40-Year Cycle Climate Swings
10/28/15 INSIIDE Track: Outlook 2015–2017
40-Year Cycle & Food Crises III
Little Ice Age Extremes: 40-Year Cycle
“The NASA Earth Observatory notes three particularly cold intervals; one beginning about 1650, another about 1770, and the last in 1850, each separated by intervals of slight warming.”
10/28/15 – Even NASA agrees – the 40-Year Cycle is alive and well. 1650 + 120 years = 1770; +80 years = 1850. The 1650’s, 1770’s & 1850’s are all phases of this ongoing 40-Year Cycle – reinforcing the potential for another extreme in the 2010’s (this one is more likely to be an extreme in warmth, like the 1930’s and even 1890’s).
Reinforcing the synergy of the 2010’s, an overarching 120-Year Cycle – a trio of 40-Year Cycles with increased significance – concurs. It connects the 1650’s cold & famine (which began an extreme period of low solar activity until the early-1700’s), the 1770’s cold & the 1890’s warmth (initial peak of warming, 40 years from the end of the Little Ice Age in the 1850’s) – with global drought & famines – and the 2010’s (expected peak in warmth – a type of 120-Year low-low-high-(high) Cycle Progression in temperature extremes. IT
Voracious Worm Evolves to Eat Biotech Corn Engineered to Kill It
“After years of predicting it would happen — and after years of having their suggestions largely ignored by companies, farmers and regulators — scientists have documented the rapid evolution of corn rootworms that are resistant to Bt corn…Bt corn now accounts for three-quarters of the U.S. corn crop. The vulnerability of this corn could be disastrous…
First planted in 1996, Bt corn quickly became hugely popular among U.S. farmers…By the turn of the millennium, however, scientists who study the evolution of insecticide resistance were warning of imminent problems. Any rootworm that could survive Bt exposures would have a wide-open field in which to reproduce; unless the crop was carefully managed, resistance would quickly emerge. Key to effective management, said the scientists, were refuges set aside and planted with non-Bt corn…
But the scientists’ own recommendations…that a full 50 percent of each corn farmer’s fields be devoted to these non-Bt refuges…were resisted by seed companies and eventually the EPA itself, which set voluntary refuge guidelines at between 5 and 20 percent. Many farmers didn’t even follow those recommendations.
Fast forward to 2009, when Gassmann responded to reports of extensive rootworm damage in Bt cornfields in northeast Iowa. Populations there had become resistant to one of the three Bt corn varieties…He described that resistance in a 2011 study; around the same time, reports of rootworm-damaged Bt corn came in from parts of Illinois, Minnesota, Nebraska and South Dakota. These didn’t represent a single outbreak, but rather the emergence, again and again, of resistance…
Entomologist Bruce Tabashnik of the University of Arizona called Bt resistance “an increasingly serious problem,” and said that refuge sizes need to be increased dramatically and immediately. He and other scientists have pushed the EPA to double current refuge requirements, but so far without success. “Biotech companies have successfully lobbied EPA for major reductions in refuge requirements,” said Tabashnik…In addition to increasing refuge sizes, farmers also need to vary the crops planted on their fields, rather than planting corn season after season, said Gassmann. Breaks in the corn cycle naturally disrupt rootworm populations, but the approach fell from favor as the high price of corn made continuous planting appealing.
“Continuous corn is the perfect habitat for rootworm,” said Gassmann…Rootworm resistance was expected from the outset, but the Bt seed industry, seeking to maximize short-term profits, ignored outside scientists. The next pest-fighting trait “will fall under the same pressure,” said Shields, “and the insect will win.”
10-28-15: A simple Google search of ’Bt Corn resistance’ provides a laundry list of credible, corroborating reports & documents addressing this single, festering problem. This is just one example of potential issues in our food production industry – that are nearing a tipping point.
In March 2015, CNBC produced a similar report. From a cycle perspective, let’s review this ‘recipe for disaster’:
1 – Take crop devastation in the late-1930’s (Dust Bowl) & add a 40-Year Cycle until a new Food Crisis.
2 – Mandate ’fencerow to fencerow’ planting in the 1970’s and begin a new 40-Year Cycle.
3 – Midway through that cycle (likely time for reinforcing events) – in 1996 – create a genetically-modified corn that now has the pesticide IN each kernel of corn – where there is no chance for it to be rinsed off during food preparation or to have the sun gradually mitigate its toxicity – and entice farmers with this technological miracle, steadily seducing them to abandon almost all other variations of corn on the way to a virtual monopoly. (As of 2014, 80% of US corn is Bt corn, as opposed to 29% in 2003… creating a homogeny & uniformity that is VERY precarious in agriculture.)
4 – Ignore all natural principles & tendencies – of pests or diseases to mutate into a ’super-pest’ or ‘super-disease’ – and invest massive time & money into fighting common-sense farming practices that could prevent a potential disaster.
5 – Now, add the remaining half of the 40-Year Cycle and allow time for mutation to intensify. While that is steadily incubating, continue to fight any attempts at preventative practices that might hurt the short-term ‘bottom line’ (after all, once this manufactured problem creates a crisis, there will be demand for a new ‘technological miracle’ to combat it).
6 – After the appropriate amount of time (2016/2017), open the incubator and see what you have.”
Food Crisis Cycles focus on 2016/2017 for significant shift… leading to escalating challenges in 2016–2021. El Nino-related drought AND flooding (soil erosion??) expected to increase challenges in South America & California/US. As warming cycles intensify (into 2019/2020??), super-pests become greater threat.