So not really "fairly untouched", then.

You're going to need more farms and more farmers, and no-one can afford to be shipping food halfway round the planet.

▲ defrost 2 hours ago | parent [-]

Let's see, I didn't make any claim about untouched - although I do have some strong positions on wetlands cover, corridors, wild old forrest, et al but that's a whole other aside.

I'm just here to point out farming and livestock at suprisng to many scales can be operated by fewer people than you might expect.

as for: > no-one can afford to be shipping food halfway round the planet.

what does the Atlas of Economic Complexity type datasets currently say about food volume tonnages and trip lengths? I know that our local farmers co-op

  handles handysize to post-Panamax vessel shipments from Australia, United States, Canada, South America and Europe to key grain markets in Asia, Europe, Central America and the Middle East.

( from: https://www.cbh.com.au/exports-overview )

and there are other grain basins about the globe.

The challenges for grain shipping going forward likely fall about getting sufficient production of non fossil origin methanol fuel variations for shipping engines.

That and making sure the front doesn't fall off.

▲

zdragnar an hour ago | parent [-]

And yet, farmers still need roads, and hardware stores, and grocery stores, and hospitals, and HVAC and plumbers and before you know it, you need villages for all the people those people depend on, along with their families.

	▲	defrost 43 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Farming communities have already had these things, the broad pattern is that fewer and fewer of thiese thigs are needed as fewer and fewer people are needed to work the same land. Urbanisation ratios have increased, farm worker percentages decreased, average land area holdings increased so stores, schools, etc. are closing. As time passes now, more an more old farm hoses are vacant island in an ocean of larger consolidated workings.