The Locavore's Dilemma by Pierre Desrochers

Author:Pierre Desrochers
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Published: 2012-04-13T16:00:00+00:00

Locavorism and Military Security

Writing in the year following the end of the First World War, the American geographer Joseph Russell Smith observed that two generations of Americans and Europeans had become so used to an abundant food supply that they no longer considered the possibilities of famine nor understood “the troubles of the past, nor as yet the vital problems of the present.” Dependence on world trade, he argued, had in the end given modern man “the independence of a bird in a cage, no more.” “The world market is excellent,” Russell Smith added, “when it is well supplied.” In wartime, however, the places where food is produced “determined the lives of nations.”49

This experience drastically shaped European food politics in later years. In Italy, the fascist dictator Benito Mussolini launched a “Battle for Grain” in 1925 that, through high tariffs, farm subsidies of various kinds, “local content” milling requirements, newer seeds, and technical education, was supposed to free Italy from the “slavery” of food imports. In practice, however, his policy came at the cost of converting a lot of the Italian landscape from profitable export crops such as fresh produce, citrus fruits, and olives to grain production, resulting in a more monotonous and costlier diet for Italian consumers. In the words of the historian Denis Mack Smith, the battle for grain was ultimately won “at the expense of the Italian economy in general and consumers in particular.” 50 Meanwhile, in Germany, national socialist ideology promoted both agricultural autarky, or self-sufficiency, and Lebensraum—the required vital space of Eastern Europe from which inferior races were to be cleared and food produced to supply the German Fatherland.51 We all know how this one ended. The leaders of the Soviet Union also pursued agricultural autarky until 1973 when confronted with a severe domestic grain shortfall that forced them to open up to food imports from their main competitor for world influence and domination.

The appeal of autarky for imperial and totalitarian regimes is easily understood. As the Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises observed several decades ago: “A warlike nation must aim at autarky in order to be independent of foreign trade. It must foster the production of substitutes irrespective of [economic] considerations. It cannot do without full government control of production because the selfishness of the individual citizens would thwart the plans of the leader. Even in peacetime the commander-in-chief must be entrusted with economic dictatorship.” 52 Many economists otherwise supportive of trade liberalization have also been willing to make an exception to their stance when national security was thought to be at stake. Perhaps the most famous was Adam Smith, who observed, “defence… is of much more importance than opulence.”53 In short, Smith implied, autarkic policies come at a significant price, but it pales in comparison to starvation in time of conflicts. We will now argue, contra Adam Smith himself, that the “autarky for food security” rationale doesn’t stand up to scrutiny.

First, we currently live in what is undoubtedly the most peaceful time in human history.

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