Is there really not enough food for potatoes and steamed buns?

As a vegetable with a broad mass base, Tudou has upgraded its new way of eating. Recently, Tudou steamed bread invaded major supermarkets in Beijing, and Tudou's future attack includes bread, twistbread, cake and bean buns.

At the beginning of this year, the Ministry of Agriculture put forward the strategy of "potato staple grain", making it another staple food besides rice, wheat and corn. It is even estimated that by 2020, more than 50% of potatoes will be eaten as staples rather than side dishes.

Indeed, potatoes are somewhat subdued as a side dish. Potatoes last longer than the three staple grains of wheat, rice and corn-ground at room temperature for 15 years. For China, which is short of water resources and poor quality of arable land, growing potatoes also saves water and fertilizer.

In fact, the United Nations has long regarded potato as "the fourth largest food crop in the world" and entrusted an important task to potato. "in the event of a food crisis, only potato can save mankind."

But is there really not enough food to eat?

China imports grain mainly because it is sold cheaply abroad.

Some time ago, the news that "people and animals live in the same house and eat meat three times a year" has aroused collective concern about how many people in China do not have enough to eat and whether there is enough grain in China. Even if China is a large agricultural country with one of the highest grain production in the world, the food crisis related to livelihood always grabs headlines periodically to manage the belly of six people in the world and rely on less than 10% of the world's arable land.

The most common story is rising grain imports-China's total grain imports exceeded 100 million tons in 2014. Incidentally, there is also the money spent on grain imports-from 2001 to 2013, China's agricultural imports increased from more than $10 billion to more than $100 billion, a tenfold increase in 10 years. Rising numbers always make worriers worry that China is running out of food again.

A careful analysis of the types of imports of China's agricultural products shows that 70% of them are used to import soybeans, and grains account for only about 3% of the total imports of agricultural products. And the main reason for large-scale imports is that prices, especially sugar, cotton and rice, are affected by price differences at home and abroad, not insufficient production.

According to USDA data, from 2013 to 2014, China's stocks of sugar and cotton accounted for 18.7% and 60.9% of the world stocks, respectively. Imports of rice are also partly due to prices, such as Hubei indica rice, which was $625 a tonne in 2012, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, compared with $598 per tonne for Vietnam's most expensive rice varieties. are much lower than China's domestic prices.

Rice export has become an important economic source of Vietnam.

Although China is self-sufficient in grain at the present stage, don't forget that our country has a large population base, with an annual population growth of several million, which puts forward high requirements for the growth of grain output.

Well, Americans are also worried about the bellies of Chinese people. According to the US Food and Agricultural Policy Research Institute and the US Department of Agriculture, affected by the increase in population and environmental degradation, by 2020, the output of China's important agricultural products is equivalent to 1.05 billion mu of cultivated land, which is equivalent to half of the existing cultivated land in our country.

However, China is much more optimistic. According to the China Agricultural Outlook report (2015-2024), by 2024, China's rice, wheat and corn output will reach 580 million tons, and the total consumption is expected to be 600 million tons. A balance between supply and demand can be achieved through a moderate increase in imports to ensure the security of China's food supply in the future.

There is not enough food to eat, because the part used to eat is less than half of the output.

Of course, not only the Chinese are concerned about this topic, the food crisis is a major event for the people of the world. In 2009, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations released a report on the State of Food insecurity, pointing out that the number of hungry people in the world has reached 1.02 billion, an all-time high. This does not include those who are suffering from vitamin deficiency, malnutrition and other forms of malnutrition, the total number of people suffering from food security may be close to 3 billion, one in two people in the world.

As soon as the report appeared, Jacques, Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Diouf launched a 24-hour hunger strike, followed by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, in order to attract enough attention.

So how much food does it take to feed a person? According to a survey conducted by the World Bank Development Research Group, the average minimum calorie intake per person per day ranges from 1793 to 2677 to maintain food and clothing. According to a minimum of 1793 calories, it takes 500g of rice or wheat a day, that is, 1 jin of grain, to meet the needs of "having enough to eat." According to the minimum United Nations standard of 2100 calories, more grain is needed.

According to the statistics of the United Nations, the grain output in 2014 was 2.5 billion tons. If all this food was used for food, the world's 7.3 billion people would get an average of nearly 2 jin per person per day.

Of course, with the improvement of living standards, there are more meat, eggs and all kinds of supplementary foods on the dinner table, which means that more grains are consumed. According to statistics, one kilogram of pork needs three kilograms of grain, one kilogram of chicken needs two kilograms, and one kilogram of beef needs seven kilograms.