Agricultural Revolution

by Danielle Stephens

We have done blogs in the past about sustainability, commodity prices, future food sources and shortages, and what it all means to farm owners and employees.

Doing more research on the subject has been most interesting, and one of the best sources of long-term outlooks has been McKinsey & Co., a recognized expert in future planning, and not just for the agriculture industry, but for all business.

McKinsey recently published two interesting articles, one entitled “A New Era for Commodities” and the second entitled “The Next Agro-Industrial Revolution.” Of paramount importance (facts we all know but bear repeating):

• Over 200 years ago, Thomas Malthus wrote that growing populations would eventually die out due to starvation, pestilence, or war. The Industrial Revolution disproved his theories---or as we increasingly hear, maybe just postponed them.
• In the past century, commodity prices continually declined on a constant dollar basis because of better efficiencies and discovery of new sources. In the last decade however, commodity prices have steadily increased, and show no signs of later decreases.
• In food commodities, increasing populations, growing middle classes, reduced land availability, reduced water, and slowing productivity increases will exacerbate shortages and keep prices high on a relative basis.

We encourage our readers to go to both McKinsey sites. They are quick reading.

While knowledge of the facts and theories is critical, of more importance is “What do we do with the information and how do we increase opportunity and decrease risk?”

At Scythe & Spade, one of our company goals is that all team members keep abreast of industry developments and know how to improve productivity while reducing costs. I am personally reminded of a book written by Andy Grove, former CEO of Intel Corporation, entitled “Only the Paranoid Survive.” Fear is a great motivator and forces continual improvement.

Comments

[Windsor]

This is an Excellent information for anyone is the farming industry . Pls give me some basic information about farm and agriculture tool.