Beer and Global Warming Part 2
Ronald Bailey | April 10, 2008, 9:47am
As reason contributor Peter Suderman pointed out yesterday, the biofuels craze is already boosting the price of beer because farmers are shifting away from barley to biofuel crops made more lucrative by mandates and subsidies.
As if that weren't bad enough, a New Zealand climatologist now warns:
The price of beer is likely to rise in coming decades because climate change will hamper the production of a key grain needed for the brew -- especially in Australia, a scientist warned Tuesday.
Jim Salinger, a climate scientist at New Zealand's National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, said climate change likely will cause a decline in the production of malting barley in parts of New Zealand and Australia. Malting barley is a key ingredient of beer.
"It will mean either there will be pubs without beer or the cost of beer will go up," Salinger told the Institute of Brewing and Distilling convention.
Whole depressing AP article here.
Disclosure: I drink scotch--preferably single malt Caol Ila, Lagavulin, or Laphroaig--which is also made using barley.
Inkstained Wretch | April 10, 2008, 10:34am | #
It's lonesome away from your kindred and all
By the campfire at night where the wild dingos call
But there's nothin' so lonesome, so dull or so drear
Than to stand in the bar of a pub with no beer
Now the publican's anxious for the quota to come
There's a faraway look on the face of the bum
The maid's gone all cranky and the cook's acting queer
What a terrible place is a pub with no beer
The stockman rides up with his dry, dusty throat
He breasts up to the bar, pulls a wad from his coat
But the smile on his face quickly turns to a sneer
When the barman says suddenly: "The pub's got no beer!"
There's a dog on the verandah, for his master he waits
But the boss is inside drinking wine with his mates
He hurries for cover and he cringes in fear
It's no place for a dog round a pub with no beer
Then in comes the swagman, all covered with flies
He throws down his roll, wipes the sweat from his eyes
But when he is told he says, "What's this I hear?
I've trudged fifty flamin' miles to a pub with no beer!"
Old Billy, the blacksmith, the first time in his life
Has gone home cold sober to his darling wife
He walks in the kitchen; she says: "You're early, me dear"
Then he breaks down and he tells her that the pub's got no beer
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