Steven Collins
May 2, 2008
My previous blog addressed the growing global food crisis, and there is more news to share on this developing story. The May 2, 2008 issue of the USA Today had a major article entitled “Surplus US Food Supplies Dry Up” (see first link below). Many media stories have appeared recently about the wheat and rice shortages in many nations, but it is now also clear that the USA has little or no wheat reserves itself.
The article noted that from a high of over 800 million bushels of reserve wheat in the 1980s, the USA now has only 24 million bushels of wheat in its Department of Agriculture what supply. The USDA’s Undersecretary Mark Keenum is quoted as saying “Our cupboard is bare.” The American Bakers Association is cited as estimating that the USA has only a “24 day supply of wheat.” The article also observed that “prices of wheat, corn, rice and other staples have doubled or tripled” around the world. An earlier USA Today article on April 23, 2008 (“Food Costs a Major Worry”) reported that “46% of [Americans] say higher food prices have caused a hardship” already.
The May 5, 2008 issue of Newsweek magazine ran an article entitled “Now It’s the $6 Loaf of Bread” (see second link below) which had the alarming observation that the “UN…says that hunger has reached a crisis level in all the 121 poorest countries it has recently surveyed.” It reports that part of the reason for the developing shortages are “crop failures in Ukraine” and a drought which has “wiped out Australia’s once vast rice production.” There is another reason why the global wheat shortage could get worse very quickly.
Africa’s wheat crops have been ravaged by a wheat virus called Ug99, but that plant disease has now spread to Iran and is threatening wheat drops in the Middle East as well as throughout East-, Central- and South-Asia (see third link below). If this wheat plant disease spreads to many more nations, the global wheat crisis will get much worse and bread prices will soar even higher. There is even a report that this wheat disease may already be in Pakistan’s wheat fields and that “China started a crash program to breed resistance [to Ug99] into Chinese wheat varieties” (see fourth link below).
Revelation 6:6-7 prophesied that global food shortages and high food costs would be another sign that the end of our current age is approaching. Food shortages and rapid food price hikes are now, indeed, coming to pass on a global scale. If this were the only sign of the latter days coming to pass, it could be written off as a coincidence. However, all the biblical prophecies about the latter days are coming to pass in the modern world now. You are invited to read my article “Are We Living in the Biblical Latter-Days?” at the articles link at this website for a comprehensive examination of the biblical prophecies about the latter days which are coming to pass in our modern world. The numerous fulfillments of biblical prophecies in our modern world confirm that the Bible is exactly what it purports to be: the inspired Word of a Creator Being who is well-able to guide world events to make sure his prophecies come to pass.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/2008-05-01-usda-food-supply_N.htm
http://www.newsweek.com/id/134311
http://www.payvand.com/news/08/mar/1297.html
