NO FUEL.

[bigpaul]

American site, subject as above. http://apocalypticsurvivalguide.com/scen...o-fuel.php

[Sunna]

if all the city folk took off for rural areas we would be f!!!ed , we canot support them all the land has owners the uks far to small to feed us all .
a true nightmare if this was to happen .

[Straight Shooter]

already got 2 mountain bikes , will be making a sled/trailer as suggested in one of S13s posts ,the one thing for sure is we will need to have some method of getting about and bringing back supplies of wood and stuff also going to make a hand cart .

[Tigs]

(19 September 2013, 19:04)Sunna Wrote: if all the city folk took off for rural areas we would be f!!!ed , we canot support them all the land has owners the uks far to small to feed us all .
a true nightmare if this was to happen .

erm! the fact is we once did feed ourselves , the fact is we became reliant on cheaper imports and EEC subsidises to cut over production of food , the simple fact is we could produce a hell of a lot more food but don't as its not financially viable to do so ( just look at the size of the food mountains the EEC have, reduced by giving it away free to developing nations even during a recession while its own people go hungry!! )

[Lightspeed]

Poorly written article.

If fuel runs out, food supply chain grinds to a halt. Gas for heating, cooking and electricity generation also ceasees to be available.

Relcation to the countryside wil only be possible for a small part of the population...and how will they travel there anyway?

As Tigs stated, we used to feed ourselves but the population was far smaller when we were able to do this. We can no longer support the current population by home grown and raised food.

[Stevew]

at the out break of ww2 the population of uk was about 47m and we relied heavily on food imports then, as of july 2012 the population stood at 63m and we only produce 52% of our own food! and that number would drop alot without oil for machinery and then theres all the live stock feed thats imported! there would be a lot of hungry people if the oil tap turned off!

[bigpaul]

we can only feed 25% of the UK population from the land mass available in this country, this includes allotments, parks and the like. with no petro chemicals, fertiliser etc this would drop even further as a lot of AGRIBUSINESSES rely on MONO cropping, this needs huge amounts of chemicals to make the crop grow, post collapse this would cease to be available and this land would become INFERTILE to the old fashioned farming methods.

[Lightspeed]

(20 September 2013, 09:00)bigpaul Wrote: we can only feed 25% of the UK population from the land mass available in this country, this includes allotments, parks and the like. with no petro chemicals, fertiliser etc this would drop even further as a lot of AGRIBUSINESSES rely on MONO cropping, this needs huge amounts of chemicals to make the crop grow, post collapse this would cease to be available and this land would become INFERTILE to the old fashioned farming methods.

Good point BP, it could take many years for the land to regain its natural fertility. That's cost of intensive farming that I hadn't considered.

Even simple stuff like cows shit in fields has changed. Have you noticed the big reduction in the number of field mushrooms that you find? that's down to the systemic use of antibiotics in cattle feed.

Ughhh!

[bigpaul]

(20 September 2013, 09:22)Lightspeed Wrote: Good point BP, it could take many years for the land to regain its natural fertility. That's cost of intensive farming that I hadn't considered.

we used to see it a lot when we lived in Somerset, the SAME crop grown in the SAME field, year after year after year. the only way that is possible is by copious amounts of ARTIFICIAL fertiliser and pesticides.

[John]

(20 September 2013, 09:28)bigpaul Wrote:

(20 September 2013, 09:22)Lightspeed Wrote: Good point BP, it could take many years for the land to regain its natural fertility. That's cost of intensive farming that I hadn't considered.

we used to see it a lot when we lived in Somerset, the SAME crop grown in the SAME field, year after year after year. the only way that is possible is by copious amounts of ARTIFICIAL fertiliser and pesticides.

One or two THOUGHTS.
Would have to go back to crop rotation.
No fuel would mean only be able to supply to nearer area. Don't know about feeding cities which leads to thoughts on how to pay for stuff.
Some would be able to use compost to help the ground but that would probably be limited.

But biggest point that we should consider and has already been correctly made is that we would only be able to feed about 25%, may be less, number of people we have at present in this country.
May even have to revert to more of an agrarian culture as food spent on feeding animals may be better feeding humans.

JUST THOUGHTS.