity. We know how to create small-scale highly diversified organic farming operations, removing fossil fuel from the equation by using solar power. We know how to transform food products to offer meat-alternatives, distribute effectively via traceable supply chains and incentivize responsible consumption patterns to reduce food waste in order to release pressure on production yields.

Last but not least, a resilient food system will generate positive externalities such as carbon sequestration, better nutrition, health benefits and meaningful social interactions.

Above the weeds

Generally, complex problems call for nuanced solutions even if these are rarely the best vectors for political fame. Given what is at stake, knowing that food demand will increase by 50% in the next 30 years and that carbon emission should be at least halved in this sector, we should consider all credible solutions on the menu. No matter if they are “low” or “high”- tech, no matter if they come from liberals or conservatives. It is time to transcend debates. We should critically look at simple but holistic solutions and reform legal systems to implement those while ensuring social cohesion. To build a sustainable future, we will have to choose recipes from all sides — orienting our choices with social fairness to achieve ecological prosperity. We should build capacities to rely on local and decentralized systems while collaborating globally. Ultimately, if we fail at transforming our economic system and face civilization collapse, we will have a mean of subsistence. We can’t debate another decade and need to place our bets, starting with food.