Humanity's greatest challenge may soon be just making it to the next harvest.

One way or another, the choice will be made by our generation, but it will affect life on earth for all generations to come

Farmers...can no longer keep up with rising demand; thus the outlook is for chronic scarcities and rising prices.

A sustainable economy represents nothing less than a higher social order one as concerned with future generations as with our own, and more focused on the health of the planet and the poor than on material acquisitions and military might. While it is a fundamentally new endeavor, with many uncertainties, it is far less risky than continuing with business as usual.

Each summer, for example, nitrogen and phosphate washing from farmlands in the Mississippi Valley enter the Gulf of Mexico, creating a massive algal bloom covering some 16,000 square kilometers. As the blooms die off, this area-roughly the size of New Jersey-is so deprived of oxygen that no fish survive.

Population growth is exceeding farmers' ability to keep up...Our oldest enemy, hunger, is again at the door.

Yet, most of the readily accessible reserves of oil formed over hundreds of millions of years will be consumed within a single generation, spanning the years from 1960 to 1995.