Climate concerns are being used to drive out small farmers. The target in the US is aimed at small farms and ranches. In Europe it's aimed at meat producers in Holland. If current measures get implemented, there will be less food for everyone. Especially meat will be in short supply. There will also be a lot fewer farmers. Only large corporate farms will remain.
The state is no longer hiding its disdain for small producers. Only corporate cronies are allowed to exist in the new normal that bureaucrats are dreaming of.
It follows from this that productive land isn't the safe haven that some believe it to be. Anything large enough to produce a decent income will be taxed and regulated to death. Even private yards and gardens will be regulated so as not to produce any food. However, there will always be some corner somewhere that is relatively free of regulations, so we shouldn't give up completely on the idea of self sufficiency.
I live in Portugal where there are many small farms, and I see no immediate danger of any heavy regulations to combat this. There's also a general irreverence towards nonsensical laws, and there's respect for private property. No-one would call for laws to ban people from growing food on their own property. If such laws were to be enacted nevertheless, no-one would enforce them.
However, there are other ways to drive out small farmers. Inflation and taxes can be used to crush the middle class. To avoid such attacks, small scale producers must go into the parallel economy.
My wife and I buy most of our vegetables from a small scale farmer who comes once a week with a bag of greens that we pay for in cash. My wife does this mostly because she likes the idea of organically grown greens. I'm primarily interested in the contact, and the fact that the man is operating in the parallel economy.
If cash is taken out of circulation, or destroyed by inflation, I will propose a deal to our farmer friend. I'll give him a 10 gram wafer of gold against a promise of 30 deliveries of greens. My gold can in this way be used to circumvent the state's plan to kill off the parallel economy.
The farmer can in turn make similar deals with the gold and silver that people give him instead of cash, and we end up with the old arrangement of gold and silver in combination with personal credit.
I trust our farmer friend enough to part with 10 gram of gold in return for a promise of 30 deliveries of food. He has in turn people that he trusts. The parallel economy will therefore live on even if cash is destroyed or banned.
An additional measure we can make for ourselves is the small time production of meat. We may buy or rent some land to keep chickens. Some of these chickens can be traded for other stuff. Gold and silver, and personal credit will again be used.
My wife will continue to earn a salary in the publishing industry. I will continue to get an annual fixed income from Norway. We're not deluding ourselves into thinking we will be able to live off of the land. But food will become scarce if politicians get their way. It will be important to grow some food for ourselves, just like it was in Russia during the Soviet era.
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By Valtov at fi:wikipedia - Originally from fi:wikipedia, Public Domain, Link
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