In article HFZqc.33886$bS1.6212@okepread02,
"Gordon Couger" wrote:
"Dean Hoffman" wrote in message
.. .
On 5/15/04 3:54 AM, in article bVkpc.28314$bS1.4040@okepread02, "Gordon
Couger" wrote:

Bulls would need less hormones to gain than steers as well. That is a big
bone of contention between the US and the EU. I hope the rising prices will
go high enough to put an end to protectionism by all players. It would be
nice for agriculture to be really profitable for a while. At current
consumption with just a bit of help from the weather we may be able to keep
from producing surpluses for good while. I don't think we can count on as
good weather for crops as we had the last half the last century. That was
and exceptionally warm wet period of time for a lot of the world.

I remember the last time things were looking up for farming. The Freedom
to Farm Act was passed. The world economy was good and it looked like the
end of government subsidies for awhile. That didn't turn out too well. I
think it was the Japanese economy that tanked and the ripple effect put US
farmers back on the government teat.

All our lives farming has had the ability to produce more than we could
consume. The time many be coming that that may no longer true and the
countries that are poor in terms of farm land will have money to pay for
food. That will make farming an very nice business if it happens. Evan nicer
if nature gives use a hand. We are due one from her too.

A lot of that depends on what the climate does. Where I have farm I am
trying to develop irrigation to assure that whoever farm the place can make
a crop. It doesn't return a great deal more on investment than dry land
farming but the investment is so much higher that it is well worth it and it
not a boom or bust deal but a much more even stream of income.

I don't pretend to know what the limit will do in relation to the farms I
own over the next 25 year but loosing crops to dry weather is a sure bet
even if I take the best 25 years out of the last 200 and I don't expect to
do that well.

I have built a number of models and anyone trying to model climate and
extrapolate their forecasts beyond the end points of their data set is
blowing wind your skirt with thier predictions and I have more confidence in
picking a year at random from the last 15 years and using it than any model
I have seen. At least it will produce climate data that aggress with the
observed climate when you run it on the last 100 years several hundred
times. Something I challenge other models to do.

A fairly serious problem with a model based on past weather is that,
if we assume climate is changing, then the basis of the model is
largely irrelevant. Mind you, that mightn't matter so much in terms
of "averages" in the short term future, but when it comes to
predicting extremes (e.g. "100-year events" etc.) all bets are off.


Cheers, Phred.

--
LID