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AT: Drones Good Scenarios AT: Ag
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- Alt cause – migrating pests
- Bees are dying – that collapses agriculture
- Drones fail but the status quo solves – helicopters
- No impact to food shortages – civilization can survive
- Food wars don’t happen
AT: Drones Good ScenariosAT: AgAlt CausesAlt cause – water scarcityMartelle, 11/3/13 – Veteran journalist Scott Martelle has written books on the Ludlow Massacre and the Red Scare clampdown on civil liberties, directly quoting the WRI (Scott, “Climate Change to Cut Global Food Production, Increase Water Demand,” TruthDig, http://www.truthdig.com/eartotheground/item/climate_change_to_cut_global_food_production_increase_water_demand)// IS’14 The second report, by the nonprofit World Resources Institute, warns that more than a quarter of the planet’s food production comes from “highly water-stressed areas,” according to Salon’s coverage of the study. “That includes half of irrigated cropland, which itself is responsible for 40 percent of the global food supply,” Salon says, defining water stress as a region in which 40 percent or more of the renewable water supply is used up each year. The WRI sees significant global stresses, which you can assess here using the organization’s interactive Web tool. The tension between crop production and available water supply is already great, as agriculture currently accounts for more than 70 percent of all human water withdrawal. But the real problem is that this tension is poised to intensify. The 2030 Water Resources Group forecasts that under business-as-usual conditions, water demand will rise 50 percent by 2030. Water supplies, however, will not—and physically cannot—grow in parallel. Agriculture will drive nearly half of that additional demand, because global calorie production needs to increase 69 percent to feed 9.6 billion people by 2050. The food-water tension won’t just be felt by agriculture, either. Agriculture’s growing thirst will squeeze water availability for municipal use, energy production, and manufacturing. With increasing demand in all sectors, some regions of the world, such as northern China, are already scrambling to find enough water to run their economies. Alt cause – migrating pestsRoberts, 9/2/13 – graduated from the University of Southampton, Carbon Brief Assistant Researcher/Writer, former intern at the Environmental Justice Foundation, former data analyst at the Centre for Economic and Social Inclusion (Freya, “Pests moving polewards threaten global food security,” The Carbon Brief, http://www.carbonbrief.org/blog/2013/09/pests-moving-polewards-increase-the-risk-to-global-food-production-(1)/)// IS’14 Fungi, insects and bacteria look set to pose an increasing threat to global food production in years to come, new research reveals. As temperatures rise, crop-destroying pests and diseases are spreading from the tropics toward the poles at a rate of nearly three kilometres per year. The rising problem of pests in some of the world's most productive farmland presents a real threat to global food security, as climate change makes higher latitudes like the US and Europe more hospitable to pests that wouldn't otherwise survive. How bad is the pest problem? For farmers worldwide, pests are already a serious problem. They are responsible for the loss of between 10 and 16 per cent of all crops during production, and result in further losses after harvest i.e. due to infestations in food stores. From microscopic fungi, bacteria and viruses to insects and other animals, there are numerous different species which affect everyday staples like cereals, potatoes, fruit and vegetables. These pests have evolved to breed quickly and disperse easily, allowing them to move readily to find new hosts. BeesBees are dying – that collapses agricultureRupp, 15 Rebecca Rupp, Ph.D. in cell biology and biochemistry, and is the author of more than 200 articles for national magazines and nearly two dozen books, “Dying Bees Spell Trouble for U.S. Agriculture,” National Geographic, 1/12/15, http://theplate.nationalgeographic.com/2015/01/12/bees/ // IS Bees Control Our Food Supply Honeybees pollinate plants that account for over a third of our food supply, such as: apples, pears, peaches, almonds, okra, alfalfa, beans, berries, broccoli, cauliflower, cantaloupes, watermelons, cabbages, peppers, eggplants, tomatoes, citrus fruits, and grapes. Without bees, there would be no strawberry shortcake, no blueberry pancakes, no salsa, and no wine. In an interview with Scientific American, entomologist May Berenbaum points out that, lacking bees, there would be nothing left of a Big Mac but the bun. (Wheat is wind-pollinated.) Cows (beef and cheese) are fed on bee-pollinated alfalfa and clover; lettuce and onions are bee-pollinated, as are the cucumbers used to make the pickles. “I don’t know what’s in special sauce,” adds Berenbaum, “but I’ll bet it requires bees.” The bad news is that we’re rapidly losing bees. In the fall of 2006, beekeeper David Hackenberg discovered that 360 of his 400 Florida hives were beeless. Such bee disappearances aren’t unprecedented; ever since people started keeping bees, they’ve been plagued by bee diseases, deaths, and disasters. In the general scheme of things, beekeepers can expect to lose up to 15 percent of their bees each winter. However, Hackenberg’s discovery proved to be the tip of a global iceberg. Suffering from what is now known as Colony Collapse Disorder or CCD, bees are vanishing from hives worldwide. Data from the winter of 2012-2013 showed an average loss of about 45 percent of hives across the United States, and in some places losses are even higher. Worried beekeepers refer to this as “beepocalyse” and “beemageddon.” Drones failDrones fail but the status quo solves – helicoptersWald, 13 Matthew Wald, reporter at The New York Times, B.A. in urban studies from Brown University, “Domestic Drones Stir Imaginations, and Concerns,” The New York Times, 3/17/13, http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/18/business/domestic-drones-on-patrol.html // IS The technology seems so flexible and promising that even some companies involved in conventional aviation are interested. For example, at Applebee Aviation, which flies 11 helicopters out of Banks, Ore., mostly to spray crops, Warren Howe, the sales manager, said a remotely piloted vehicle might never replace a conventional one for that purpose. In a drone, he said, “you’re limited to looking with a camera; you wouldn’t be able to see necessarily the wind changes that control drift, or a spotted owl or something, or beehives in a neighboring yard.” “You may not see that kid coming down the street to take a look because he thinks a helicopter is really cool,” Mr. Howe said. But at the same time, he said, his light helicopters cost $1,100 an hour to charter, and a lot of survey work could be done with a drone instead, mapping out what a manned helicopter would be needed for. Mr. Anderson, in contrast, said that later this year, his company would introduce a helicopter for agricultural surveillance that would sell for less than $1,000. “That’s not per hour, that’s for the helicopter,” he said. No impactNo impact to food shortages – civilization can surviveBeach, 6/6/14 – Toronto-based freelance writer and political activist (Justin, “Stop Worrying, Humans Aren't Going Extinct Any Time Soon,” The Huffington Post, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/justin-beach/human-extinction_b_5457038.html)// IS ‘14 In 2014 there are more nuclear weapons than ever, but we don't really talk about them very much. Instead we talk, primarily about the possibility of human extinction due to climate change, food shortages, ocean acidification or, occasionally, super-volcanos or comet collisions. All of these things are possible, and all of them are very unlikely to cause the extinction of humanity. Given our current population, if something killed 99.99 per cent of the human population, 700,000 people would survive and those people would have the knowledge necessary to make drinking water safe, create sanitation systems, advanced communication systems, make medicines, transportation systems and generate electricity. During the 20th century, we experienced the dust bowl and the great depression, two world wars, worldwide pandemics, numerous genocides and still managed to triple our population and double life expectancy in 100 years. We are a resilient species. It is likely that, by the end of this century, we'll inhabit a second planet and vastly increase our life expectancy rather than face extinction. Food wars don’t happenSalehyan 08/13/07 – Professor of Political Science – University of North Texas (Idean, “The New Myth About Climate Change”, Foreign Policy, http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=3922)// IS ‘14 First, aside from a few anecdotes, there is little systematic empirical evidence that resource scarcity and changing environmental conditions lead to conflict. In fact, several studies have shown that an abundance of natural resources is more likely to contribute to conflict. Moreover, even as the planet has warmed, the number of civil wars and insurgencies has decreased dramatically. Data collected by researchers at Uppsala University and the International Peace Research Institute, Oslo shows a steep decline in the number of armed conflicts around the world. Between 1989 and 2002, some 100 armed conflicts came to an end, including the wars in Mozambique, Nicaragua, and Cambodia. If global warming causes conflict, we should not be witnessing this downward trend. Furthermore, if famine and drought led to the crisis in Darfur, why have scores of environmental catastrophes failed to set off armed conflict elsewhere? For instance, the U.N. World Food Programme warns that 5 million people in Malawi have been experiencing chronic food shortages for several years. But famine-wracked Malawi has yet to experience a major civil war. Similarly, the Asian tsunami in 2004 killed hundreds of thousands of people, generated millions of environmental refugees, and led to severe shortages of shelter, food, clean water, and electricity. Yet the tsunami, one of the most extreme catastrophes in recent history, did not lead to an outbreak of resource wars. Clearly then, there is much more to armed conflict than resource scarcity and natural disasters.
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