The image of the pumpkin is synonymous with Thanksgiving. It is hard to imagine a greeting card or table napkin designed for Thanksgiving not having the image of a pumpkin or turkey printed on it. Why didn’t they let us know before we carved up all those pumpkins for Halloween that just rotted on the front porch?

What is the world coming to when there is a shortage of canned pumpkin and pumpkin pie mix?
It seems it has to do with the rain – it rained so much in the mid-west this past year that the pumpkin crop was affected and thus less pumpkins for canning. Libby’s brand of pumpkin pie announced the rain hurt the production of pumpkins at their Morton, Ill. farms. They will not be packing any more pumpkin this year and feel that supplies will run out by Thanksgiving leaving the rest of the holidays lacking. They say the supply could run out earlier if the cans fly off the shelf for future use.

They say that once this supply is depleted – which could come much sooner if people hoard the present supply – that there will be no more until the harvest season in 2010.

Many grocers are pushing fresh pumpkins for making pies to be used in this holiday traditional treat. They are also suggesting that various kinds of squash such as butternut can be substituted – and are suggesting other substitutes such as sweet potato or pecan.

What may be one company’s woe might be another’s wind fall. The organically grown pumpkins may see a rise in their 3-4% market versus the 85% market held by Nestlé’s. Oh, that we still had family farms. Could this have been averted had large corporations not taken over the family farms that had been in families for generations. With all the pumpkins grown in the same area seems to have fallen prey to the old adage, “You shouldn’t put all your eggs in the same basket.”

Some things to ponder – what a waste of all those jack-o-lanterns cut and discarded – could this be a ploy to increase prices of this canned product – or could this be only the beginning of such shortages now that so many family farms have been absorbed by corporation farms? Also, we get an unprecedented amount of fruits and vegetables from other countries which in the opinion of this writer are so sub-standard and not the quality we, here in America, have been used to in previous decades from American farms.

If you still live in a semi-rural community, you may still be able to buy fresh pumpkin from local farmers; and there may be some available at the local farmer’s market.

Pumpkin mix is not only used for making pumpkin pies; but has become an important ingredient in other treats such as pumpkin bread – another traditional food which many families enjoy making together as gifts – along with the preverbal banana nut bread. There has also been concern about future banana harvesting because of the destruction of the rain forest.

Is this only a glimpse of what is to come by depending on large corporations and foreign trade for the very food we eat? Will our future include home gardening once again? While many people in the world are going hungry – and the need for food production so high – could all of this have to do with government control? It is hard to understand why we continually depend on other countries and large corporations for oil, manufactured goods, and now the very food we need to survive.

What is the world is going on when because of lack of water in California and the harm to a small fish – when thousands of farms have gone dry to dust where food cannot be grown – this is an outrage and only one of the things going on in our government that seems to be dismantling America. It was once said, “He who controls the money, controls the world.” It is scary to learn that perhaps it will be, “He who controls the food, controls the world.”

While Illinois led pumpkin production last year, producing 496 million pounds of pumpkins; they were followed in production rates by California, Pennsylvania and New York. Pumpkins grown in 2008 produced revenue in the amount of $141 million.

Official notification:

“Our calculations indicate that we may deplete our inventory of canned Libby’s pumpkin as we approach the Thanksgiving holiday,” said Paul Bakus, vice president and general manager of Nestle Baking, in a press release.

Note: For those who do not believe in the Bible and the prophecy regarding famine - it is in there. People didn’t listen while Noah built the ark either.  It is said that in the last days that a loaf of bread will buy a bag of gold.