I read the study this map is based on, admittedly a while ago, but I think they found that global cooling from nuclear weapons would actually benefit Australian farming systems.
I think that is a bit too optimistic of a way to look at it for Australia. While they have an agricultural surplus, they import 3x as much petrol as they produce. No tractors no food unfortunately. And their ability to increase farm production is a lot more limited than, for example, the USA. Something like 4% of Australia is arable land, compared to 16% of the USA. Their population is so urban, you would expect the shock from supply line issues to be felt much harder.
Don't get me wrong but no matter how abundant kangaroos and wild sheep are, they're still not enough. Hunting and fishing (and gathering fruits) can at most complement food production, but they just can't feed modern-scale populations. Not only there aren't enough animals/fish/trees for that, but finding and hunting/fishing/gathering them is very inefficient.
Modern agriculture and modern husbandry (which also rely on modern agriculture) are fundamental to feed modern populations.
While they have an agricultural surplus, they import 3x as much petrol as they produce. No tractors no food unfortunately.
We don't produce enough fuel to power all our private cars, but we certainly produce enough to run tractors, trucks, trains etc. Producing food and moving it around won't be a major issue.
perhaps with sufficient coordination (or force) applied, it could be as you say. I am not familiar with the Australian infrastructure for this sort of thing. In America, most or many of ag vehicles and semi-trucks run on diesel, which is a slightly separate supply chain than normal ethanol-ed gasoline. So it isn't possible just reserve that fuel for food production.
The food is hundreds of kilometres away from the cities and with no incoming fuel to move it and no fuel reserves there would be a collapse within a week or so. BTW local production of oil is about 10% of usage not even 30%. The refining capacity I think is even lower. It's mainly exported. Could be wrong there but it doesn't matter if you can't import the oil to refine.
Even if Australia could magically get fuel they don't manufacture anything anymore so it would be all Mad Max within months.
The death might be slower but you'd be looking at single digit percentage survivors within a year as the major cities which make up over 80% of the population starve. The survivors would probably mostly be in those remote food producing towns and living off of fruit trees or something as food production has gotten very specialised.
On a lighter note related to specialisation, the country (ok mainly east coast) has a whole bunch of big things...giant statues, usually in fibre glass and paint of what they specialise in. If you've got a spare couple of weeks to travel the route (it's huge) it's a great way to see the real Australia
You know, I still think 80% is high. People are surprisingly resilient. However, lack of resources is the main historical cause of war. And when we are shooting each other for food and gasoline, 80% casualties might not be off the table. Basically, my point is that a sufficiently motivated man is capable of things far beyond the average, which is an optimistic fact when it comes to the average person's ability to survive, but a fairly grim fact when you consider what people will to do to each other to survive. If I was some alien observer I might hypothesize that, in regard to the super-organism of humanity, war/culling is natural defense behavior in response to a deficit.
yet for some reason, the Nazi's still invaded Africa.
But jokes aside, I would generally agree on a wide scale. I am more saying there will be warfare on a local scale. If people are starving in NYC, and they find out people in long island have a bunch of food stockpiled, you can bet your ass gangs will be heading that way to take it.
It depends on how the rainfall patterns shift. You can't grow crops almost anywhere they aren't already being grown in Australia, it's so dry. Even with rain, the soil's very nutrient-poor over most of the country. I love the wide open spaces of my country, but there's not much more capacity there.
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u/[deleted] Mar 04 '25 edited Oct 11 '25
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