In part 1 I provided a list of job opportunities that I believe will be growing in demand for many years.
In this article, I’m going to continue providing details to support my assumptions.
3. Farming/Gardening
There is a growing global food crisis that is putting a lot of people in danger of starvation in the next several years. There are a lot of reasons why this is happening.
Natural disasters are increasing which are damaging food sources. For example, hurricanes, floods and earthquakes have damaged many rice fields around the world. These rice fields that cannot be quickly replaced and it will take many years before they will produce as much rice that they did before.
Natural disasters are not the only way the crops have been reduced. Changing weather patterns of extreme hot and cold temperatures are also reducing crops delivered to the market. Both natural disasters and changing weather patterns are contributing to the global food shortage.
Just last week I had to pay an additional $.50 for a sub sandwich because of the increase in tomatoes prices. Apparently a large percent of the current tomato crop recently froze in California.
Tomatoes are a staple item for many types of food. This tomato shortage will drive up the cost of many foods.
Along with shortages, the global credit crisis has been causing many nations to increase their tariffs, which are basically just another way to tax the public to help pay for the rising government debts.
Tariffs are on the rise as they usually are after a deep recession, brought on by the global debt crisis that is likely to continue for many years. Tariffs add to the costs of imports.
Approximately 13 percent of all U.S. food is imported; double what it was 30 years ago. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has been overwhelmed by the increase in demand to inspect all the food being imported.
In the short run, the cheap food has hurt local food producers – but as the government increases the tariffs to pay for the additional inspections that are needed to ensure the quality of imported food – the cost of producing local foods are once again competitive.
Of course few realizes that they are actually paying part of their food costs through an increase in taxes - which taken together is much more expense then purchasing locally grown foods. Voting to increase taxes to support the governments Food and Drug Administration to police foreign imports of cheap foods is much less efficient and much more expensive then growing food locally. We are in effect subsidizing foreign imports with tax dollars - pretty stuppid.
Then there is the growing fear that genetically modified plants and fertilizers are perhaps contributing to the increase in diseases. This is also fueling a debate for local organic foods.
The green energy hype is also fueling the demand for locally grown food because locally grown foods reduce the amount of oil that is needed to transport and store foods. The number of local farmer markets' across the nation has doubled just in the last few years. I have seen four local farmer markets' start up in my area alone.
All these things taken together result is a growing demand to grow more food, both by large farmers and small hobby farmers. The mid-west states have some of the best farm land in the world.
This trend is also creating many jobs related to the industry. For example, everything from tractor suppliers to seed suppliers are already seeing large increases in sales. The companies that supply the needs of the farmers are going to continue to see growth.
If you are looking for a job, consider looking at companies related to producing food or perhaps consider starting your own hobby farm and selling food at a local farmers market. Or if you want a government job, consider working for the FDA.
If you don't find a job in this industry but live in an area that has good soil for growing food, then consider creating your own job by planting a garden to feed your own family. Here is an article about my garden which I have estimated to be worth $3300 per year.
In Part 5, I’m going to continue providing detail about these jobs and why I think demand will continue to grow.