The energy crisis in Germany is now a confluence of terrible events that will snowball well into next year.

The world’s largest chemical company, BASF, has announced they will cut down the production of ammonia in order to use less natural gas.

In the short term this will help Germany build up natural gas supplies to survive a cold winter with predicted rationing still planned.  However, in the long term the shortage of ammonia means less fertilizer which will mean future shortages and increased costs for farmers; ultimately creating lower yields next year.

FRANKFURT, July 27 (Reuters) – Germany’s BASF (BASFn.DE), the world’s largest chemical company, is cutting ammonia production further due to soaring natural gas prices, it said on Wednesday, with potential ramifications from farming to fizzy drinks.

Germany’s biggest ammonia maker SKW Piesteritz and number four Ineos also said they could not rule out production cuts as the country grapples with disruption to Russian gas supplies.

Ammonia plays a key role in the manufacturing of fertiliser, engineering plastics and diesel exhaust fluid. Its production also yields high-purity carbon dioxide (CO2) as a byproduct, which is needed by the meat and fizzy drinks industries.

(more…)

According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) global economic activity, as measured by economic outputs, contracted in the second quarter.  However, when it comes to identifying the cause of the issue, the IMF joins western financial leaders and central banks in playing the game of pretending.

The radical new energy program contained within the Build Back Better agenda, is the root cause of the supply side inflation.  The drop in the production of oil, gas and coal in the same western nations that are following the BBB agenda is origin of the massive spike in energy prices.

Inflation is a major issue, geographically consistent and virtually identical in all the nations who are following the Build Back Better climate change agenda, which is the justification for the energy ‘transition.”  However, not a single leader, central bank or multinational financial institution -including the IMF- will admit the energy policy is the cause of the issue.

(IMF) – The world’s three largest economies are stalling, with important consequences for the global outlook. Inflation is a major concern.

The global economy, still reeling from the pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, is facing an increasingly gloomy and uncertain outlook. Many of the downside risks flagged in our April World Economic Outlook have begun to materialize.

(more…)

As oft repeated, in order for severe ideologues to retain their insufferably bad policy they must pretend not to know things.  However, in the case of food shortages, the pretending about the origin of the problem has severe consequences.

Vladimir Putin’s military action against eastern Ukraine had nothing to do with the severe food shortages and inflation in Sri Lanka {link}.  Nor does Putin have any influence over the Dutch government trying to stop food production {link}.  Additionally, Putin has no control over Justin Trudeau’s decision to limit harvest yields by blocking the use of nitrogen-based fertilizer {link}. More importantly, it was not Vladimir Putin who forced all the western politicians to sign up for a new ‘climate friendly’ energy program that is destroying the ability of western farms to generate higher yield crops.

You do not need to be a farmer to understand that nitrogen/phosphorus-based industrial fertilizer has been the reason why farm yields have generated massive amounts of food on a global basis.  The United States, Canada, the U.K. and places like the Netherlands have massively increased their ability to generate food for export, in large part due to the success of improved fertilizer and crop saving modern pesticides.  Take those farming advancements away under the guise of climate change and you get a global Sri Lanka.

Those western climate and energy policies create downstream consequences.  The decision to chase a new global energy policy under the name “Build Back Better,” in combination with short-sighted EU sanctions against Russia, and you get food shortages. And boy howdy are they trying to avoid taking responsibility for it.

It was not Vladimir Putin who told British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz their proactive recommendation to switch from crop-based biofuels to human food would be blocked.  That G7 decision was made by Justin Trudeau and Joe Biden. {link} Even more significantly, it was not Russia who threatened the multinational energy companies about investing in Africa for expanded natural gas supplies for their fertilizer needs. That threat came from the same western government alliance, per their instructions from the World Economic Forum group {link}.

(more…)

Until people understand what is happening, we cannot correct things or even respond to them accurately.  Many people don’t want to accept what is happening.  Even more still believe in the Schoolhouse Rock civics they were taught in grade school and cannot accept how these ideologues operate.  As long as denial remains a survival mechanism, correction is difficult.

All of the people on the monetary policy side of the economic equation are working earnestly to manage the global economy into a decline thereby slowing the need for energy production. The bankers are supporting the Build Back Better policy makers by putting the western economies into an intended contraction.  Slowing the western economies helps to lower energy use and moderate/offset the extreme increases in cost (coal, oil, gas, electricity, fuel etc) the policies are creating.

Lower economic activity means less income, job security and wealth for the working class. Simultaneously, increased energy costs mean more expenses for the same workers who are losing income and wealth.  This is the ‘managing’ part of their collectively “managed transition.”  They are monitoring and managing the pitchforks.

In this Meet the Press segment with Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, you will note she says “lower economic activity during this transition” is good.  She also happily says businesses are taking “appropriate” action to lower their activity, because that is exactly what the central planners want.  They want businesses to do less, create less, sell less, even employ less, because ultimately, they want businesses to help advance the cause of climate change by consuming less energy resources.  WATCH:

The central bankers are trying to support western government policy.  Unfortunately, the government policy they are under obligation to support is the fundamental energy shift, or what the World Economic Forum (Davos Group) has called the “Build Back Better” climate change agenda.

(more…)

Neil Oliver uses his weekly monologue to challenge the originating precept of the Great Reset, Build Back Better or New World Order, agenda. Get beyond the talking points and every policy from within the World Economic Forum instructions boils down to the quackery behind anti-humanism.

“The so-called Green Agenda is predicated on the rape of the earth for rare minerals, lithium and cobalt and more,” he points out. “Also, metals like copper, silver and gold. The extraction of those commodities means wholesale destruction of environments,” he adds. “Before a single turbine is raised or solar panel set in place, the sites are cleared and sterilized of all life. The turbines held up by massive plunks of concrete and while in action they kill millions of birds. When they come to the end of their working lives there’s nothing to be done with the colossal blades but to bury them in vast landfill sites.”  As Oliver notes all of this is being done under the hypocrisy of calling it “green”. WATCH:

.

(more…)

Let me say from the outset, with a degree of specific assurance we generally reserve for other matters, Russia had nothing to do with the targeting of a grain facility in the port city of Odesa.  Geopolitically and strategically, such an action would be against their interests.  These events have the smell of the U.S. State Dept and CIA all over them.

Start by first reviewing the agreement between Russia and Ukraine that was announced yesterday. July 22 (Reuters) – Russia and Ukraine signed a landmark deal on Friday to reopen Ukrainian Black Sea ports for grain exports, raising hopes that an international food crisis … can be eased.”   NATO country Turkey, specifically Recep Erdogan, brokered the deal between Russia and Ukraine.  Ignore the narrative engineering and WATCH:

Russia was particularly a geopolitical beneficiary from the agreement itself.  No longer could NATO and the western alliance blame Russia for the void in gobal food markets associated with the conflict in Ukraine.

From the perspective of Russian President Putin, the grain movement through the port city of Odesa was a net benefit.  “Russia has taken on the obligations that are clearly spelled out in this document. We will not take advantage of the fact that the ports will be cleared and opened. We have made this commitment,” said Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.

However, from the perspective of the Western alliance, the agreement mooted one of their biggest justifications for the upcoming global food shortage.   If Ukraine and Russia are exporting food, and yet food costs are still rising…. well, the food shortage impact from western energy disruption, the Build Back Better agenda, starts to become increasingly visible.

Suddenly, within hours of the trade agreement, the grain transportation system and the port city of Odesa come under fire from mysterious cruise missiles.

(more…)

Purchasing managers for both goods and services are reporting a strong contraction in orders.  The decline in goods has been subtle up to this point, with June and July now reflecting a significant change to the negative.  More concerning is the severe change on the service side.

Contraction within business activity is now happening in almost all sectors of the economy.

Bloomberg Reports – US business activity contracted in July for the first time in more than two years as manufacturers and service providers signaled sluggish demand that only adds to heightened recession anxieties.

The S&P Global flash composite purchasing managers output index slid 4.8 points to 47.5, the weakest reading since May 2020, the group reported Friday. Outside of the early months of the pandemic, the July figure is the weakest in data back to 2009. Readings below 50 indicate contraction. 

[…]  “The preliminary PMI data for July point to a worrying deterioration in the economy,” Chris Williamson, chief business economist at S&P Global Market Intelligence, said in a statement.

“Manufacturing has stalled and the service sector’s rebound from the pandemic has gone into reverse, as the tailwind of pent-up demand has been overcome by the rising cost of living, higher interest rates and growing gloom about the economic outlook,” Williamson said.

(more…)

A few years ago, we might have just brushed this type of ideological policy aside and called the guy a nut.  However, he might indeed be a nut, but more and more countries are adopting the climate change farming policy he is advocating.  {Direct Rumble Link} WATCH (2 minutes):

.

I often wonder about the mental health of these people.

(more…)

EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, a woman of notoriously bureaucratic disposition, has proposed that all member nations to reduce their use of natural gas by 15% in order to subsidize and protect the larger member nations -specifically Germany- who are more dependent on Russian energy.

Spain, Portugal and Greece are balking at the idea of voluntary cuts in order to spread the energy resources to the larger economies.

Things amid the EU could get spicy again, with the league of nations in Brussels taking control of economic wealth distribution.

BRUSSELS, July 20 (Reuters) – The European Union set out emergency plans on Wednesday for countries to cut their gas use by 15% until March, warning them that without deep cuts now they could struggle for fuel during winter if Russia cuts off supply.

Europe is racing to fill its gas storage ahead of winter and build a buffer in case Moscow further restricts supplies in retaliation for European support for Ukraine following Russia’s invasion.

[…] The regulation needs approval from a reinforced majority of EU countries. Country diplomats are set to discuss it on Friday, with the aim of approving it at an emergency meeting of their energy ministers on July 26.

(more…)

In May the inflation rate in the U.S. increased to 8.6%, a few weeks later the European Union measured their May inflation rate to match at an exact 8.6% {link}.  In June the U.S. inflation rate increased again to 9.1%, and now we see the U.K. reporting their June inflation rate today at 9.4%.

While the individual amounts of government COVID-19 spending amid the U.S, U.K. and Europe were different, the percentage of that spending in relationship to the size of their economy was very similar.  As a result, the global inflation rates contain strong parallels.

None of these parallels are accidental.  All of this economic turmoil is running on an identical track -on a global basis- because the entire western plan was coordinated and followed.  What we are seeing right now is the outcome of the “Build Back Better” roadmap.  The “global inflation” is the outcome.

Joe Biden is blocking domestic energy production as he follows through with the agenda of the Green New Deal.  In Europe, not coincidentally demanded by Biden, a similar outcome comes from the sanctions and blocking of Russian energy resources.

One could make a reasonable argument that the team behind Joe Biden specifically wanted the EU sanctions against Russia, because the U.S. crew wanted to keep both industrial economies mirroring each other as the U.S. energy system was dismantled.  It would make sense to avoid a spotlight on the U.S. economic collapse, by forcibly pushing the EU economy into the same situation.

Taking that line of geopolitical and economic consequence one step further, and that would be part of the strategy -albeit undiscussed- behind having a consistent global cap on the price that any nation could pay for Russian oil.  That approach is not about punishing Russia, it is to make all of the economic pain and problems equal amid all western nations.  Globalists, and the central bankers, are good at creating economic systems to deliver equitable misery.

(more…)