Food Shortages

As many doom and gloomers are arguing about the scarcity of food worldwide, we in the developed nations continue to over-consume both our planets resources and it's food supplies. We're feeling our pennies pinched by ever increasing prices at the grocery store for staples such as bread, flour, rice and we watch as the price of meat goes up accordingly (since the price of grains to raise animals goes up too).

But I want you to think about your total income for last year. Not what you reported on your taxes...what actually came into your house as income. Now figure out how much you spend on groceries in a year including snacks and eating out. Is it 10% of you income? 20%? 50%? On average in the developed nations it's under 15% and yet the country complaining the loudest in the US which spends a paltry 7% on food. I think this number is probably higher because of the food stamps program but I don't know how they came up with the results in the info I'll post in a moment. I do know that in our family it's about 25% on average but that will change as the kids grow up and leave home and as our income increases. Other large families are in the same boat as us, and we're not worse off simply because of good shopping habits and growing some of our own food. Once the farm is up and running again our food bills will be much less. Hooray!

Here's the information I'm referring to. It shows selected countries income to food dollars.

I know that cost of food isn't the whole story. These numbers don't take into account that maybe people in developed countries are spending 40% of their income on shelter as opposed to other countries where it's lower. What it DOES show though is the inequality of calories consumed. I'm guessing that the higher the number of calories, the higher the consumption of fat and sugar in junk foods. I wonder if we'll ever be able to strike a balance? Well...my diet continues. All I can do is my part.

I do believe that food shortages are something to prepare for. So today I'm planning my seed shopping for next years garden. I usually have a storage of seeds from one year to the next but since moving we're starting over again with many things. Seeds included. It's time to add them back into my food storage plans. I'll let you know what we're growing next year.

I'm trying to give up Pepsi

I'd give up Cola but I'm No Quitter! So instead I'm trying to cut down. I made the move from always diet coke or pepsi to regular and it's shockingly sweet. But it's helped me get down again from litres per day (maybe 2) to on average maybe 2 litres per week. Some days I have a lot and other days I have none. If I'm on the go and need a mental pick me up I'll have some or if I'm getting a migraine and not near my meds. But I'm really trying to cut down for both health reasons and because it gives me heartburn at about 10pm, right when I'm trying to wind down and get some sleep. So far so good. I'm not intending to give it up completely but to imbibe in moderation. I'm not substituting another soda for cola because it's not the caffeine I'm avoiding, it's all pop. All of them have sugar and other ingredients like phosphoric acid that aren't good for you. Since I'd rather drink fruit juice anyways it's not a major stretch except juice costs more and doesn't go very well with a big mac and fries :)


Here's a shocking (by today's standards) print ad for Coca Cola. So much for truth in advertising. I wonder what our dentist friend would have to say about this.

So much sugar has got to be terrible for a child's first teeth. And I've seen kids with terrible teeth just from taking a bottle with milk to bed! I can't imagine what cola would do.

I vividly remember the first time our son Chris ate sugar. It was ice cream, and my mum gave it to him. He was 7 months old and I was horrified. That was the end, I thought, of my sugar free baby. Which may seem odd to those of you who know me wel as I love sweet things. But the kids had limited sugar when they were little. Chris and Jordan first discovered that people ate sugar on cornflakes then they were at a sleepover when they were 6 and 8 years old. Now they are teenagers and for a large part they plan their own snacks but still eat whatever I'm making for dinner unless it's liver like the other night in which case Jordan opted for beans on toast. For the record, the rest of us thought it was very good served with beef gravy and lots of fluffy mashed potatoes. Mmmm.


Most of us know that a can of 355ml contains 10 tsp. of sugar, right? Only a serving of cola is not normally 355ml. It's normally double that or more.

The recommended daily intake of sugar is 10 tsp. for an average person so one can of pop is it. No pudding or cake, no sweet sauces, no fruit. And that hardly leads to a healthy diet does it? That's why people drink diet pop, so they can have dessert! But it's also loaded with chemicals and artificial sweeteners, none of which are foods found in nature.


But pop has been around for a long time right? And now that there's no cocaine in cola it's not so bad for you right? WRONG!! You don't need the cocaine to get a high, that's what the sugar is for. Check out the infographic below and see the short term affects from only one can of coke. I'll print some text below for yo to follow along too.

• In The First 10 minutes: 10 teaspoons of sugar hit your system. (100% of your recommended daily intake.) You don’t immediately vomit from the overwhelming sweetness because phosphoric acid cuts the flavor allowing you to keep it down.
• 20 minutes: Your blood sugar spikes, causing an insulin burst. Your liver responds to this by turning any sugar it can get its hands on into fat. (There’s plenty of that at this particular moment)
• 40 minutes: Caffeine absorption is complete. Your pupils dilate, your blood pressure rises, as a response your livers dumps more sugar into your bloodstream. The adenosine receptors in your brain are now blocked preventing drowsiness.
• 45 minutes: Your body ups your dopamine production stimulating the pleasure centers of your brain. This is physically the same way heroin works, by the way.
• >60 minutes: The phosphoric acid binds calcium, magnesium and zinc in your lower intestine, providing a further boost in metabolism. This is compounded by high doses of sugar and artificial sweeteners also increasing the urinary excretion of calcium.
• >60 Minutes: The caffeine’s diuretic properties come into play. (It makes you have to pee.) It is now assured that you’ll evacuate the bonded calcium, magnesium and zinc that was headed to your bones as well as sodium, electrolyte and water.
• >60 minutes: As the rave inside of you dies down you’ll start to have a sugar crash. You may become irritable and/or sluggish. You’ve also now, literally, pissed away all the water that was in the Coke. But not before infusing it with valuable nutrients your body could have used for things like even having the ability to hydrate your system or build strong bones and teeth.

So that's why I'm cutting down on the soda. Plain and simple. I don't want the caffeine withdrawl headache for 10 days so I'm cutting back slowly and that's how people wean themselves off tea and coffee too. I thought you might find it interesting if you've been thinking about eliminating pop yourself. I know that a lot of you don't drink soda, this is for those of us that do. It's just one of the ongoing things I'm trying to do to be more healthy. And self sufficient people can't manufacture coke...ginger ale and root beer yes, but not cola.

And for the record...Pepsi is better than Coke!