If Africa vanished

[Rider]

If the entire contintent of Africa disappeared overnight, would the world’s economy be noticeably effected? And as a supplementary question, does the world put more into Africa in terms of foreign aid than it gets out?

[ResIpsaLoquitor]

I imagine there’d be a big hole that water would suddenly go rushing into. Every continent’s shorelines would be notably extended, and shipping/fishing industries worldwide would be devastated. Beachfront property would be worthless desert property.

[Bryan_Ekers]

Diamond pricing would more accurately reflect their scarcity, and not simply the whim of DeBeers.

[kniz]

*Originally posted by Bryan Ekers *
**Diamond pricing would more accurately reflect their scarcity, and not simply the whim of DeBeers. **

The problem is that diamonds really aren’t scarce, especially with modern means of moving dirt around. If it weren’t for DeBeers, diamonds would be about as expensive as zircons. Such a situation happened many years ago and from that DeBeers emerged.

[mobo85]

*Originally posted by kniz *
**The problem is that diamonds really aren’t scarce, especially with modern means of moving dirt around. If it weren’t for DeBeers, diamonds would be about as expensive as zircons. Such a situation happened many years ago and from that DeBeers emerged. **

Isn’t DeBeers located in South Africa? We’d lose them.

Also, we’d lose around 800 million people, and there’d be 53 less countries in the United Nations.

[3waygeek]

*Originally posted by ResIpsaLoquitor *
I imagine there’d be a big hole that water would suddenly go rushing into. Every continent’s shorelines would be notably extended, and shipping/fishing industries worldwide would be devastated.

Thereby counteracting the putative effects of global warming. Which raises the question: how much land mass would we have to remove to exactly counteract the projected rise in sea levels?

[pseudotriton_ruber_ruber]

Where would all this land go?

I have a little space in my underwear drawer you could use, but it’s going to require even more space. Can we all pitch in?

P.S., if possible I’d like some dirt from Mozambique, please.

[Duck_Duck_Goose]

CHOCOLATE!

CHOCOLATE WOULD BE
GONNNNNNNE !!!..

<< weeps hysterically >>

[Duck_Duck_Goose]

• cough *

Okay, I feel better now…

Er, besides cacao, there are other equally vital resources on the African continent.

Report from 1984.
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/report/1984/HRA.htm

U.S. Reliance On Africa For Strategic Minerals

CSC 1984

< snip >

Virtually all the worlds reserves of some strategic minerals

lie either in the Soviet Union or in Africa. Between them,

these two areas contain over 90% of the world platinum,

manganese and chromium ores…

< snip >
This section is designed to analyze these minerals to

determine the impact on the U.S. if the normal supply of any

of them were disrupted. Only four will be discussed (chromium,

cobalt, manganese and platinum) because the majority of the

free world reserves of each is located in Africa, each has

a major impact on the U.S. economy, and the U.S. imports a

majority of its needs from Africa.

[Neurotik]

Uh, cacao is grown in many places besides Africa, Duck.

[Duck_Duck_Goose]

http://www.hort.purdue.edu/newcrop/duke_energy/Theobroma_cacao.html

Two-thirds of the world’s production presently comes from Ghana, Nigeria, and Ivory Coast in West Africa, and one-third from Brazil and Dominican Republic.

http://www.apsnet.org/online/feature/cacao/top.html

In Brazil, the production of cocoa beans has dropped from 400,000 to 100,000 metric tons in just 10 years, largely as the result of the infection by the fungus, Crinipellis perniciosa. This fungus has spread beyond Brazil into Peru, Ecuador, Venezuela, and Colombia in South America, and Panama in Central America. The pathogen also is on the Caribbean islands of Trinidad and Tobago (28,31)

http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/AR/archive/aug01/cacao0801.htm

But cacao cultivation in Central and South America is threatened by two major diseases. During the past decade, Brazil’s main production area in the state of Bahia has been devastated by a fungal disease called Crinipellis perniciosa, or witches’ broom. The fungus penetrates stem and fruit tissue, inhibits pod formation, and destroys a tree’s mature pods.

In only 12 years, Brazil, which used to export about $100 million worth of cocoa beans to the United States every year, has gone from being the world’s third largest exporter of cocoa beans to a net importer of beans.

Poo. Don’t try to tell ME where my Toll House morsels come from. The American Cocoa connection is going down the tubes due to disease, and if Africa does the Atlantis thing and disappears into the sea, it takes Chocolate with it.

So there.

[Neurotik]

True, but the American cacao has the benefits of not being picked by child slaves. And just wait until the disease spreads to Africa, because, y’know, in this highly globalized world market we live in, these things happen.

You’ll be making the switch to carob in the next few years, is my guess.

[monstro]

The world’s biodiversity–animal, plant, and human–would decrease by thousands of orders of magnitude.

[gobear]

In addition, the disappearance of Africa would have untold climactic consequences.

[Squink]

In addition, the disappearance of Africa would have untold climactic consequences.

Such as better surfing on the west coasts of Australia and South America. With 20,000 miles of open ocean to build up height there’d be some MONSTER waves.

[Colibri]

*Originally posted by monstro *
**The world’s biodiversity–animal, plant, and human–would decrease by thousands of orders of magnitude. **

Well, not by orders of magnitude. For biodiversity, I dunno, maybe 10-20%. The Afrotropics are in general much less diverse than the Neotropics or Oriental realms.

[tisiphone]

Along with all the other stuff mentioned, we would lose one of the most valuable pools of our own species’ genetic diversity, if I remember properly.

Isn’t the African gene pool the oldest and most diverse of all? Seems to me I was watching a show on the evolution of humanity, and one of the major supports to the Out of Africa theory was much more genetic variation between the tribes left behind. This is important to our species survival - with lots of healthy genetic variation, it becomes less likely that any one pathogen can wipe us all out.

[Banger]

*Originally posted by tisiphone *
**Along with all the other stuff mentioned, we would lose one of the most valuable pools of our own species’ genetic diversity, if I remember properly.

Isn’t the African gene pool the oldest and most diverse of all? Seems to me I was watching a show on the evolution of humanity, and one of the major supports to the Out of Africa theory was much more genetic variation between the tribes left behind. This is important to our species survival - with lots of healthy genetic variation, it becomes less likely that any one pathogen can wipe us all out. **

I have been considering this problem, and I am therefore willing to let some hot African chicks come crash at my place for awhile.

You never know when the floods will come

[Colibri]

Africa contains about 7% of the world’s oil reserves. Major exporters include OPEC members Libya, Algeria, and Nigeria, plus Egypt, Angola, Gabon, Congo, and others.

[Buck_The_Diver]

*Originally posted by Duck Duck Goose *
** The American Cocoa connection is going down the tubes due to disease, and if Africa does the Atlantis thing and disappears into the sea, it takes Chocolate with it. **

So, you’re saying chocolate would become more valuable than…diamonds! :eek: