26 LHE AUD U BOW 7BeU iS aes 
FAMINE — 1975! AMERICA’S DECISION: WHO WILL SURVIVE? 
by William & Paul Paddock. Little, Brown & Co., Boston, 1967. $€.50 
This book is the handwriting on the wall. The locomotive of famine is 
roaring full throttle down the track. Famine is inevitable. 
The Paddock brothers — one a retired Foreign Service Officer of the 
State Department, the other a plant pathologist and agronomist, with a 
combined forty years experience of “working and traveling in the under- 
developed, hungry nations on all continents” — present with good docu- 
mentation the dilemma of the world’s inability to cope with the specter of 
famine before it strikes. They claim that within 8 to 10 years from now, 
parts of the underdeveloped world will be suffering from famine, and in 
15 years these famines will be catastrophic with revolutions and social 
turmoil. These upheavals will sweep areas of Asia, Africa, and Latin 
America. 
No amount of increased crop production on a realistic basis, birth 
control, or foreign aid can avert the tragedy that will strike India, China, 
Peru, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Turkey, Columbia, and others. Even Soviet 
Russia is said to be hard pressed for food and cannot be expected to help 
feed its communistic friends. 
The United States alone, with its present food surpluses, may be able 
to save some countries — but not all. The Paddock brothers recommend 
that the U.S. help only those who have the leadership and national 
capacity to pull themselves through the times of famine. We haven’t the 
capacity to save everyone; wise choices must be made to avoid wasting 
help on the hopeless nations. 
Further, the Paddock brothers point out, aid given by the United 
States means depletion of our own wealth and resources. It takes much 
land, machines, minerals, oil, and hard work by the American people to 
produce food to feed the world. Before the famine is over, Americans may 
be called upon to cultivate submarginal land and even nature preserves 
to feed the hungry. 
Within weeks after the Paddock brothers’ book appeared on bookstands, 
“The Kiplinger Washington Letter” (June 23, 1967) was warning that there 
was an explosive situation developing in world food supplies. Kiplinger 
predicted the U.S. will be asked to ship more food abroad, and this will 
mean a change in farm policy, 1.e., from holding down production to in- 
creasing it. They intimated that the wise investor will buy into agricultural- 
associated business and land. 
Conservationists should note this book well and move to immediate 
action. Land, even waste lands, will become more valuable than ever in 
these coming times of crises. Whatever nature preserves are secured now 
may be the only ones we can acquire for reasonable prices. 
If the Paddock brothers’ warning has even half the danger implied, 
conservationists ought to take heed and act fast to preserve what we can 
of our natural heritage before the locomotive of famine comes around 
our corner. 
—Dr. Lewis Stannard 
THE SILENT EXPLOSION 
by Philip Appleman. Beacon Press, Boston. 1966. 
The author concludes that it is imperative to reduce the population growth 
rate throughout most of the world. His reasons are two fold: the popula- 
