Chinese Farmland Too Polluted for Food Production

[semipro]

It seems the Chinese are going to have to change their ways.
This may be a good lesson to those here
who would prefer our own environmental enforcement be more "laissez-faire"

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/12/30/china-environment-farmland-idUSL3N0K90OY20131230

 

[Seasoned Oak]

Wife keeps buying Frozen Tilapia labeled as coming from china. Try as i might i cant get her to stop buying this stuff. I watched a few news stories about the polluted lakes where fish are raised.

 

[legrandice]

I am sure there will be more of this to come, there is probably a lot of land that is untested and equally polluted. I am not even sure how they would go about cleaning it up.

We try to eat as much local food as possible, fortunately we have a lot available where we live.

 

[BrotherBart]

Why do I just know that this one is gonna end up in the Can someday?

 

[Seasoned Oak]

Unfortunately the only way to know what goes into your food is to grow it yourself. That includes livestock.

 

[semipro]

Wife keeps buying Frozen Tilapia labeled as coming from china. Try as i might i cant get her to stop buying this stuff. I watched a few news stories about the polluted lakes where fish are raised.

Yeah, its amazing the food stuff coming from China now. Apple juice is a biggie. That surprised me.
We also avoid any fish or produce raised in China. Its hard to find out where stuff comes from sometimes.

 

[semipro]

Why do I just know that this one is gonna end up in the Can someday?

Since a little Winter trolling cleansing was done lately I thought I'd take the chance.

 

[Highbeam]

Unfortunately the only way to know what goes into your food is to grow it yourself. That includes livestock.

I tried that with a batch of meat chickens. Well, you've got to buy feed for them and guess what? That feed is often medicated or of questionable origin. Not many animals can be raised by grazing on the lot, you've got to buy feed.

 

[begreen]

It's a serious problem for China and some other developing nations. The cost of cleaning up polluted farmland can be a 100 times that of preventing or dealing with the pollution in the first place.

 

[Slow1]

I tried that with a batch of meat chickens. Well, you've got to buy feed for them and guess what? That feed is often medicated or of questionable origin. Not many animals can be raised by grazing on the lot, you've got to buy feed.

Well, you just need to grow your own feed then! oh, and process your own fertilizer and... Nothing is as easy as it 'should' be eh?

 

[Slow1]

It's a serious problem for China and some other developing nations. The cost of cleaning up polluted farmland can be a 100 times that of preventing or dealing with the pollution in the first place.

Isn't that true for most/all things? Avoid the issue to begin with and you can save a lot of expense and trouble later.

 

[begreen]

Not saying one needs to go organic or buy from Amazon, but unmedicated feed is not that hard to get.
http://www.amazon.com/Organic-Naturally-Layer-Chicken-25lbs/dp/B0068SP1XE
http://poultry.purinamills.com/OURPRODUCTS/Products/StartGrow/default.aspx
http://www.tractorsupply.com/en/store/dumorreg%3B-chick-starter-grower-20%25-feed-50-lb?cm_vc=-10005

 

[Highbeam]

unmedicated feed is not that hard to get.

Of course not. That's not the point. You can also buy organic feed or grow your own.

The point is that standard feed brings medication, that they'll admit to, along with who knows how many other herbicides and pesticides deemed necessary for growth of the feed.

 

[begreen]

"Some" standard feed brings medication. And it costs extra for that. I think the Dumor line of feed is pretty clean, though I could be mistaken. But true that one doesn't know what hebicides or pesticides were used to grow the feed. The corn and soy are almost certainly GMO which generally means roundup resistant.

 

[Seasoned Oak]

No doubt parts of the US are equally polluted and not fit to grow food or animals.

 

[begreen]

True, but was this farmland to start with? I guess this depends on what we call polluted. I consider farmland soaked in pesticides and herbicides as polluted, so by that definition we have a lot of polluted farmland too. The difference is in the numbers. In China almost 10% of their farmland is polluted. That's really serious when you have 1.4 billion people to feed and a growing population.

 

[semipro]

I remember a professor in college stating that in countries like Russia and China many environmental contaminants are measured in parts per thousand rather than the parts per million (PPM) we use in the U.S.

 

[begreen]

Air pollution levels there are like that. India too. Dehli's or Peking's normal daily winter air pollution would have LA's needles pegged and declared a national emergency.

 

[sloeffle]

Of course not. That's not the point. You can also buy organic feed or grow your own.

The point is that standard feed brings medication, that they'll admit to, along with who knows how many other herbicides and pesticides deemed necessary for growth of the feed.

Unless you are willing to buy certified organic ( twice the cost ) or grow your own grains then you will not have much luck feeding chickens a non GM feed. Most oats and almost all wheat is non GM but I am not sure how you would be able to fully balance a chicken ration without corn.

We also did our own meat chickens ( freedom rangers ) a few years and the cost was about twice of what you can buy it for in the store. IMHO knowing where the meat and produce comes from is worth the extra $$$.

 

[semipro]

China is apparently looking to reduce vehicle usage in cities to address air pollution.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/10/china-car-sales-pollution_n_4570452.html?utm_hp_ref=green

Somewhat ironic in that at the existing air pollution levels there driving a car with modern emission controls may actually emit cleaner air than it takes in.

 

[Ehouse]

China is apparently looking to reduce vehicle usage in cities to address air pollution.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/10/china-car-sales-pollution_n_4570452.html?utm_hp_ref=green

Somewhat ironic in that at the existing air pollution levels there driving a car with modern emission controls may actually emit cleaner air than it takes in.

Someone needs to invent an engine that runs on smog.

 

[begreen]

Volvo created a radiator system that cleaned up smog several years back. They could use tech like that.

 

[Galt]

Tilapia can be raised in concentrations as high as one pound of fish per gallon. Keeping them healthy can be simplified by reducing that to one pound per two gallons. Meal worms, spirulina algae, service fly and duck weed can all be self produced using inputs like wood burning exhaust gas, fish harvest offal, and vegetable scraps. Settle out the gross solids and draw off periodically to feed garden crops. After settling out the bigger solids circulate the waste water through shallow ebb and flow beds filled with basaltic gravel and fines. Worms will establish in the gravel beds so you quickly establish a vermicultural filter/plant feeder. Vegetables planted in the basalt will reap the benefits of a wide spectrum of minerals and micro nutrients while further filtering the water. Replace 10-25% of the water each week (ideally with collected and filtered rain water) and put the whole sheebang in a greenhouse to limit environmental contamination while extending your growing season. Tilapia are tropical cichlids and won't over winter in temperate zone so they are typically harvested in about 9 months. The ratio of grow beds to tankage should probably be about four or five to one at that stocking density, so a single IBC tote with the top cut off as a tank should balance with about (14) 4'x16'x1' deep grow beds. Throw a small wood burner on one end against a radiant reflector with some fans and you're growing 365. If you can get hot water from your stove to circulate through PEX in the root zone and use a high efficiency cover like Solexx this would probably work all the way up to Canada. Add some extra water filled totes or stacked drums for additional heat storage and who knows. Feed the exhaust gas through a bio-reactor to feed the spirulina algae and you've got a 65% protien super food growing off of wood burning waste gas. With a little creative engineering a DIY'er could probably pull the whole thing off for under five grand. Finished product grows more vegetables than three or four families would need for a year, and enough Tilapia to eat a couple of pounds a week for a year in about 800 square feet of yard space. Run a few ducks in the greenhouse for slug and bug control and you get eggs and a few nice duck dinners in the bargain. If the grow beds are built on legs about hip high maybe run a Kunekune pig on the floor after planting some beetroots for them to self harvest. They also don't mind extra vegetables and scraps from the beds. Switch out some of the veggie over production for a tray based fodder system and you've got fresh greens for some laying hens all winter long. Replace the lawn with a fodder crop for a Lowline Angus and a Gurnsey and you're only goin' to the store for toilet paper. Further north maybe try striped bass or trout and add a bee hive or three just for good measure.

Just off the top of my head...