Malta self-sufficient for most vegetables

Paul Smith

Mar 3rd 2009, 17:53

Gents,

You both have missed my point. My point is, you need to farm better - either that or reduce your population. There is no argument in this, you have no other choice. You will not be able to feed half a million people without large imports of nitrogen fertilizer large amounts of water. Your water table is dropping and fertilizer is derived from natural Gas so will become very expensive, then there is fuel for farm equipment, Malta like the rest of Europe needs to take a deep look at farming and also needs to free up more land and start to employ more people in agriculture and new farming technologies, i wish you well , we are all going to need it, we face a severe decline other the next decade in both oil and Gas and this will effect every aspect of our lives.

V Zammit

Mar 3rd 2009, 17:21

@Paul Smith
I believe you should get your facts straight on water. Most of Malta's fields use what are called dry agriculture (methods) - that is the only crops grown are grown during the wet season, not throughout the year, as they do not have sources of water. Only a small amount of the land is under irrigation, which allows it to produce almost year round. Should water come from Reverse Osmosis, as you imply, it would be prohibitively expensive and all farmers would go bankrupt!! Water in Malta comes from only a number of sources - conservation by collecting water from roads and storing it in reservoirs, extraction from the Upper Water Table (the water found on the Blue Clay stratum), extraction from the Mean Sea Level Aquifer, and pumping up water from our ephemeral streams during the wet season, to compensate for the oncoming dry season. Till some years ago, there was also some 2nd class water produced by the Sant Antnin Recycling Plant which was used for irrigation purposes in Southern Malta - I am not aware of the situation on this topic nowadays so I cannot comment any further on it.

Adrian Archer

Mar 3rd 2009, 17:19

@Paul Smith

I believe what you said is true. However, I must point out one thing. When one says that Malta is self sufficient when it comes to vegs, the meaining is that it can provide its own vegs that are grown locally. Self sufficiency does not mean that all the material are obtainied locally.

What it means is that the demand for most vegs, milk and eggs can be supplied through local production. Partial self sufficiency means that we do produce things like wine and potatoes but we need to import them as well to meet our local demand.

Paul Smith

Mar 3rd 2009, 14:08

This is very misleading. Malta imports nitrogen ferts as well as top soil. Pigs are also very energy intensive and require lots of cereal crops.
And what about water? My guess is most comes from reverse osmosis.

Can Malta produce all it's veg and pig meat without fossil fuels?

You will need to start to do this.