Surplus Food

Unexpected co-operation. After the events of the previous night, Lore was expecting some hesitancy from the Chairman but there was none present when he came to meet with them. After the explosion, the Chairman and his wives were transferred to a safehouse nearby. To show his gratitude for saving him and his staff, he had arranged for Lore and Char to stay in a nearby hotel for the night where he would meet them in the morning.
“What’s this about a famine then?” Shren strolled over to meet them in the hotel’s lobby.
“Are you sure you’re ok Chairman?” Lore looked to Char who looked equally worried. “You don’t want to be with your family?”
“Of course I do.” A tear rolled down his cheek. “But If this famine is important enough for you to travel through time to warn me then I must forego the immediate and consider the long term.”
“Certainly.” Lore nodded. “Ideally we need to bring together the leaders of your planet so you’re better able to pool your resources but we also need to see what you’ve got available to you.”
“Last night I was messaging our sister cities and their leadership teams have both agreed to a summit in three days. The western front are yet to respond. I’ve arranged for a transport to take us to the central food centre.” It was obvious by the speed at which he was talking that he didn’t want to dwell on the events of last night so Lore and Char thought it best not to press the issue. Out of respect, they followed his plan, neglecting to express their sympathies for his children.
The seats of the transport were obviously not designed for them but were still usable. It took a while but eventually, they were within viewing range of the food complex. The building was surrounded by kilometres of farmland, brimming with native vegetation unknown to Lore but exciting to Char.
“It’s been ages since I had a Birygen and they look just about ripe.” She was about to pick one of the fruits but remembered why she was there and stopped herself.
“What’s a Birygen?” Lore looked to both the Chairman and Char.
“We call them Pyrne. They’re a juicy fruit with a hard flesh.”
“They’re basically pears. Last time I checked, you don’t like them.” As soon as the word pear had left her mouth, Lore had stuck their tongue out in disgust. Char nodded. “Excellent harvest this year, Birygen are notoriously poor crops.”
“We planted them as a border for our Zeith, to deter rodents, and they started flowering.”
“Wheat.” While their translator made sense of most of the Chairman’s speech, Char’s translation of proper nouns was appreciated.
The centre itself was enormous, taking up as much room as The Occams Razor and more. The complex was a city in its own rights but felt like a ghost town as Lore stepped down from the transport.
“Six hundred and twenty six kilometres of farming, storage and processing and it only needs a population of two hundred and fifty to keep running.” The Chairman took a deep breath in. “One of our greatest achievements.”
They had stopped outside of the main entrance so had skipped the majority of the trek from the outer gates. Now inside, the building was familiar yet alien. It shared common aspects that Lore had expected to see in an office building yet its layout and fixtures were completely new as the complex had been designed around the physiology of the natives.
“Here we are.” Shren gestured for Lore and Char to come over and look at the computer he had just logged into. “This graph shows how much food is currently in storage and the expected harvest of the grain outside.”
“Now we need to see your area’s consumption rate so you can get an idea of how to best ration it.”
The monitor flickered as the graph updated. A third bar appeared on the chart. The graph now showed a steady decline with the usage bar being higher than the stored foods but lower than the expected harvest.
“How do you get through so much food?” Lore’s voice broke out of confused terror.
“Ah, this might explain things.” A fourth bar joined the graph, this time detailing food waste. It sat at about half the size of the usage bar. “I didn’t realise…” The Chairman was speechless.
“You didn’t realise?” Lore was gobsmacked. “Nearly half of the food your people buy gets wasted?” They tapped the bar, splitting it into its constituent parts. “At the very least, most of the waste is shops so we can stop that.”
“Why are your shops making up half of your food waste? Why do you have this data? Why haven’t you done anything with it?” Char was beginning to get angry. “The only place where a planet full of food could go hungry…”
“It’s relatively recent… The report came out a week ago and it has been a priority…Given the circumstances, I think plans will have to change.” The tone of Shren’s voice dropped. “What do we do?”
“What definitions were used to work out what was food waste?” Char pointed to the bar.
“Anything that was disposed of but still edible. Anything past its consumption date but still fine to eat.”
“That’s what you change your consumption date to then.” Lore started. “The consumption dates need to reflect when the product is actually edible not when it’s at its best.”
“Then you need to work out the amount of food the average family needs to consume in a week to stay alive.” Char tapped at the screen. “So, if we say that the next two years are going to have the same harvests and then…” She devolved into a quiet mumble. “There you go. If you eliminate most home and shop food waste and institute rationing city wide by the end of the week, your city alone has enough food for the next twelve years.”
“Twelve years.” The Chairman echoed. “We’ll survive the famine.”
“Not necessarily, you still have to consider the other settlements.” Lore’s reminder dampened his spirits.
“The other cities…” The Chairman didn’t sound positive as he began dialling his counterparts numbers. Long-range Forecast.