In the civilized world, where we go to supermarkets and all the food we want comes cleaned and wrapped we almost never pause to think what it means.
There are today 7 billion persons on earth. Let us assume for our purpose here that each person consumes just 1 kg, or 2.2 lb, of food a day (North Americans consume far more than that). That is minimum of 7 billion kg of food needed everyday.
The total land area of the earth (assuming that all of it is equally utilizable for cultivation) is 149,450,000 sq.km. On the average, therefore, there is 21,350 sq.m of land for every person, and, therefore, every 58.5 sq.m (approx. an area 7.6 m by 7.6 m, or 25 ft by 25 ft) of land has to produce the equivalent of 1 kg of food every day. Or put another way, every square foot of land has to produce 1.7 kg of food every year.
But, of course, not all the land on earth are cultivatable (or even inhabitable) or available for such cultivation. For the moment let us just assume that half of the Earth's mass is currently unavailable as a source of our food; places like the Sahara Desert or the Polar (or near polar) regions. This means that every square foot of land has to produce 3.4 kg of food ever year. And this is just the minimalist figure we had assumed for our purpose. And we have not even taken into consideration the needs of all the animals; whether they are carnivorous or vegetarian, they derive all their nutrition ultimately from the plants that grow on the same square feet from which we get our feed. What a great weight of provision our Father has placed on the Earth for all that He has made!
©ALBERITH
191203lch