Acropolis Now

[gaelic cowboy]

there is no alternative to the rise of the megalith developing nations but to move ever higher up the value chain, for only by producing high value goods and services will we maintain a level of relative wealth that will preserve living standards as they are.

high value services means high value, not some pleb working in an O2 customer support call-centre. notably london is the place where 85% of Euros are traded, not to mention 95% of metals.

high value goods means high value, not some brummie car-plant churning out cheap and cheerful family cars by the tens of thousand. what we are talking about is high-level engineering backed up by strong R&D.

adapt or die.

My point is that O2 guy used to be high value too once and if you think that China and the rest of the new countries are incapable of developing there own high value services they you are in for a big shock one day soon.

My idea would be to try at least try to remove the wage element from the cost base through more and more automation both physical automation and process automation etc etc China has a good price but materials, excise etc are pretty much the same all over wages is the wests problem. People in the west prefer there brands western and there smart enough now to know the benefit of making it here too also if as I suspect a significant element of carbon taxing comes into play one day filling a boat from China could get dearer one day.

If all low skill manufacturing is outsourced without a squeak then there will be no high value stuff later as industry needs a foundation for basic skills etc in order to move up a chain later. The adaptation I think we should be using is in our ability to use tech to reduce our costs this will bite us in the ass eventually.

I am sure you have figured by now I do not want to build walls around industry I prefer to think of it as using the first steam engines in Britain I believe it was in the economist awhile back. In order to empty waterfilled mines in Britain which had a higher cost base then than continential Europe for mining they used automation and so did not abandon mining. I worry that we are getting far too clever for our own good with this rush to proclaim that the west is incapable of producing cheap goods healthy economies are diverse and your thesis is not.

Unfortunately I think the people with the money and the ones who take there orders have already made the decision on this long ago and no amount of reasoned argument from me will change them which is a shame.

mods sorry for wandering off topic

[Louis VI the Fat]

Unfortunately I think the people with the money and the ones who take there orders have already made the decision on this long ago and no amount of reasoned argument from me will change them which is a shame.

I would agree with you.


*insert lengthy economical and geopolitical exposé*



Thatcher closed Wales, Scotland and the North. NuLab and Furunculus agree on one thing: the rest of England doesn't matter either. Only the City and its financial services matter. Hey, the City did boom under NuLab the past fifteen years, waking from its decades long slump, eclipsing even New York in the process.

[Fragony]

http://www.southeast-europe.eu/

Que? A festival to take away doubt about further expansion?

[Furunculus]

Thatcher closed Wales, Scotland and the North.

NuLab and Furunculus agree on one thing: the rest of England doesn't matter either. Only the City and its financial services matter.

Hey, the City did boom under NuLab the past fifteen years, waking from its decades long slump, eclipsing even New York in the process.

Thatcher killed off the state subsidies that propped up moribund industries that contributed nothing towards britain's long term prosperity, and actually did a lot to retard medium term prosperity given that the scale of the subsidies retarded overall growth.

No, i don't agree with NuLab on that, as my two previous post make very clear what i want is both high-value innovation in services AND goods. less hyperbole, more fact please.

Indeed the City has contributed a great deal to the exchequer in the last 20 years, which is surely a good thing for all the moralising poseurs who like to feel good about themselves by cheering on each new gender awareness officer employed by some feckless local council. take that away and social spending will decline, does that make you happy, or is it that you just want to punish the bankers for their evil ways?

[rory_20_uk]

You see, successful businesses make money. These lost money for several decades.

Being state run they were viewed as piggy banks with endless money by certain groups who then forgot the idea was to sell things, not merely turn up and cook up new ways to get a pay rise.

Royal Mail is another case in point: "increased efficiency - but what will happen to all our members whos jobs are currently leading to year on year loesses??!?"

[Husar]

there is no alternative to the rise of the megalith developing nations but to move ever higher up the value chain, for only by producing high value goods and services will we maintain a level of relative wealth that will preserve living standards as they are.

So in other words, improving means stagnation and also keeping the others down?

adapt or die.

Oh yes, that's living the dream, and so much for an Orwellian society...

[Furunculus]

errr, at what point did you make the faulty leap in logic to assume that i was saying that:
1. continual evolution = stagnation
2. that providing high-value goods and services (which command a high return) = keeping other people down

it may sound dramatic, but it is true, if you provide low value goods and services which generate a low return you will be poorer, and the country's balance of payments will worsen as you are forced to import those high-value goods from other countries which will accelerate the rate at which wealth is transferred from the rich west (where i get free hospitals and pensions) to the developing east (where they don't).

do you see the pattern? in a different but similar example; you as a hard-working german are transferring your countries wealth to prop-up the not so hard working greece, how does that feel, knowing that your hospitals and pension provisions will take a hit?

[Furunculus]

oops, congress isn't happy about the IMF using US funds to bail-out out hopeless causes (read: Greece) for political reasons, when the money could be better utilised bailing out worthy causes (read: Spain) for genuine economic reasons:

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/finance...id-for-europe/

[Beskar]

The problem is, high-tech manufacturing gets outsources to places like China as well. For incidence, the iPod/iPhones, etc.

This means China is the only place with all the facilities and they know exactly how these products are made, in otherwords, they are getting free R&D and investment from the West. It would be akin to the Japanese TV Crisis in America, where they outsourced televisions to Japan, then Japan turned around and sold their own to America, etc, which killed off all the American brands and thus why we are watching TV on our Sony's and Samsung's, etc.

So while you say about innovation for example in high-value goods and services, these are getting exported as they are.

[Furunculus]

you getting obsessed with the whole idea of actually making things, when what really matters is where the value of those goods resides:

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/finance...onomic-future/

Our expertise as at R&D and high-level design means that Britain benefits from every single Ipod and smartphone in existence, regardless of the fact the are made in China and sold in America, because each and every one of them contains high-value IP licensed from ARM and PowerVR. That situation is repeated all over Britain, with us creating crazy stuff at a faster rate than the competition and licensing off rights to manufacture to everybody else.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/n...g-beckons.html

http://channel.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=22823

and just in case the point needs to be laboured yet further:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/c...es-things.html

[rory_20_uk]

Although a coutry based on such high-value goods would be ideal, sadly most people have neither the ability or the inclination to be a part of that. Jobs are needed for the Betas, Deltas and Gammas in society and manufacturing is one of the best places.

It keeps then busy and is physically demanding. Like and good dog trainer knows, you need exercise and discipline as well as rewards to keep a happy pet.

[Furunculus]

we're still the 6th largest exporter in the world so that's still true today, but it is high value goods and services that will mean that our retirement in 30 years or so time will be near as comfortable as it is now rather than resembling Romania.

[Beskar]

you getting obsessed with the whole idea of actually making things, when what really matters is where the value of those goods resides:

But then the Chinese will have all the intellectual property, the means to do their own research, then they can flood the markets with their "Chinese iPod" version, irrespective of whatever IP's there are. This is what the Japanese did with the American Televisions, and now look at the world, Sony, Samsung, etc are the world leaders. They got all the production, all the intellectual property, etc, all from those American outsourcers.

[Furunculus]

But then the Chinese will have all the intellectual property, the means to do their own research, then they can flood the markets with their "Chinese iPod" version, irrespective of whatever IP's there are. This is what the Japanese did with the American Televisions, and now look at the world, Sony, Samsung, etc are the world leaders. They got all the production, all the intellectual property, etc, all from those American outsourcers.

if it was that easy then ARM holdings would not not be a FTSE100 listed company.

adapt or die*



* metaphorically speaking for the slow of wit.

[Beskar]

if it was that easy then ARM holdings would not not be a FTSE100 listed company.

adapt or die*
* metaphorically speaking for the slow of wit.

Indeed, we are going to die by your words. Because we give everything to China, they adapt, then we are left with nothing.

[Furunculus]

Wrong, people keep on licensing ARM and PowerVR products because they cannot match the pace of development maintained by these specialists, and if they did attempt it then they would merely end up throwing billions down the drain to create an out-of-date competitor.

I repeat; ARM just became a FTSE100 member for a reason, because people brighter than you or I have a great deal of confidence that their business model works, and works very well.

[Beskar]

Sorry, I wasn't aware the United Kingdom was relied so much on one (or a small handful) of companies.

On the otherhand, what am I saying has had a track record in the past and since the future competitors is getting the IP directly from ARM for example, it means in the future that they can use their own work against them in the competitive market, just as happened in the past, many times before.

I mean, as the nationalist, I would have thought you actually agreeing with what I am saying, as I am talking about the sustainability in the United Kingdom.

[Furunculus]

Is that a back-handed way of admitting you were wrong, but disguising it by making another wrong statement (i gave examples of ARM and PowerVR)?

Yes people nick IP, this is not news, but it's why we try to shoehorn everyone into WIPO membership so there are mechanisms for redress.

Why would my being a nationalist cause me to agree with you that Britain's future as a prosperous nation does not depend of extreme innovation in high-value goods and services.......... i'm confused?

[Beskar]

Why would my being a nationalist cause me to agree with you that Britain's future as a prosperous nation does not depend of extreme innovation in high-value goods and services.......... i'm confused?

You can still do that and manufacture goods in Britain. Tesco for pure example is one of the top of the FTSE100 list, and they basically got all of their money in Britain. From the gamma's stocking selves, and economics of scale.

Also, by sending our IP all over the world, we become less and less relevant overtime, as afterall, some one needs to manufacture and use this IP and by doing that, we train them and expose them to our IP so they can take-over what we originally started.

While I am not advocating everything needs to be homegrown, but for the "West" to maintain its status, it needs to stop giving everything away, so those others nations end up superior than the west and as you put it, the west dies. I am pretty much arguing that what you are saying will not cause the results you want.

[Husar]

1. continual evolution = stagnation

[...] to move ever higher up the value chain,[...] preserve living standards as they are.

Moving up to keep things as they are, evolution to get stagnation, it's right there.

2. that providing high-value goods and services (which command a high return) = keeping other people down

maintain a level of relative wealth

You see, I read that as relative to the other nations, combined with part one, where we stagnate, we're actually trying to keep them down...somehow...

it may sound dramatic, but it is true, if you provide low value goods and services which generate a low return you will be poorer, and the country's balance of payments will worsen as you are forced to import those high-value goods from other countries which will accelerate the rate at which wealth is transferred from the rich west (where i get free hospitals and pensions) to the developing east (where they don't).

Then why aren't China etc. staying poor due to all the low-value goods they're producing?
It doesn't make sense to claim that countries producing low-value goods stay poor and then say China, which produces mostly low-value goods, is threatening us all economically.

[Ironside]

lol, so it was nothing to do with our political masters keeping interest rates too low at the same time as encouraging 'social' lending to the un-creditworthy?

high value services means high value, not some pleb working in an O2 customer support call-centre. notably london is the place where 85% of Euros are traded, not to mention 95% of metals.

adapt or die.

You don't think this is related?... London didn't rapidly exand as a financial center because of it's known to be a decent tourist city.

Now there's also the question were the remaining 95% of London workforce is supposed to find these high value jobs.
As Rory cynically mentioned, you'll need as high employment as possible for the society and financial system to work well. For those high value jobs, there's a simple question. Are there enough of them? And no "the market will create more jobs", unless you wish to explain how the industry will produce more jobs by producing more and reducing the number of employed. It's an inadecute explaination and will fall horribly if it's market efficient to have a smaller workforce.

Sure I can agree with adapt or die, the question is if that adaptation is a dead end fairly soon.

[gaelic cowboy]

I have a feeling that mad as it seems now but I think that in maybe 100yrs Ireland, Britain, France and Holland will end up being agri bread baskets for the for Asia and Mid East.

Maybe the kids should be doing agri-science and GM courses those bloody financiers cant outsource a field of Cork grass or a French orchard yet. There is probably still plenty of automation that can be put in the agri world there's robotic dairy farms, farm networks to track food and watch housed animals on web cams while the farmer works in part time job and tracks the intake and outputs in beef production on his iPhone it's all there.

Naturally this would be a shot in the dark for a major western country and the howls from the hedge funds would probably deafen you so you would get little investment due to long term payoff nature of the agri business but if you want summit solid then own land and plant some spuds.

Hell Greek debt crisis comes and society turns into a mad max hellhole anyone who can make it to mayo will be sound for a plate at the Cowboys house.

[Jolt]

I have a feeling that mad as it seems now but I think that in maybe 100yrs Ireland, Britain, France and Holland will end up being agri bread baskets for the for Asia and Mid East.

Unless something drastically changes with European soil, I doubt very much. European soil isn't well suited for agriculture, which partly explains the low productivity of the European farmers in relation with other countries and the EU's ferocious protectionism of its agriculture.

[gaelic cowboy]

Unless something drastically changes with European soil, I doubt very much. European soil isn't well suited for agriculture, which partly explains the low productivity of the European farmers in relation with other countries and the EU's ferocious protectionism of its agriculture.

Who said anything about growing anything in soil??????? And grass does not need huge fertility it's huge benefit in Europe is that it rains regular and that grass is cheap just ask NZ farmers. French products are mainly high value as Furunculus keeps telling us we need to move too and Holland has market gardening greenhouses etc and it would all be exported for cash because Europe is easily self sufficient many times over.

Your soil is easily treated and as I said there is still a vast amount of RnD and the like that can be do on this plus protectionism will be gone before the end of the century mark my words. Plus you focus on European soil when soil depletion and acidification and a multitude of other problems with soil are happening in America and Australia reducing land area but population is increasing and the more middle class the world becomes the more it will require to eat.

Europe has vast unused potential which is not explained by fertility it is more explained by low investment and high labour costs trust me just cos it might not produce four crops a year does not mean it wont be eaten. The people of the newer regions are growing bigger every day and they all want to eat and I am certain they will pay for it.

[gaelic cowboy]

I think this is good I dunno at least they bought the bonds and expect to get paid back I suppose.

NTMA raises €1.5bn in bond sale

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

The National Treasury Management Agency has sold €1.5bn of bonds in an auction, its first since eurozone leaders unveiled their unprecedented aid package to help indebted euro nations.

Investors bid for 3.1 times the 2014 and 2020 securities offered, the NTMA said today.

It sold €750m of 4pc debt maturing in 2014 to yield an average 3.11pc and €750m of 4.5pc debt maturing in 2020 to yield 4.72pc.

European leaders on May 17 offered a €750bn rescue package as they sought to calm a rout in bond markets.

Concern that the mounting debt crisis in Greece would spread to other nations sent the premium investors charge to hold the debt of countries such as Ireland, Spain and Portugal soaring to euro-era highs earlier this month.

“In the context of recent nervousness in peripheral European government bond markets, this is a good result,” Dublin-based Glas Securities, which specialises in fixed-income markets, said in a note today.

At Ireland’s last auction of 4pc 2014 debt in February, the average yield was 3.03pc. A March auction of 4.5pc bonds maturing in 2020 yielded 4.43pc.

The treasury agency said in an emailed statement that it has raised about 66pc of its planned 2010 bond issuance program. The next auction is scheduled for June 15.

Ireland’s budget gap widened to 14.3pc of gross domestic product in 2009, almost five times the European Union’s 3pc limit. Greece’s deficit was 13.6pc of GDP, while Spain had a 11.2pc shortfall.

The difference in yield, or spread, between 10-year Irish securities and 10-year German bunds, the euro-region’s benchmark government securities, was at 181 basis points this morning. It widened to 306 basis points on May 7.

- Dara Doyle

© Bloomberg

Seeing as it a Greece thread then here is summit else from same paper.

Greece gets first installment of loans

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

By Jones Hayden and Natalie Weeks
Tuesday May 18 2010
Greece has received the first installment of a three-year emergency-loan package from eurozone allies, allowing the country to repay €8.5bn euros of bonds due tomorrow and avoid default.

The EU completed the transfer of €14.5bn, with 10 euro-region countries, including Germany, contributing to the first payment, the Athens-based Finance Ministry said today in an emailed statement.

The International Monetary Fund, which is participating in the bailout, made its initial contribution of €5.5bn last week.

The loans will cover Greece’s financing needs for May and June, a Finance Ministry official said yesterday. Tomorrow’s bond redemption is the last Greece faces until €8.6bn of three-year debt matures in March 2011.

“With this money the immediate and short-term borrowing needs and requirements of Greece are covered,” today’s statement said.

Euro-area ministers and the IMF agreed on May 2 to a €110bn aid package for the debt-stricken nation.

Greece pledged to implement austerity measures of almost 14pc of gross domestic product in exchange for the rescue funds that EU officials hoped would stem declines in the euro.

The initial bailout failed to stem the slide in the euro and end the decline in bonds of other high-deficit nations such as Spain and Portugal.

EU leaders on May 9 agreed to a financial lifeline of €750bn to try to stop the contagion. The euro was little changed today at $1.2402 after reaching a four- year low of $1.2235 yesterday.

Prime Minister George Papandreou has raised taxes, cut wages and reduced government spending in a bid to tame a deficit that reached 13.6pc of GDP last year, more than four times the EU limit.

Luxembourg’s Jean-Claude Juncker, who leads the group of euro-area finance ministers, said today that there are “good reasons to believe” Greece is on the right path and officials will continue to evaluate the situation.

The other euro-region countries that contributed to today’s payment are France, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Austria, Portugal, Luxembourg, Cyprus and Malta.

- Jones Hayden and Natalie Weeks

© Bloomberg

[gaelic cowboy]

I cannot see this happening myself but sure we will see I suppose.

Lenihan says State will recoup Greek loan

In case any of you think you have a tough job Brian Lenihan is our minister for Finance and he also has cancer the poor fella hated and pitied at same time below is a statement from his personal website on it where outlines how he will soldier on.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

During the week before Christmas, I underwent tests in hospital which identified a blockage at the entrance to my pancreas. A stent was inserted and the pancreas is now functioning normally. Cancerous tissue has been identified in the material that has caused the blockage. My medical advice is that chemotherapeutic and radiotherapeutic treatment are required. I will begin the treatment later this week.

Notwithstanding this medical condition, I am feeling fit and well. Having discussed the matter with the Taoiseach and having consulted my medical advisers, it is my intention to continue to serve as Minister for Finance. I will not be accepting invitations for speaking engagements in the next few months. I will continue to fulfil the essential functions of my office. I will supervise the work of my Department and meet delegations relevant to this work. I will prepare for and attend Government meetings. I will make myself accountable to Dáil Éireann and carry out my parliamentary duties. I will convene and attend any meetings required for the implementation of Government policy. I will be available for media interviews about my work as Minister, as required. I will continue to represent the constituency of Dublin West to the best of my abilities.

The Government is determined to implement the plan for economic recovery set out in the last two Budgets. That plan has been endorsed by every member of the Government. With the full support of my colleagues I will continue to oversee its implementation.

I am well aware of the importance of the office I hold. My doctors have advised that I am fit to continue to fulfil my duties. If that position were to change in the course of my treatment, I would be the first to recognise it. At all times, I will act in the best interests of the country and in accordance with any medical advice received. I do not intend to issue any further statements about this matter.

I want to thank the very many well wishers who sent me messages of support following media reports of my illness. I have been overwhelmed by the goodwill shown to my family and myself from all sides. I am aware that many have remembered me in their thoughts and prayers. I thank them for it. I hope I can repay this goodwill by continuing to serve to the best of my ability as I undergo treatment for my medical condition.

[Furunculus]

You can still do that and manufacture goods in Britain. Tesco for pure example is one of the top of the FTSE100 list, and they basically got all of their money in Britain. From the gamma's stocking selves, and economics of scale.

Also, by sending our IP all over the world, we become less and less relevant overtime, as afterall, some one needs to manufacture and use this IP and by doing that, we train them and expose them to our IP so they can take-over what we originally started.

While I am not advocating everything needs to be homegrown, but for the "West" to maintain its status, it needs to stop giving everything away, so those others nations end up superior than the west and as you put it, the west dies. I am pretty much arguing that what you are saying will not cause the results you want.

tescos is an excellent example of a company that achieves competitive advantage through innovation in service, fine with me.

it isn't being given away, it is being bought, and the profits reinvested back into the next generation of intellectual property, which other nations will also have to buy because they spent their money buying our IP rather than designing their own.

i'm not argueing against manufacturing in britain, merely pointing out that mass manufacture of low-tech goods like fridges and cheap cars is not something that will help us in the long-term.

Moving up to keep things as they are, evolution to get stagnation, it's right there.

You see, I read that as relative to the other nations, combined with part one, where we stagnate, we're actually trying to keep them down...somehow...

Then why aren't China etc. staying poor due to all the low-value goods they're producing?
It doesn't make sense to claim that countries producing low-value goods stay poor and then say China, which produces mostly low-value goods, is threatening us all economically.

maintaining our standard of living is hardly a good example of stagnation now is it.

free-trade floats all boats, but the higher the value of goods and services you provide the higher the value you retain in your own economy, a fact that preserves are comfortable living standards. quelle probleme?

because they start off from a position of poverty, and therefore low costs, whereas we exist with high-costs. it's not a difficult economic concept, really.

You don't think this is related?... London didn't rapidly exand as a financial center because of it's known to be a decent tourist city.

Now there's also the question were the remaining 95% of London workforce is supposed to find these high value jobs.
As Rory cynically mentioned, you'll need as high employment as possible for the society and financial system to work well. For those high value jobs, there's a simple question. Are there enough of them? And no "the market will create more jobs", unless you wish to explain how the industry will produce more jobs by producing more and reducing the number of employed. It's an inadequate explanation and will fall horribly if it's market efficient to have a smaller workforce.

Sure I can agree with adapt or die, the question is if that adaptation is a dead end fairly soon.

i really don't get what your saying there...........?

not everyone can or needs to have a high-value job, but it is also not difficult to realise that places like london and the south east generate a vast excess of tax revenue which pays for services in areas of the country that are a net-drain on resources, because they generate high-value services which bring in a high net revenue.

i don't believe it is.

[Jolt]

Who said anything about growing anything in soil??????? And grass does not need huge fertility it's huge benefit in Europe is that it rains regular and that grass is cheap just ask NZ farmers.

EUSOILS reference to soils: "Agricultural soil is a precious and limited resource. Soil is the medium that enables us to grow our food[...] It is not an understatement to say that soil is one of the key issues on which agriculture is based and, thus, fundamental to the existence of human society."

It is not a matter of finding grass. There may be plentiful grass in mountainous areas, but you aren't going to plant much there.

French products are mainly high value as Furunculus keeps telling us we need to move too and Holland has market gardening greenhouses etc and it would all be exported for cash because Europe is easily self sufficient many times over.

Eh? What are you ranting on about? I didn't manage to catch anything on it.

First what does high added value products have to do with anything? Agricultural products are NOT high added value products in any way.

Second, large-scale agriculture (Required to become the breadbasket of anything - and you said of the world EDIT: Asia and Africa.), isn't done in greenhouse workshops. Sticking your agriculture to greenhouses isn't going to make you the bread-basket of anything.

I had to make an essay of the CAP for International Economic Relations. The rationale behind CAP is for Europe to be self-sustainable in agricultural products, and to protect domestic players from extra-EU competitors. Such a protection is needed due to many reasons, amongst those is the productivity of European agriculture, which is very significantly impacted by the inadequateness of the European soil. A notable example of why the overall productivity of European agriculture is suffering can be given by the fact that EU subsdies do not even try to respect or foment an economy of scale. Simply put, they are more concerned with making up for the lack productivity with subsidies, to make sure our farmers don't go out of work while the markets are flooded by cheaper Extra-EU agricultural products, thus even supporting the larger agricultural firms to make sure their Intra and Extra-EU quota stays high and they stay competitive globally.

Another clear example is the price floor (Minimum price) the EU imposes for imported Extra-EU agricultural products so these can only be sold with a cost inside the margin of cost for the European producers, so the (large) European producers can easily compete with imported products.


The true breadbaskets are the same suspects as usual. We cannot have the productivity of the Pampas region, the Gran Chaco region, the Prairie States of the US and Canada, Ukraine and the Chernozem corridor of Russia.

[Furunculus]

Germany's move to ban short-selling gets more disgust heaped upon it:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/c...-the-euro.html

[gaelic cowboy]

EUSOILS reference to soils: "Agricultural soil is a precious and limited resource. Soil is the medium that enables us to grow our food[...] It is not an understatement to say that soil is one of the key issues on which agriculture is based and, thus, fundamental to the existence of human society."

Of course it is my fault I used the term breadbasket which has connotations of some kind of massive Iowa style farm I am talking cattle here.

It is not a matter of finding grass. There may be plentiful grass in mountainous areas, but you aren't going to plant much there.

You don't plant in grass you bale and feed it to housed cattle and make beef or milk.

Eh? What are you ranting on about? I didn't manage to catch anything on it.

First what does high added value products have to do with anything? Agricultural products are NOT high added value products in any way.

Sorry its following on from earlier in the thread about the outsourcing of manufacturing from europe Furunculus keeps saying adapt or die that you must sell high value products and many agri products are finished to a very high quality in europe and sold for a big markup due to the luxury nature of the product in question thats what I meant by high value.

Second, large-scale agriculture (Required to become the breadbasket of anything - and you said of the world EDIT: Asia and Africa.), isn't done in greenhouse workshops. Sticking your agriculture to greenhouses isn't going to make you the bread-basket of anything.
The true breadbaskets are the same suspects as usual. We cannot have the productivity of the Pampas region, the Gran Chaco region, the Prairie States of the US and Canada, Ukraine and the Chernozem corridor of Russia.

Not all agri product that have high value require a field flowers are an example of products that will make big money. Ok so maybe not everything is grown in a greenhouse but I am talking in a generic sense about investment in all sorts of thing and greenhouses are one of those investmenst I also mentioned agri science gm crops and the use of robots etc etc.

I had to make an essay of the CAP for International Economic Relations. The rationale behind CAP is for Europe to be self-sustainable in agricultural products, and to protect domestic players from extra-EU competitors. Such a protection is needed due to many reasons, amongst those is the productivity of European agriculture, which is very significantly impacted by the inadequateness of the European soil. A notable example of why the overall productivity of European agriculture is suffering can be given by the fact that EU subsdies do not even try to respect or foment an economy of scale. Simply put, they are more concerned with making up for the lack productivity with subsidies, to make sure our farmers don't go out of work while the markets are flooded by cheaper Extra-EU agricultural products, thus even supporting the larger agricultural firms to make sure their Intra and Extra-EU quota stays high and they stay competitive globally.

Another clear example is the price floor (Minimum price) the EU imposes for imported Extra-EU agricultural products so these can only be sold with a cost inside the margin of cost for the European producers, so the (large) European producers can easily compete with imported products.


The true breadbaskets are the same suspects as usual. We cannot have the productivity of the Pampas region, the Gran Chaco region, the Prairie States of the US and Canada, Ukraine and the Chernozem corridor of Russia.

Remember this is just a thought experiment its not talking about today but the future in 2100 its just a thought on a possible future. I am well aware of the black soil in Ukraine but the foods in Europe are higher value Grapes which make wine pork which becomes parma ham I could go on and on. CAP is not the only thing that affect farmers in europe labour, energy, hygiene and quality standards etc etc these all add to the price.

In the idea the world would be richer and full of maybe 8-9billion people who will to be fed one region won't feed that many we will have to use more land ie more investent more use etc etc.

In short just to recap I was talking in a generic sense about a possible future that could be invested in to secure both manufacturing jobs processing jobs and production jobs and all the attendent services along with it too and many other skills in the wider economy by moving to big agri production. Look I understand its not really going to happen but hell stranger things have happened. Mainly this is not going to happen because the economy would have to reorient itself to achieve this senario however it would be more secure you cant outsource a field and be practically gauranteed a market with the rise of Asia.