AgricultureNo risk of global food collapse consumption decreasing & productivity improvingLomborg 12[Bjorn, Professor at Copenhagen Business School and head of the Copenhagen Consensus Center; Foreign Affairs, July/August; p. 33-4]And predictions about the last two factors, agricultural production and pollution, were way off which is important because these were the two backup drivers of collapse if a scarcity of resources didnt do the job. Global per capita food consumption was expected to increase by more than 50 percent in the four decades after 1970, peak in 2010, and then drop by 70 percent. Calorie availability has indeed increased, if not quite so dramatically (by somewhat more than 25 percent), but the collapse of the food supply is nowhere in sight, and there is every reason to believe that the gains will continue and be sustainable. Malnutrition has not been vanquished, and the absolute number of people going hungry has in fact increased slightly recently (in part because some crops have been diverted from food to biofuel production due to concerns about global warming). But over the past 40 years, the fraction of the global population that is malnourished has dropped from 35 percent to less than 16 percent, and well over two billion more people have been fed adequately. The world is nowhere close to hitting a ceiling on the usage of arable land; currently, 3.7 billion acres are being used, and 6.7 billion acres are in reserve. Nor have productivity gains maxed out. The latest long-range UN report on food availability, from 2006, estimated that the world would be able to feed ever-more people, each with ever-more calories, out to midcentury

Major alternate causalitiesUrbanchuk, 08director, LECG, a global experts consulting company (John, Critique of World Bank Working Paper a Note of Rising Food Prices, 7/11, http://www.ethanolrfa.org/objects/documents/1812/lecg_work_bank_critique.pdf)In early April 2008, Dr. Donald Mitchell, Lead Economist in the Development Prospects Group of the World Bank, prepared a draft working paper that examined the sharp increase in global food prices between January 2002 and February 2008 and attempted to identify causal factors for the increase. 1 The report was intended solely for use within the Bank and was not authorized for citation or circulation. The lead sentence in Mitchells summary attributes the vast share (threequarters) of the increase in global food prices to the large increase in biofuels production in the U.S. and EU. The report was leaked to the Brit ish newspaper The Guardian which published Mitchells conclusions just prior to the opening of the G8 HokkaidoToyako Summit, and has received worldwide attention. A careful reading of Mitchells study reveals that Mitchell identifies several factors that have contributed to the rise in food prices. Increases in petroleum prices and related increases in agricultural inputs derived from petroleum, notably fertilizer and chemicals. Drought in Australia in 2006 and 2007 and poor crops in the EU in 2007 which reduced supplies of grain. Increased demand for oilseeds in China to supply a rapidly expanding livestock and poultry sector. The decline in the value of the dollar. Speculation by institutional investors. Export bans and restrictions that restricted access to supplies of food crops. Increased demand for biofuels which, in addition to increasing demand for food crops, led to large land use changes which reduced supplies of crops (wheat) that compete with food crops used for biofuels. These factors have been widely discussed and accepted by many analysts. Mitchell goes on the assign weights to many of the factors specifically: The decline in the value of the dollar has contributed about 20 percentage points to the rise in food prices. Thus, the combination of higher energy prices and related increases in fertilizer prices, and dollar weakness caused food prices to rise by about 35 percent from January 2002 until February 2008 and the remaining threequarters of the 140 percent actual increase was due to biofuels and the related consequences of low grain stocks, large land use shifts, speculative activity, and export bans. Mitchells analysis is largely subjective. While he discusses each of these factors in some detail he fails to describe how he arrived at the relative weights described above. Specific points of criticism include: 1. Mitchell fails to disaggregate the impact on food prices from ethanol and biodiesel. While he correctly points out that land used to produce corn used for ethanol competes with wheat and oilseeds (notably soybeans in the U.S. and rapeseed in Canada and the EU). Much of the feedstock for biodiesel production in the EU has come from palm kernel oil imported from South Asia. The demand for biodiesel has boosted edible oils prices which have a larger weight in the World Bank food price index than does meat and dairy which are affected by corn. 2. Mitchell contends that increased biofuel production has increased the demand for food crops and has been the major cause of the increase in food prices. Specifically he states that almost all of the increase in global maize production from 2004 to 2007 went for biofuels in the U.S. with the net effect being that the increase in global consumption for other uses came largely from stocks. In fact, current USDA Foreign Agricultural Service Statistics report that world maize production increased 74 million tonnes between 2004/05 and 2007/08 (715.77 MT to 789.812 MT). During this same period the amount of corn used to produce ethanol in the U.S. increased 42.6 million tones (33.6 MT in 2004 to 76.2 MT in 2007). 2 Consequently, the expanding U.S. ethanol industry used only slightly more than half the increase in global corn production between 2004 and 2007. 3. While vegetable oil is the primary feedstock for biodiesel production, Mitchell fails to take into account the increased use of waste grease and oil particularly in the U.S. The lions share of the increase in world fats and oils prices is attributable to demand from the EU biodiesel industry. 4. Mitchell attributes the increase in world wheat prices largely to reduced production caused by diversion of wheat area to corn in the U.S. and to oilseeds (rapeseed and sunflower) in Canada, EU, Russia, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan. Specifically he focuses on the significant increase in area planted to corn in the U.S. in 2007 and consequent decline in soybean area. He does point out that this pattern is being reversed this year with higher soybean and lower corn acreage. Examination of acreage patterns fails to show the sharp land shifts Mitchell blames for the decline in wheat production and increase in prices. Table 1 summarizes world area harvested for corn and the grains corn competes with for land and the major oilseeds used to produce biodiesel for two five year periods 19992003 and 20042008 using current (June 2008) USDA projections for 2008. As can be seen in Table 1 total world area increased by nearly 5 percent with the largest increases realized by oilseeds (soybeans and rapeseed) and corn. Wheat area increased marginally while area devoted to other feedgrains declined. Looking at individual countries provides sharply different results. For example, In the U.S. corn area increased primarily at the expense of sorghum, barley, soybeans and cotton. Canadian rapeseed area expanded at the equal expense of wheat and barley. In the EU rapeseed area expanded at the expense of corn and only marginally wheat. Wheat area declined in Russia in 2006 but recovered in 2007 and 2008. Area devoted to rapeseed increased but from a very small base. Wheat is the primary grain crop in Kazakhstanand area increased steadily over the past decade. Rapeseed is a new crop with about 200,000 hectares under cultivation, compared to 13 million for wheat. In Ukraine, declines in wheat area in 2006 and 2007 were matched by gains in other grains and to a small extent rapeseed. Brazil expanded area for wheat, corn and soybeans with the acreage coming from pasture and rain forest. Argentina increased soybean area at the expense of wheat and pasture. It is possible that but for biofuels more wheat (and less corn and oilseeds) would have been planted. However had the demand from biofuels not supported higher commodity prices that provided an incentive for increased planting, total grain and oilseed area (and production) could have been lower also resulting in reduced stocks. The impact of weather on wheat yields likely had more impact on production globally than land use changes prompted by biofuels demand. No Russian economic collapseAdomanis, 1/7/13 (Mark Adomanis, undergraduate degree in government at Harvard, master's degree in Russian and East European Studies at the University of Oxford, Forbes, "Why Russia's Economy Isn't Going To Collapse", www.forbes.com/sites/markadomanis/2013/01/07/why-russias-economy-isnt-going-to-collapse/ //)

Hating Russias economy is a full-time job for many people. Owen Matthews in Newsweek is perhaps the most colorful of the bunch, but the difference between Matthews and other Western journalists is primarily one of degree not of kind. Ive been following Russia very closely for about a decade now, and Ive simply lost count of the number of analyses Ive read arguing that the end is nigh and that the economys final implosion is mere months away. These articles vary greatly in quality, but the basic indictment of Russias economy consists of a number of actually quite reasonable observations on the countrys corruption, red tape, and over-reliance on natural resources. However, after getting decimated during the worse days of the financial crisis, Russias economy has been plugging along with steady and unremarkable growth in the 3-4% range, hardly world beating but actually faster than almost every country in the EU. As more time has passed and Russias economy has defied predictions by continuing to not collapse, Ive become increasingly convinced that its economic stability has been somewhat underrated and that, despite its many faults, its basic economic model is quite likely to endure through the short and medium terms. I certainly dont think that Russia is going to become some sort of economic hegemon, but it seems far more likely than not that it will evolve gradually, and not through some titanic rupture or revolutionary upheaval. But my hunches and inclinations arent very good evidence, so I thought I would put a few charts together which show why I think that Russias economy is basically going to stay stable over the next several years and that its a huge mistake to predict a cataclysm which will sweep away the dread Putin. 1.The price of Brent crude has stayed remarkably robust despite chronic economic weakness in the developed world. I suppose its possible that the EU will never emerge from its current doldrums, but I think that the developed world will eventually get out of its funk and start to grow again. When it does that growth will likely drive the price of oil even higher, or at least prevent it from going much lower. 2. Russia still has very large foreign reserves, some of the largest in the entire world Although you often hear, as in Matthews piece, that the Russians used to be responsible with their oil money, now theyre become totally reckless and irresponsible, Russia still has very large foreign reserves that amount to almost 25% of its GDP. Note the similarity between the oil price graph and Russias foreign reserves, their shapes are almost identical While the utility of foreign reserves can often be overstated, they can be very handy in averting economic catastrophes, and, as you might expect, the Russians drew heavily on their foreign reserves during the worst days of the 2008-09 crisis. I think that the reserves provide a cushion that will help to shield Russia from a future shock, such as a rapid and massive decline in the price of oil. Of course theres still the chance that Russia will suffer a slow and gradual decline in competitiveness, but what Im pushing back against is not that argument but the argument that the whole house of cards is going to collapse in the next couple of years. 3. The Russian government still runs a budget surplus, and its spending as a percentage of GDP is not very high From January-October 2012 Russia ran a budget surplus of about 1.4%, smaller than the 2011 figure (3.2%) but a surplus nonetheless. Russias total level of government spending (about 32% of GDP) hardly seems outrageous or unsustainable. Additionally, despite a lot of loose and foolish talk from the Russian defense ministry about it looming re-armament campaign, Russias budget spending is more weighted towards the social sphere than the military industrial complex. Courtesy of the Gaidar institute, heres a graph showing where Russias consolidated government spending was directed in the first ten months of 2012: The Gaidar institute is hardly a Kremlin outfit, indeed the overall tone of the report to which I linked is actually quite gloomy* and critical of the authorities, and considering its track record I dont think that it would have spun the numbers in a more pro-Putin direction. When analyzing any countrys budget posture you need to focus on where the money is actually being spent. While theres been an awful lot of talk about comprehensively re-arming the Russian military, the actual level of spending remains relatively small and well within the countrys ability to pay. The purse-strings are clearly somewhat looser than they used to be, but a quick glance at Russias budget certainly doesnt give the impression of a totally reckless and debauched approach. 4. Russian unemployment is at or near a post-Soviet record low Russias labor market isnt exactly a model for anyone else, but its arguably more robust now than its ever been before. I think that this will act as a sort of stabilizing influence in its own right, but, more importantly, it might allow the government to feel comfortable enough to do some tinkering and implement a few moderate reforms. Basically, the government is more likely to undertake some modest liberalization if the labor market is healthy and its confident that people will be able to find jobs than if the unemployment rate is already trending upwards (unemployment is obviously highly politically sensitive in performance legitimacy regimes like Russias).

No US-Russian war: Perry et al 09 (William J. (former United States Secretary of Defense, Americas Strategic Posture The Final Report of the Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States, 2009 http://media.usip.org/reports/strat_posture_report.pdf)It is important, moreover, to bear in mind that despite our many disappointments, Russia has not returned to the role of the Soviet Union as a global challenger to the United States. It is not amassing military forces along its borders in readiness for an invasion of Europe. Although Russia is strengthening its nuclear forces, it does not appear to be seeking overall nuclear supremacy. Indeed, its focus is largely on its domestic economic transformation and its near-abroad, where there are many challenges but also some opportunities for cooperation with the West. The risk of direct military confrontation between the United States and Russia is much lower than during the Cold War. High food prices dont effect hungerPaarlberg, 08 - professor of political science at Wellesley College and a visiting professor of government at Harvard University (Robert, The Real Food Crisis, Chronicle of Higher Education, 6/27, lexis)

Is the world really facing a food crisis? Export prices of basic food grains -- corn, rice, and wheat -- have certainly spiked upward this year, indicating a scarcity of exportable supplies relative to commercial demand. Yet export prices on the world market are an imprecise measure of actual human hardship, since the world's poorest and most vulnerable citizens do not have regular access to world food markets. Instead those poor and hungry people, who primarily live in the countryside of sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, tend to rely on local rather than global food systems, and many of those people remain malnourished even when international prices are low.South Asia and Africa tend to import very little food. Only about 6 percent of South Asian grain is imported, and sub-Saharan Africa imports only about 10 percent of its total caloric consumption. And it is the more prosperous city dwellers who purchase what little is imported. So when import prices rise, urban consumers do feel a squeeze (particularly if fuel prices are also high), and they may even express their displeasure by taking to the streets. The results can threaten political stability and are easily captured by the international news media. Yet even when international prices are high, these urban dwellers are usually better fed than their fellow citizens in the countryside.

Empiricallyfood crises are effected by local factors, not global pricesPaarlberg, 08 - professor of political science at Wellesley College and a visiting professor of government at Harvard University (Robert, The Real Food Crisis, Chronicle of Higher Education, 6/27, lexis)Ironically, it was only when the so-called food crisis of the 1970s came to an end, during the slow-growth decade of the 1980s, that food circumstances in poor countries significantly worsened. In Latin America, even though world food prices were falling sharply, the number of hungry people increased from 46 million to more than 60 million. The reason was a regional "debt crisis" triggered by higher U.S. interest rates after 1979. The number of hungry people also increased sharply in Africa during the 1980s. The reason was faltering farm production, exacerbated in some regions by severe drought and civil conflict. The price for imported food was down, but hunger was up. Most real food crises are local rather than global.

ManufacturingICBMs solveTurner 3(Stansfield, Retired US Navy Admiral and former Dir. CIA and Commander-in-Chief of NATOs Southern Flank, Naval War College Review, Is the U.S. Navy being marginalized? 56:3, Proquest)Strategic Deterrence. At the peak we had forty-one strategic ballistic missile submarines (SSBNs). We are now approaching eighteen and probably going to ten. In part that is true because of the demise of the Soviet Union. It is also in part because we are beginning to recognize that the prime virtue of the SSBN, its invulnerability, has never been as important as many of us who have written on this subject have contended. This change of mind results from a realization that the threat of even only a few retaliatory nuclear detonations is sufficient to deter anyone. That is because any would-be nuclear aggressor must assume the worst, which is that we would retaliate by attacking his cities. Would the Russians or even the Chinese, let alone ourselves, be willing to lose ten, or five, or even two major cities in the name of initiating and "winning" a nuclear war? Thus, even if we had only the more vulnerable intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) and no SSBNs at all in our nuclear arsenal, we would still have an adequate strategic deterrent. That would be the case even were some other nuclear power to acquire many more nuclear weapons than we. No such power could assume that any preemptive first strike it undertook would be 100 percent successful-that is, that there would be no nuclear retaliation. There would always be errors of targeting, missiles that failed entirely, missiles that were inaccurate, and human errors in execution. It all adds up to what Clausewitz described as "friction" in war. So a U.S. strategic nuclear deterrent with only ICBMs should suffice. Thus, the Navy's role in this area is going to be looked at more critically, and this mission of the Navy will be seen as less critical to the country than it once was.

Nuke threat not credible nowcrushes deterrence.Gerson 9/29 senior fellow at CFR, was at Heritage Foundation (Michael, 2009, "Rethinking US Nuclear Posture" http://carnegieendowment.org/files/0929_transcript_nuclear_posture.pdf)On the one hand, I think you can make a case that U.S. threats, whether theyre implicit or explicit and really what were talking about here is the ambiguous threat is simply not credible. Its not credible for a variety of reasons. I mean, one is the nuclear taboo, this moral and political aversion to using nuclear weapons that has emerged in the long absence of nuclear use and conflict. In the nuclear arena, the United States is largely seen as cool-headed, risk-averse and sensitive to casualties and collateral damage. The United States does not seem to be able to benefit from the sort of rationality of irrationality type argument. The prospect that the United States would unilaterally shatter the almost seven-decade record of non-use in conflict I think contributes to the belief that the United States would in fact not use nuclear weapons. Another argument is I think that one could make the case that an unintended consequence of the United States first use the United States efforts to lead to the global non-proliferation regime is that it reduces the credibility of the United States to use nuclear weapons first. If the United States spends all of this time working on the efforts to prevent others from getting nuclear weapons, it seems it makes it less credible that the United States would risk shattering that and throwing it all away by using nuclear weapons first. And finally, in the Gulf War, despite the threats of calculated ambiguity and the ambiguous threat of nuclear weapons, which some believe deterred Saddam, Bush, Scowcroft, Powell, and Baker, all said after the conflict that they had actually never intended on using nuclear weapons. And such public admission I think reduces the credibility of those threats.

Deterrence collapse inevitableeven Gates concedes.Morgan, 8 [David, 10/28, U.S. must update nuclear arsenal as rivals are: Gates, http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE49R7ST20081028]WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates warned on Tuesday that America's aging nuclear weapons stockpile faces a bleak future of decline just as rival nations including Russia and China are modernizing their nuclear arsenals. Nearly two decades after the end of the Cold War, Gates said the U.S. nuclear program is suffering from an exodus of qualified designers and technicians, the stockpile has not been modernized and no weapons have been tested since 1992. "Let me first say very clearly that our weapons are safe, secure and reliable. The problem is the long-term prognosis -- which I would characterize as bleak," Gates said in a speech to the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a Washington think tank. Gates used the warning to urge Congress to fund a modernization effort by the Pentagon and the Energy Department to create new weapons designs that he said could be used to create a safer and more secure stockpile without abandoning the 16-year-old unilateral U.S. ban on new weapons tests. Russia has begun to rely increasingly on its nuclear force by developing new land- and sea-based missiles while maintaining the ability to manufacture new warheads, Gates told his audience. He said China has also expanded the number of missiles and pursued new land, sea and air systems that can deliver nuclear warheads. "Currently, the United States is the only declared nuclear power that is neither modernizing its nuclear arsenal nor has the capability to produce a new nuclear warhead," Gates said. "To be blunt, there is absolutely no way we can maintain a credible deterrent and reduce the number of weapons in our stockpile without resorting to testing our stockpile or pursuing a modernization program." Since the end of the Cold War, the United States has taken a series of weapons systems including the Peacekeeper ballistic missile out of service and plans to reduce the U.S. nuclear warhead stockpile by two-thirds to between 1,700 and 2,200 by 2010 under an agreement with Moscow.