Jim Rogers: Brace Yourself For Food Shortages, Thanks To The Banks Hoarding Cash

The Business Insider ^ | 1/15/10 | Vincent Fernando

[FromLori]

Jim Rogers is sounding the alarm -- buy agricultural commodities ahead of the riots. The financial crisis has cut off investment in agriculture, with many farmers unable to get loans for fertilizer according to Mr. Rogers. Of course, this means agricultural commodities will make a killing:

CNBC: "Sometimes in the next few years we're going to have very serious shortages of food everywhere in the world and prices are going to go through the roof."

Cotton and coffee are good buys because they are very distressed, while sugar, despite the fact that it has gone up a lot, is still down 70 percent from its all-time high, according to Rogers.

"I don't think that the problems of the world are behind us yet," he said.

Starting at 1:30 in the video:

[GeronL]

The banks are not hoarding cash they are loaning it all to government. Buying bonds. Then borrowing more from the federal reserve at .25% and buying bonds at 3%.

There is a wild man in charge and this is the safest bet they could find.

[FromLori]

ping

related

http://thepacker.com/Freeze-to-cause—significant—vegetable-price-increases/Article.aspx?articleid=975156&authorid=1662&categoryid=122&feedid=215&src=top

http://thepacker.com/Freeze-destroys-much-of-Florida-s-tomato-crop/Article.aspx?articleid=975082&categoryid=122&feedid=215&src=top

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/gardening/features/6809275.html

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2428855/posts

[FromLori]

I posted it because of the food aspect and have posted some additional links about price hikes coming you might want to look at.

[NewJerseyJoe]

P4L

[MtnClimber]

Interesting story. Jim Rogers usually has good insight. Another good reason to have your own garden and to can your own food!

[opentalk]

US Farmers Plant Fewest Wheat Acres Since 1913

This article also indicates concern.

A government report shows the nation's farmers planted the fewest winter wheat acres this season since 1913.

The Agriculture Department reported Tuesday that the total acres of winter wheat for 2010 is 37.1 million acres, down 14 percent nationwide from last year.

The agency blames poor weather, low prices and the late row crop harvest for the decrease

[GeronL]

I am just saying it’s not the banks, its the government; the consequences are the same though.

[Mr. Lucky]

This is a good sign. Wheat is planted in the United States largely in spite of market forces, not in response to them.

Farmers' shifting production from very heavily subsidized wheat planting to crops demanded by the marketplace should be a cause for celebration, not whining.

[Constitutions Grandchild]

I can attest that this is true. Hubby does marketing for Monsanto — the farmers can’t buy if there are no loans. We don’t eat, if they can’t buy and plant. Even if they plant and can’t buy fertilizer and pest control (which is an astronomical cost), the yields will be far less and there will be less to go around.

[opentalk]

not whining.

not whining, just sharing info.

[Kartographer]

Also the government no longer has stores of surplus grains. All such were emptied a couple years ago and are not being built back up. Though you will find a good number of Freepers that agree with that decision I for one say that it was a bad one. Just like the Strategic Reserves that the government keeps for a number of (in case of war commodities such as the Strategic Petroleum Reserve)food is just as important if not more so.

[MattinNJ]

I am the last guy you would think would have his own garden and would can food. I live in Joisey for God's sake. However, I am very fortunate to live in a rural part of the state and have over an acre of very fertile land on a ridgeline that gets a ton of precipitation and slow snow melt.

I will plant my first garden next year to start to learn how to do it-figure there is a learning curve. I guess I will need to stock up on fertilizer and some sort of chemicals to preserve the crop. It would be the ultimate in irony for me to plant a garden, have a crisis happen, and then have the harvest wiped out by a disease or insects.

[WKUHilltopper]

“The banks are not hoarding cash they are loaning it all to government. Buying bonds. Then borrowing more from the federal reserve at .25% and buying bonds at 3%.”

You got that right. Exactly what the Feds want to happen—and then Obama bitches about them making profits.

[GeronL]

All of that is true, but its not the banks. The banks know they will be punished further if they don’t cought it up and buy more bonds. They know this government will do what it can to put them “fat cat bankers” out of business, they minimize risk, in their view, by buying government debt.

The government knows that they need to sell more bonds in order to spend more debt. The fed loans it to the banks at .25% and they buy bonds at 3%, giving the government mo’ money. Government is wasting it and stealing it.

The result is the same, of course. No loans.

[NeoCaveman]

Everything is being crashed, on purpose.

[unkus]

ping

[Mr. Lucky]

My frustration was not with you, but rather New York financial pundits who pretend to be experts on farming.

[Steamburg]

The banks are not hoarding cash they are loaning it all to government. Buying bonds. Then borrowing more from the federal reserve at .25% and buying bonds at 3%.

There is a wild man in charge and this is the safest bet they could find.

---

Truth in a nutshell. We have nothing but amateur Marxists and Fascists running this government. Even they don’t have a clue which totalitarian direction to go.

[griswold3]

Ding!