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Comment by sva_ | Hacker News Reader

I recently looked into how much rice I'd need to survive for a year. The results were fairly surprising. A kilogram of uncooked rice only provide you with about 3500 kcal, less than you'd use in 2 days of time (for the average human). So you'd need quite a lot of rice. Beans are similar, they just have more protein (not a complete protein though).

I concluded that while it is definitely advisable to have some number of days/weeks in storage, it doesn't seem feasible to store enough food to last a prolonged period of time (unless you go all-in on prepping, which has its limits). We humans are as successful as we are because we cooperate with other humans, and on our own we're pretty powerless. So fostering community might be the best way to advert crisis.

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You don't need 2k calories a day in an emergency.

You can survive on 1200-1500 calories a day.

I still don't advise going in 100% on rice as beri-beri is an issue (or heavy metal issues if you go all brown rice).

A good mix of canned goods, dried goods and reliable water will help. Even in a shortage you will probably have some access, but limited access.

I strongly advise against bottled water for emergencies. It is the worst possible solution for cost/size/availability. You can buy 6 gallon aquatainers and fill them with tap water for an easy (and useful for camping) solution. Rotate every six months and you don't need secondary treatment.

Otherwise a food grade 55 gallon drum is $100 and you can fill it from your tap. You will want secondary treatment options if you plan to rotate just every 2 years, and you still need a smaller intermediary vessel.

Speak for yourself! I’m biking distance from a lake, so I’m going to focus on having enough bleach around. Bottled water is great… for bottles to do solar disinfection with. Though I guess I should really be worried about an algal bloom… ugh.

220gal IBCs should be $100 too, but maybe they’re more now.

you can buy handheld, portable, battery-powered, solar-recharging devices that electrolytically produce bleach from salt and water

Bleach degrades fast though. Look into pool shock and know how to make bleach from it.

You're forgetting about your fats. A 5 gal container of oil contains about 153,000 calories.

Every time you cook rice, beans, spit peas, lentils, etc. you put in a few tablespoons of oil or fat to keep it from boiling over, and to add flavor and calories. Each tablespoon is about 120 calories. When you make hummus, refried beans, tamales or spanish rice you generally add in a considerable amount more fats.

My assumption is that if I'm trying to survive more than about two weeks, "possessions" are a cute theoretical idea.

My friends were talking about his. If a food shortage hits the plan is to consume the perishable stuff while massively cutting calories.

The goal is to reduce excess muscle and reduce the metabolism.

Rip off the bandaid and then the food rationing won't be as uncomfortable.

After a few days of fasting you lose a lot of your hunger.

Muscle is protective against injury & against angry humans.

Right, its always a good idea to have short term reserves but it's way more important to build out local and regional resilience and a less vulnerable, more robust, diverse food supply

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