Bourgeois Improvidence Blocks Navigation on the Mississippi
As the U.S. federal government and railroads try to avoid supply disruptions caused by an unruly workforce, another threat of chaos looms over the economy. The Mississippi River, the great artery of U.S. freight transportation, due to lack of rainfall has reached its lowest levels in 40 years, preventing barges from being drawn. Water levels in Memphis, Tennessee, a major logistics hub, are nearly 11 feet below average. The sailing time of a barge, the preferred mode of transportation for most agricultural products, from St. Louis, the main trading center on the river at the confluence of the Missouri River, to New Orleans, at the mouth of the great river on the Gulf of Mexico, has doubled.
Barges must be less loaded because of the reduced draft, nine feet compared to twelve in normal times and fourteen on the lower Mississippi. In addition, voyage times have increased greatly; a tug can push fewer barges because of the navigable width, reduced by low water: a typical convoy of 40 barges now pushes only 25. A standard barge loads 1,500 short tons, about 1,361 metric tons, for example 50,000 bushels of soybeans. Every foot less draft reduces the capacity of a barge by 150 to 200 short tons-a 25 to 30 percent reduction.
Army engineers in October began dredging the bottom and raised a berm of mud on the riverbed, which further restricted traffic: it was possible to travel along the Mississippi only during the day and in the berm area alternately one-way. More than 1,000 barges waited in line.
It is important for U.S. farms to ship their products to the international market while the southern hemisphere, particularly South America, is still in winter. The world’s largest soybean producer is Brazil, where the planting season begins in September. Beans are harvested on average after nearly 4 months. As Brazilian production arrives, prices begin to fall. This will result in reduced profits. In addition, the corn harvest is approaching, which will require new shipments.
The problem shows no sign of abating in the near future. Even if rainfall returns soon the dried up soil from the long drought would absorb most of it. Conversely, if the rain were too concentrated, the parched farmland would not have time for it to percolate from the surface, to feed the water tables and springs, and would be washed away.
The bourgeoisie, however, is unwilling to take any measures to mitigate this problem.
The big capitalist powers remain locked into fossil fuels, particularly petrochemicals, as a huge source of profits and rents.
From oil they get not only energy but chemicals for fertilizers. Warming caused by fossil fuel emissions, together with the disruption of the nitrogen cycle caused by overuse of fertilizers, has severely disrupted the natural climate cycles that sustain life on this planet.
The destruction of billions of dollars of capital invested in this sector is unthinkable; too much money is at stake.
Although everyone knows that negative carbon emissions and the restoration of the nitrogen cycle to facilitate the growth of plants, which capture carbon, are necessary to avoid catastrophe, the impassive bourgeoisie insists that we must produce and consume more and more goods. Only communist revolution can lead us off this dead-end course.