Can we talk about inflation and food?

Spend just a few minutes reading, researching and looking around our globe. Its a crazy time frought with dangers, war, disease, and peril. And we here in America seem to feel insulated from major issues. Yet inflation is rising, prices are skyrocketing on everyday goods… and we are beginning to see bare spots on our grocery store shelves.

The truth is there is a very real and serious event coming…. there will be massive shortages of food world wide. Some of this precipitated by war, and some from wrong management of the agricultural business. In other cases it is a drought, and in general a large amount of farms have put their fields to fallow because of the rising cost of fuel, shortage of fertilizer, and shortage of labor. Even investment professionals are beginning to consider the shortage of food production world wide.

So can we talk? Can we begin a dialog on how to prepare for this crisis?

Here are four practical things you can do to prepare your household for this never before known to America event:

• When you grocery shop pick up a few extra things…. buy what you would eat, but add dry goods like rice, beans, barley, oatmeal to your list, and begin a small stash in your home. One tip on storing dry beans is to put the package in the freezer for 3-5 days, then remove and store on a shelf. This adds length to the storage capability of beans.
• Buy seeds and start a garden. There are a lot of resources out there to show you how to grow vegetables whether in a full blown garden, or pots on your patio. Grow food you like… while learning or improving your gardening skills. If you dont know how to grow food, reach out to friends and neighbors that do.. even though it’s July, it’s not too late to plant lettuce, beans, beets, carrots and fall greens like kale.
• Learn to can food. Applesauce is a super easy one to start with. Then there are jams and jellies that go quickly. Learning the skill of canning will allow you to preserve the harvests of your garden or the bounty you find. Every year we buy a case or two of peaches and can them up in the hot summer. they are so good to open up in the middle of the winter!!! If you dont know how to can and would like to learn there are amazing resources out there. If you live in the Cleveland area I am willing to teach you.
• Encourage others to do the same.