How Much Land does it take

To provide enough food for one person to survive
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That seems like a fairly reasonable question doesn't it? One would think that it would NOT involve any politics or ideology?

One would be wrong.

Oddly enough most of the articles I scanned immediately began to shame americans for our diet. Facts were hard to come by.

But I persisted.

My goal is to determine if it is possible for a 'urban aquaponics system' to produce enough food to feed me, my wife, and cats. To do that I have to determine how much food we need.

Not as easy as it might first assume.

Here's what I found out so far.

It's 'generally accepted' that an adult female human requires about 1800 calories a day and that an adult male human needs 'about' 2000.

So...problem solved. Eat a couple of snicker's bars....right?

er..no.

The problem is a bit more complex....

SO..if you want to follow me in my voyage of culinary and nutritional discovery....

• the average American consumes about 2000 lbs of food per year,
  that's a TON of food. no wonder my grocery bill is so high!)
  .
  which works out to about 5.5 lbs and 2700 calories per day–or nearly your entire body weight in food per month.
  .
  Divide those daily 2700 calories by 5.5 lbs and you get 490 calories per pound of food, on average.
  .
  There are differences in the quality

Quality is important, as is price and availability. What can I do to improve on my situation? How much of it can I grow myself? Do I want to do that?

Stay tuned for further episodes.