Date: July 15, 1997 03:27 PM
Author: Al Durtschi (rcox@mail.lcc.whecn.edu)
Subject: Introduction to Food Storage

Why store?

Even if the y2k bug doesn't bite us very hard, which is unlikely, there are lots of reasons for putting away a year supply of food.

The world we live in today is fast moving, ever changing and full of surprises. On top of this, there has never been a time when the average family has had less food in their homes than now. A hundred years ago, people generally didn't go to the store very often. As a rule, North America was much more agrarian in the past than it is today, with people growing the majority of the plants and animals they ate. Today, many of us would be at our rope's end after just a couple of days of not being able to go to the grocery store. Listed below are some of the things that have happened within the last couple of years to break up a normal family's food supply channels:

• Loss of employment
• Strikes
• Fire
• Floods
• Droughts
• Hurricanes
• Wind Storms
• Civil unrest
• Earthquakes
• Injury or death of the prime wage earner

It's a good guess that every family will have at least one serious crisis during their life time. During such times, a family shouldn't have to worry about what they are going to eat.

So why not be ready for it? If you were the town's mayor during a time of disaster, wouldn't it be a great relief for you if 1/2 of the inhabitants of your town had a three day supply of emergency supplies. A month supply? And wouldn't it be great to know not only you, but all the neighbors on your street had an emergency supply of food and other items? One thing is for sure: When an actual emergency arises, the time for preparation is past. One of the greatest advantages that can come to you from this type of preparation is peace of mind.

How much is enough?

The U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) suggests at least a three day supply. The rationale is that in the event of a disaster it will take at least three days for emergency personnel to get things going again. In case you must leave your dwelling it needs to be already together and transportable. It's referred to as a '72 hour kit.' You should have at least three days worth of anything and everything you might need in the worst of conditions.

Somewhat on the other end of the spectrum is the LDS Church who believes strongly in maintaining a year's supply. Whatever you choose to believe, it is a good idea to put something away for 'that rainy day.'

What follows is some Basic rules for home storage:

Rule 1: Store what you eat, and eat what you store. It would be too bad to have a supply of food you would only eat with the greatest reluctance. Also, you can spend a lot of money on a supply of food and other provisions now, but after 15-20 years it won't be much good anymore. Which brings us to the second rule.

Rule #2: Rotate your food supply. Eat the old and replace it with new food. It's great on the pocket book. Large amounts can be purchased when they are on sale, then used when they aren't. This may also require you to change your eating habits just a bit - like eating a few more beans and making more wheat mush and whole wheat bread. Again, if you are not into beans and whole wheat bread, then don't buy wheat and beans for your storage. This brings us to another important point.

Rule #3: Whatever you store, insure it is as nutritious as possible with the 50 essential elements required for health. You should include a mineral/vitamin supplement. Some of the more important elements are the essential amino acids (proteins). For financial reasons for most of us, the majority of your protein will come from plants. Rule #4: Special care should be taken in preserving your emergency supply, especially if you plan on storing it for several years. Generally, if you plan on using it up within a year it should be safe to store your dry grains and beans in the paper or plastic bags it came in. But if you do this, be sure you have a cool, dry place to keep it, free of rodents or insects. If you are planning on it being around for a while there are several different ways to preserve it:

• 5 or 6 gallon plastic food pails. To get rid of the oxygen, give it a squirt of nitrogen in the bottom. Another way is to use Dry Ice. The carbon dioxide it gives off as it evaporates will displace the air in the bucket.
• Can your produce in bottles. This works best for fresh vegetables and fruits, and even meat if it is done correctly. However, know that after two years, wet packed foods in cans or bottles lose much of their nutritional value. Rotation is the key!
• Dehydrate your own foods. Some foods that lend themselves well to this kind of food preservation are potatoes, carrots, onions, peppers, and all kinds of fruits. After dehydration, be sure to store them in air tight bags or containers. It would also be a good idea to throw in a couple of oxygen absorber packets.
• Whatever method you use to preserve your food, Store it in a cool, dry, dark place.

Rule 5: Learn to grow a garden now before any hard times come. Yes, I am sneaking into another forum here on Gary North's site, but I firmly believe a garden on which you can live off is an important part of every family's year supply. Learning to grow a garden now will get the trial and error out of the way before you really need to eat off your garden. For someone who has never grown a garden before, it is not as easy as it may seem. Each part of the country has it's unique challenges. There is a real art to growing a great garden and this knowledge doesn't come all at once. Become proficient at it now, and learn now how to preserve what you grow.

Getting back to what you should store, someone in the LDS Church wrote a little freeware DOS program (87K) back in 1989 that really spells most of it out. You can download it at http://waltonfeed.com/self/foodstor.zip. Or you can find a link to a really high speed food storage program for Windows or Mac on one of our pages that contains much of the information in this post at http://waltonfeed.com/self/plan.html. It's in the middle of the page.

Al

See http://waltonfeed.com/grain/faqs/vi-c.html
for a listing of food storage companies.

(http://garynorth.entrewave.com/forums/Index.cfm?CFApp=16&Message_ID=387)

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Date: August 15, 1997 05:18 PM
Author: Joe Jeffries (joejeffries@hotmail.com)


I have a question.

It seems that a serious depression could start in 1999 as people begin to understand and run on the banks. Then there might be a complete collapse as power, banks etc go down in Jan 2000.

So, in round numbers, we have spring of 1998 and 1999 to learn to farm. Then we have to have enough food stored to get us through to harvest time 2000.

So, in pure theory, food we store now must last 3 or four years tops.

So, the question is, if we buy bulk food in Al/Waltonfeed's best bucket packaging, and store it in a mini-warehouse (I live in hot Florida), will it last that long to get us through to harvest time 2000?

Thanks.

(http://garynorth.entrewave.com/forums/Index.cfm?CFApp=16&Message_ID=1535)