With China and other foreign nations buying up farmland in the U.S., Brandon Smith of Alt-Market.us discusses the harmful ramification for Americans, and the future of our economy.
In the past three years China has accelerated export agreements and industrial operations in Africa, becoming the continent’s largest bilateral trade partner. Given Africa’s complete lack of development and GDP, the Asian rush to cement economic ties might seem strange. However, I would argue that China is adapting to events that haven’t quite happened yet.
I’m referring to a major global shift away from interdependent markets (i.e. traditional globalism) into a chaotic period of trade protectionism. I’m talking about the end of the current model of export-based nations supplying goods to the west in exchange for advantageous trade deficits and access to dollars. This will be the era of what I would call the “Great Resource Grab.”
I believe China is positioning itself for this era, perhaps out of desperation due to the disastrous economic decline they are currently trying to hide from the rest of the world, or maybe the CCP has been given a warning from globalist interests. (China’s government has been exceedingly supportive of the IMF’s one-world digital currency push, and it makes sense that globalists would give them vital information on future disasters in exchange.)
Why Africa? Because of the lack of modern development, Africa is a vast land mass loaded with untapped natural resources. China is importing billions in raw materials including vital metals from Africa and they are trying to establish infrastructure to increase the extraction of these commodities. If you are familiar with China’s rotting domestic conditions, then you understand what is happening here – China has hollowed out their own country and they must spread into other regions to survive.
To be sure, Africa is not the only place in which the Chinese are quietly setting up camp. Through diplomatic agreements that have been given access to Russian farmland in the north, and they have even been buying up farmland in the U.S. (nearly 400,000 acres according to official reports). In America, anyone that questions this trend is immediately accused of “conspiracy theory” and I would argue this tells us A LOT about what is really happening.
Yes, other nations besides China are buying up farmland in the U.S. (over 43 million acres of farmland to be precise), and frankly, no one in the establishment media is talking about it. The Chinese purchases make the news because communist nations buying resource rich land in the U.S. makes Americans nervous; but the overall problem is being ignored. Foreign land holdings in the U.S. dwarf those recently purchased by Bill Gates, and no one is addressing the issue.
There is a change happening on a global scale; it’s a silent race to secure as many raw resources as possible. Those who know are stacking land assets, mining assets, energy assets, fresh water sources and circling undeveloped nations like hungry piranha.
Some will claim that the Great Resource Grab is about climate change and governments positioning for impending weather calamity. This is incorrect. If that was the case, then China would not be coveting Africa, a continent that would be devastated should global warming predictions ever come true (they won’t). Instead, I believe the change is about impending war, both economic and kinetic.
Global war will be the catalyst for massive trade protectionism and disruption of existing supply chains. Economic sanctions and trade embargoes will shrink exports between East and West down to nothing. And, sadly, western nations with their paper markets will be most injured by this. Our economies are mainly abstract, rooted in currencies with abstract values, equities with abstract values, and debt instruments with abstract values. All of this comes crashing down when nations start desiring physical resources over the false promises of market speculation.
In other words, what we have in the U.S. in terms of raw commodities will be ALL we have for many years to come should the Great Resource Grab come to fruition. Buying from other countries may not be possible, simply because we will be in conflict with them, or because we won’t have anything they want. Meaning, America will have to return to production again on a level surpassing that of the 1960s and early 1970s.
To be sure, this era will be short, maybe lasting around a decade. Eventually, globalists will try to use the worldwide division and subsequent crisis as a vehicle for total centralization. They’ll say, “This is why nation states are a bad idea.” They’ll argue that a one-world digital currency system and global economic governance is the only solution. During this debate, the average person will face a much different consumer environment than they are used to – one of scarcity instead of plenty.
Globalists will make promises of plenty that they do not intend to keep as western populations struggle to return to domestic production.
By extension, investment in vital commodities used for production and wealth protection (such as gold or other precious metals) would be a good move. Look at what certain foreign entities, central banks and globalist companies are buying up right now and ask yourself “why?” Look at past world wars and what kinds of resources were in short supply; there is a way to protect yourself financially even in the midst of international calamity, you just have to know some history and accept the fact that the world we live in today is not any safer than it was back then.
Brandon Smith has been an alternative economic and geopolitical analyst since 2006 and is the founder of Alt-market.us